I just read an article about how Neil Armstrong doesn't like the president's space plan, yadda, yadda, yadda.

My initial reaction (and feel free to call me a heretic if you'd like) was "who gives a fuck?"

Let someone else be first, and let us learn from them. Don't spend as much money in some places; redirect it to better use. We put a man on the moon what, just over 40 years ago? And what have we done since then?
-Vaccines for rubella, chicken pox, pneumonia, meningitis, hepatitis B, hepatitis A and lyme disease
-Completely eradicated (according to W.H.O.) smallpox
-Created artificial HEARTS that can be implanted into people
-Cloned all sorts of animals
-Discovered how to use human skin cells to create embryonic stem cells
-Developed MRIs
-Microprocessors
and the list goes on.

Yet we haven't been back to the moon since 1972.

I ask again. Who cares?

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Let's go to Mars and mate with their women.

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"Counting all the assholes in the room, I'm definitely not alone!" ~ Michael Poulsen, Volbeat, Still Standing.

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Life on earth will end well before humans could ever get past the Milky Way, let alone somewhere important. I would put any funding toward telescopes, orbiters and such in order to "see" as much out there as possible, but I wouldn't waste a dime on trying to put people beyond satellite installations/repair.

Yeah, that punk...who does he think he is having an opinion on manned space flight?

Everyone at NASA is in love with the Presidents decisions for the direction of the agency, and Armstrong is just a political hack.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

I didn't mean to discount the man's (or the agency's) accomplishments. They did what the nation needed back then.

I'm just trying to figure out what they've done the last 40 years, besides get some pretty cool pictures. The braintrust there is huge, no doubt. What if their minds were focused on engineering feats INSIDE our atmosphere?

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Hubble is way more than just pretty pictures...and hubbles replacement is coming online as we speak.
These telescopes give physicists a view into the origins of our universe and a chance to answer some of the biggest questions ever fathomed by mankind.
Do you not think the hundreds of ongoing experiments on the ISS have no value for life on earth?

NASA isn't doing these things for fun or to experiment for the sake of experimenting.

Hell, the Japanese grew barley in space and Saporo bought the crop and brewed space beer. SPACE BEER!
http://www.physorg.com/news147622516.html

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Hold my beer and watch this...

There's been quite a large number of engineering breakthroughs that came out of the space program and into everyday life.

We should be exploring space, and manned spaceflight should be happening. NASA needs to cut some bloat for sure, and I wish that all the international space agencies would work together instead of competing.

I didn't taste space beer, so I don't believe it.

I realize the experiments yield valuable outcomes, but personally, I'd like to see the money spent on things like stem cell research, developing renewable energy resources, or creating baseball sized cold fusion reactors

I think a lot of the experiments are more "what if's" than pointed research, and that kind of pisses me off. For example, stem cells develop different proteins in space than they do on Earth, but WHAT THE FUCK DOES THAT MATTER? We're not administering them in space...

(For what its worth, they did find that the proteins the stem cells produced are resposible for the depletion of calcium, which would account for why astronauts who are in space a long time incur bone loss.)

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Technological innovation is the main job of the private sector.
Building a space station, not so much.
Our government gives out billions in research grants towards the technology you deem important.

I see no reason why a robust space program and research in other high tech fields are mutually exclusive or even non-complimentary.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

IN additon to everything just said. We should continue to push NASA, and space exploration for the technological and military benefits as well. Who do you think launches those defense systems into space, I can assure you it's not the boy scouts.

The USAF in coordination with NASA launch those things into space. Without space exploration we'd be much more vulnerable to attacks, and we'd have a lot less ability to see what was going on around the world.

I agree that there could be some tweaks to what we're focusing on, but to think that going to the moon isn't important, in my opinion, is just plain ignorant. Especially considering how little we actually know about it, and with all the advances in technology in the past 30 some odd years, we'd be able to gather a lot of data from just one mission.

Cutting this, but not cutting certain social programs that are known for wasting billions of dollars each year, well it's patch-work economics. Cut something that could be of use 15-20 years from now, to make your budget look pretty today. To quote Adam Mair, "It's a big fuckin johke Luc, you gotta protect this guy all year long, it's a johke"

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"She's like plan C after an 18 pack"

Squanto 7/27/2010

Without space exploration we'd be more vulnerable to attacks? That's a weak statement; I think without equipment in space, we'd be more vulnerable.

As far as answering the oldest questions of man; I feel like I've got a strong grasp on the concept of infinite, and "believe" in it (I surround it in quotes because it's a theory that can't be argued in mathematics, but when discussing the universe, some people believe in more of a "fish bowl" theory). I don't know that we *can* point to a single instant that our universe was created. I think it's *always* been.

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Again, how do you think we figured out how to put it up there, it's not like we had some ape out there with a sling shot firing it up there.

It's because of space exploration that we were able to develop some of those technologies, and figure out how to put them up there...

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"She's like plan C after an 18 pack"

Squanto 7/27/2010

What if a stem cell that was prepped in zero-G turned out to be more effective at doing it's job than one prepped down here? There's obviously differences in the two environments, but you'll never know until you test it out.

I know, I know. You fuckers always find a way to bring me back to a level-headed opinion.

Dickheads.

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I do my best.

Geeze, I didn't know you were a particle or astrophysicist.
Well then that's settled.

I'll call up Steven Hawking and tell him to take a break, NYIntensity has it figured out.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

I hope you're being obstinate, and not a prick...I can't tell

As far as Hawking....what does he know...he can't even walk.

/bad taste

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I'm just effin with you...that was a pretty bold statement to make.

EDIT: although, I am a prick to be sure

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Hold my beer and watch this...

I didn't think I made it matter-of-factly, just what 'I believe'.

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