# Why Space Travel?



## iKwak (Jan 8, 2004)

I  never understood space programs and the need of NASA. Someone help me.
What is the point of spending billions of dollars to get an expensive craft out of Earth and various space programs?
What is water exists on Mars? What is we find living organisms on other planets?
Shouldn't the U.S. and other super country worry about the planet Earth that we live in? Spend the money to discover new technologies- how to reduce global warming, reduce traffic congestion and air condition, expedite cancer research, start an agriculture program in third countries and lot more.


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## Jayaprakash Satyamurthy (Jan 8, 2004)

Yes, we should take care of our own planet first. However, I also feel it is apparently illogical or ill-timed ventures (can I say 'Quixotic'?) that have taken us forward as a species. I imagine some caveman scolding his friend and saying 'Stop tinkering about with those round rocks when we haven't figured out how to cook yet!!!'


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## littlemissattitude (Jan 8, 2004)

Well, to begin with, it seems like the human instinct is to seek out new places. We're running out of places here on earth to explore (however, there is still the sea bottom, with a lot of the same problems as space exploration in terms of it being a very alien environment). My own personal belief is that the human psyche needs to know that there are new places to explore; if not, the spirit withers.

But you must also remember that in the creation of technologies for space exploration, there are often applications appropriate for earth as well. And you must also remember that the business of space exploration does not just create jobs for scientists and engineers, the highly educated minority. It also creates all sorts of high level administrative jobs, mid-level management jobs, clerical sorts of positions that any business needs to keep going, and all sorts of other service sector jobs to support the businesses created to get us into space. And there are probably all sorts of job categories that would benefit that I'm not even thinking about on the spur of the moment. In other words, jobs for all sectors of the work force are created - and goodness knows, any job creation is a good thing.

Besides, if we can ever create the technology to get even a part of the population of earth living off-planet, the environment can only benefit by not being so stressed by so many people living here.


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## Allyn (Jan 8, 2004)

Plus the ISS runs experiments and tests up there on things that could have a major impact back down here.


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## dwndrgn (Jan 8, 2004)

In addition to all the comments already made - the more we learn about the other planets, the more we understand about our own.  Basically it's like studying the societal makeup of chimpanzees and seeing how they interact and applying what you've learned to how we humans interact with each other.   Quite often while working on one thing, we accidentally find the solution to another.  Look at how post-its were invented.  The man was trying to make a super glue and ended up with something that most of us use on a regular basis these days.

Or as my dad used to say, "The more you learn, the more you learn."


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## Jayaprakash Satyamurthy (Jan 9, 2004)

Ah, cool. I was afraid I would be the sole voice in the wilderness supporting the space effort. Then again, this is an SF/fantasy board.  



> My own personal belief is that the human psyche needs to know that there are new places to explore; if not, the spirit withers.


I second that. Although I must confess that I feel if we paid half as much attention to inner space, as it were, we might have a lot less of the problems we currently face as a species.


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## nemogbr (Jan 11, 2004)

I actually thought I'd get to join Starfleet when I grew up. Imagine my disappointment. 

Final frontier at the moment is to colonise Mars, Venus and the NEOs. A lot of sci fi films concerns the extinction of the human race and being on only one planet sort of makes us very vulnerable...actually being on one star system still makes us vulnerable, but we don't have to solve that for another 100 years. Lets just take baby steps.


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## Jayaprakash Satyamurthy (Jan 11, 2004)

> I actually thought I'd get to join Starfleet when I grew up. Imagine my disappointment


Me too. And where are my Art Deco flying cars??? 

Sorry, silly sunday.


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## dwndrgn (Jan 12, 2004)

nemogbr said:
			
		

> I actually thought I'd get to join Starfleet when I grew up. Imagine my disappointment.


Are you telling me there is no Starfleet??!!  What's next, there is no such thing as elves?


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## nemogbr (Feb 3, 2004)

there was that address by G.W.Bush about financing sending a man to Mars.

I always thought that they should have done it by the seventies. 

I get the feeling that it's liable to run into troubles right away. 




> Shouldn't the U.S. and other super country worry about the planet Earth that we live in? Spend the money to discover new technologies- how to reduce global warming, reduce traffic congestion and air condition, expedite cancer research, start an agriculture program in third countries and lot more.


We already poessess the knowledge on how to reduce global warming - get rid of cars and invest in public transport, especially in the cities. Logical don't you think?

We have food mountains in Europe and North America. The food problem has already been solved, it's just distribution.

When the problem of getting there the first time has been solved. I think it will be access to the technology to get there again will be the problem.

I remember somebody saying that it wasn;t the miners who became rich in the gold rush. It was the suppliers and the ones who controlled the transportation that ended up rich.


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## Stormydreamer (May 26, 2004)

One small point: without the technology we gained sending the first rockets into space, this message board, the internet, and computers as we know them... would not exist. Other than that, though, there's not much I can say, except I agree whole heartedly with the other posts. The only way to go now is space


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## Sage Orion (May 26, 2004)

I would be afraid to travel through space!!  

Its so far away from the earth.....I am afraid to die out there, that
is one of the big risks of going!! 

But I wouldn't mind traveling through time though.....in that wonderful
delorian!!  That would be fun and on the ground!!


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## polymorphikos (May 26, 2004)

_:: raises a finger and moves to point out something glaringly omitted from that last statement._

Na. Not worth it.


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## erickad71 (May 26, 2004)

It would be pointless.


