http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/01/AR2010020102145.html
Obama cancelling the "return to the moon" program. This is, in my estimation, an incredibly wise choice. The idea of a return to the moon is something that I believe was just a reason for NASA to get more budget, with no good outcome. There is no positive in making it successfully back to a place we already visited 50 years before. And so much downside... the trip could fail, for example.
Here's to wisdom prevailing in NASA funding, for once.
The point is that unmanned missions have given us far more in terms of knowledge, with essentially no risk to any human life. Consider how far robotics and remote control have come in the past 40 years - there is SO MUCH we can do and no living person has to be anywhere near it.
Going back to the moon would actually be comparatively easy with today's technology, but there's no point in doing it, really, compared to having funding for satellites that measure OUR climate and can give us clearer answers and understanding about THIS planet, since it's a bit more important for us to know things about the place we inhabit. If we had been focused on this sort of thing all along, we'd have a more definitive answer about climate change. I'd almost say it'd be good to fund a series of space junk interceptor spacecraft, to try and clean it up out there a little and dispose of stuff that no longer works.
A second moon landing's cost-benefit is heavy on the cost, but very light on the benefit. Its only real purpose is dick-wagging in front of other nations and making people ignorant of science go "Whoa!".
Yay to him for increasing funding for science that actually means something, and taking it away from pointless flights of fancy.
Tripper
i'll agree. we have bigger fish to fry
Let me play devils advocate here though. Medicare, Medicaid, and Welfare are 21%, 13%, and 11% (45% total) of the entire 2009 budget.
How much was NASAs last year? Not the flight budget, but the entire budget for the whole agency? .55%
Do you think we could make a .55 percent cut to Welfare and keep the space program rolling? Seems like the entitlement programs would be a great place to trim the fat....
The point is not "should we put more money into NASA." We should, and we are. The point is, "should we fund a return trip to the moon?" And I think that the unequivocal answer to that should be no.
It is politics pure and simple.
A straw man cut.
"how can you be sending men to the moon when blah blah!"
Unmanned missions are more efficient for scientific knowledge - yes.
Manned space travel is more about solving exotic challenges in engineering
Something that is impossible to put a value on as the outcomes are unknown and risky.
It is easy to put a price on trying and say nah - play it safe.
especially against a political headwind.
It's like a troubled tech company that seeks to prolong it's life by cutting the "blue sky" research it depends on to exist -
a temporary measure that makes the decline inevitable.
How about if we just send all the politicians, lawyers and religious nuts to the moon instead?
I'd take all the politicians in Washington over all the Sarah Palins out there who think they have what it takes to replace them.
Fingers, I disagree. Yes, there is a lot to learn from sending people into space. I don't think there's much of a point to sending anyone to the moon at this point, though. When Bush announced that, it was like the stupidest thing I had heard re: NASA in as long as I could remember. There was nothing to gain. It's 50 year old tech at this point. Send a man to Mars, that would impress me.
most estimates i can find put NASA around 4:1 return on investment. some go as high as 22:1 while some go as low as 1:10. either way, i think NASA should be well funded. unfortunately i don't know enough to decide whether we should pursue the moon again.
Unless there's some VERY large ROI (like a huge telescope put on the dark side), then leave the moon alone. That said, many of the modern marvels we take for granted now (besides Tang ;) ) came out of the moon program. There are already several advances being worked on for the eventual trip to Mars.
I doubt the idea was to go to the moon and
plant a flag like it is 60s nostalgia - that would be dumb.
Do the "One small step for man" again and again
It was a staging point to eventual trips to mars.
The economic benefits would come out of the
exploration and technological advances