A meaningful goal for NASA

[Pie]

Originally posted by SteveDallas
And what I hate to say is that it may be time to bag manned space flight. ... but even before this, I was starting to wonder if the effort to put human beings up there is worth it.

I think you hit the issue square on the nose, Steve. While Apollo (and to a lesser extent, the shuttles and the ISS) have served a useful public relations functions while expanding our quest for more knowledge about our surroundings, they have been woefully short in the bang-for-buck analysis.

Unmanned vehicles are an order of magnitude cheaper and are developed much faster. The risks we run are also a lot smaller. "Yep, another probe crashed into Mars. Oh well, back to the drawing board. Fire that guy at Lockheed who couldn't convert feet to meters correctly, and we'll try it again."

People love the thrill of manned space flight, of kids saying "I want to grow up to be an astronaut!" -- but let's face it, there is a lot more good science that can be done a lot more cheaply without the presence of a human being in the payload.

Here I am, arguing against manned space flight. When I was five, all I ever wanted to do was be the first person to reach Mars...


- Pie

PS: and oh, yeah -- Macs rock!