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## Hypes (May 26, 2004)

> We have food mountains in Europe and North America. The food problem has already been solved, it's just distribution.



Distribution is not a problem- inflation and poverty is. The African countries have _plenty_ of food, but none can afford to purchase it.

We should always strive to move forwards, and push our own boundries.


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## Morning Star (May 26, 2004)

Anyways, that guy in the wheelchair (his name always escapes me) says that travelling at the speed of light will always be impossible. A pity, seeing as mankind is doing such a good job of running this place to the ground...probably just as well, lest we become one of those sinister alien races, the ones that suck a planet dry of its resources before taking over another one.

I would be too scared to set foot on mars. I owe that to Ray Bradbury and Total Recall.

Edit: Although when I was a kid I so wished to see hyperspace travel in my lifetime...I suppose I still do. Perhaps there would be more chance of using articifial black holes to travel through space, like in Event Horizon. Yeah, that went well.


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## polymorphikos (May 26, 2004)

I always point out the millions of things that have been proved wrong in science over the years whenever I hear that wheelchair guy say that. Or people boo time travel. Etc. etc.

Basically, its not that it is impossible to do certain things, but that we may have to do them in a way very different to what we've considered so far and using ideas and facts that don't exist yet, and which we cannot factor into the equations. 

Then again, there's always hibernation and a really big petrol tank.


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## Hypes (May 26, 2004)

You know the reason why we are here today? Because some people don't take _no_ for an answer. It is elementary to our progress- _"it's impossible"_ gets you nowhere.


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## Morning Star (May 26, 2004)

I like those trains of thought. The blokes a ****** anyway.


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## Hypes (May 26, 2004)




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## nemogbr (May 27, 2004)

Hypes said:
			
		

> Distribution is not a problem- inflation and poverty is. The African countries have _plenty_ of food, but none can afford to purchase it.
> 
> We should always strive to move forwards, and push our own boundries.


I'd say money worship is the problem. How can American farmers undercut the Mexicans that they can sell corn at a cheaper price in Mexico?

 We go to Space and we could conceivably become another version of the Martian invaders. 

Just do what we can so that does not happen.


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## Hypes (May 27, 2004)

We are six billion people on this planet- I think we should able to multi-task well enough to settle both issues.


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## Michael (May 27, 2004)

I wish. Hypes, all those people may make it harder to come to an angreement!

Okay, I have this book by Carl Sagan called*Cosmos*. There is a section that describes existing and possible future technologies for space travel. In another forum I keep reading posts thast say our current technology is really slow.

*Cosmos* tells a different story. The technology referred to is still slow but much faster than what I've seen posted.

Here is a quote from the book:

"Today we have the preliminary designs for ships to take people to the stars. None of these spacecraft is imagined to leave Earth directly. Rather, they are constructed in Earth orbit from where they are launched on their long stellar journeys. One of them was called Project Orion after the constellation, a reminder that the ship's ultimate destination was the stars. Orion was designed to utilize explosions of hydrogen bombs, nuclear weapons, against an inertial plate, each explosion providing a kind of "putt-putt," a vast nuclear motorboat in space. Orion seems entirely practical from an engineering point of view. By it's very nature it would have produced vast quantities of radioactive debris, but for conscientious mission profiles only in the emptiness of space. Orion was under serious development in the United States until the signing of the international treaty that forbids the detonation of nuclear weapons in space. This seems to me a great pity. The Orion starship is the best use of nuclear weapons I can think of."

I don't want to keep going with that, but basically this kind of drive, according to the book, would propel the ship up to about 10% the speed of light. Impractical for extrasolar travel, but incredibly practical for exploring our own solar system, don't you think?


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## Hypes (May 27, 2004)

Yes, that is a real pity. Explorative flights like that would really enable us to do a much more hands-on approach towards our own solar system.

That treaty should be amended to only apply to Earth's immediate space.


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## Stormydreamer (May 28, 2004)

*sigh* If there's one thing that gets me really angry, it's the general ignorance people have concerning nuclear power. I live in a part of the country that has several nuclear "power plants" I suppose you'd call them. Among many other uses, a primary function of one of the plants is to create medical isotopes. This plant was also a center for research for cancer, and I know several people with the disease who benefited from it. Unfortunately, some bureaucrat in some office somewhere decided that "nuclear" sounded bad, and probably wasn't good for the environment, so they signed the order to close the whole million (maybe billion, I'm not sure) dollar place down. A man I knew died because these isotopes were no longer available to him and others. 

So much for our modern awareness. 

It's a simlilar thing with space travel/exploration. If we really wanted to, I'm sure we could be out there colonising the planets in the next ten years; but people just don't think that it matters that much. They're not willing to spend their valuable tax dollars on what really counts (in my opinion). It's all such a waste! People are so ignorant, and so arrogant in their ignorance... 

This is a very frustrating subject for me


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## polymorphikos (May 28, 2004)

I read almost cried one night when I realised that all of my hopes and dreams were never going to come true. I'm never going to see colonies on the other planets. I know it, and it's heart-breaking. I once read in a forward to 2001 that  half of the budget of the Vietnam War was all that we needed to have everything displayed in that book. That was what killed me.


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## Hypes (May 28, 2004)

I suppose one could say that war will always be prime achievement of Man.


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## Stormydreamer (May 29, 2004)

Or how about if every person just donated 20 dollars? That would be plenty... if only people would care more...


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