What is the real purpose of the space program?

Question

It seems like they are just wasting money, time, and lives.

Answer 1

To increase our knowledge of everything.

Answer 2

Exploration is the real purpose for the space program. I know there has been catastrophic failures, and feeding the poor of the world should be given priority. But to give up on the possibility of extending life to other planets should not be given up. Do you think the great explores like the Phoenicians, the Greeks, the Chinese, and the Portuguese, didn't have failures when sailing the world's oceans.

Exploration helps to bring about new ideas, it exposes man to new cultures, and it allows for the growth of mankind. I know there has yet to be evidence to suggest life exist elsewhere in the universe, and there is no guarantee that we can transport life to other planets. This planet however has limited resources and limited room to support an ever increasing population. So no I do not feel that NASA is a waste of money, it does however like any government agency needs to spend its money wisely. The universe still holds answers, that I believe can help us here on Earth. And without that need to explore that has been in man ever since he evolved out of Africa, and journeyed to the other continents, and sailed across the great bodies of water, I do not think man would be as intelligent as he is now.

Answer 3

The purpose of the Space Program is to improve technology use on Earth. Thru the developments in technology to get to where we are today, we now have Cell Phones, Internet Connectivity, Cable TV (how do you think those overseas programs and international channels get here, satellite), and GPS and Howard Stern on XM Radio. Teflon, Velcro, freeze dried foods, powdered beverages are all developments that have occured in conjunction with man's exploration of Space.

Having said that, I do believe the Global focus should now be inward, and by that, I mean undersea and underground. I'm don't mean mining and exploration, although that will be one of the side effects of these scientific endeavors. Why can't we calculate when the earthquake will occur by studying faultlines, stress and strain gauges, satellite positioning and telemetry can tell when a particular spot on the earth has deviated by centimeters. We created pressurized vehicles for space, why not for the pressures of undersea research. The Earth is 70% salt water but how much do we know of what's happening at 500 feet below sea level?

Google Earth Satellite views are unbelievable. Thanks to whomever decided to put the GEO-Sats up. Explore the links that take you away from the below link, dig deeper....

Answer 4

Well, seeing as every known human being in the universe currently lives on a thin, unstable crust of solid rock floating on a giant ball of intensly hot molten rock and metal, it might be a good idea if we figure out how to take people elsewhere, just in case there happens to be a problem on Earth. A future, catastrophic asteroid collision is a mathmatical certainly, the only question is, "How long until it happens?"

The same is true of the supervolcano underneath Yellowstone national park. The hot-spot has been repeatedly erupting as that region of the Earth's crust slides across it. These eruptions are huge, unlike anything human beings have ever witnessed. Hundreds of square miles of the some of the most fertile farmland in the world will be covered in molten rock and thousands more miles will be blanketed with tens of feet of volcanic ash. The "breadbasket of the world" will be no more.

The list of life-ending disasters certain to occur on this planet before the sun swallows it whole are too many to list here. Do we think so little of our entire species that it becomes a "waste of all our money" to find a way to spread ourselves around and prevent a single catastrophe from killing us all?

It may already be too late to develop the technology needed to save mankind. It is more important for us to develop the ways and means to take life off this planet than it is for us to develop new, robotic ways to study more of the hostile universe in which we live, allowing us to discover newer and more violent ways in which the Earth will face certain devastation. There comes a time when theoretical science must be applied for the good of humanity. That time is now.

Unless you prefer that yourself, your children, or their descendants be stuck here on this thin skin of cooled magma, crying in abject terror, as an unstoppable doom destroys all life on Earth.

Answer 5

For every dollar spent in the space program the estimated return in technology is 9 dollars over a 10 year period.That's a 900% return. These returns can be found in every facet of your life. Medicines, Metals, Food preservation, appliances, bonding agents, electronics, even the modern engine in your cars came from technologies that was developed by the aero-space industries.
The world would be much different with out it.

Answer 6

I remember being in Florida in a taxi as one of the ships launched and the driver said "I could have driven my cab for 10 yrs on what they just ignited".

he space program is for a lot of things - exporation discovery inovation war survielance communication and the possibility we might have to one day leave the planet. Finding aliens trying to figure out where we came from where we are going and what we are.

It however seems to me that we should fix our own backyard first. There are starving people there are places that need a road (notice "a" road , singular) Schools need to be built , alternate fuels need to be put in place etc. All of these things could use the money resource and brilliant minds that the space program has drawn but not one of those things is as exciting as a chance to be Capt Kirk of the Starship Enterprise.

Answer 7

The real purpose of the space program is to find a home for Bono, since his head is getting so big.

Answer 8

Like everything else, the purpose of all gov-funded programs is military advancement. NO ONE SET OUT TO INVENT THE TV - it came from altering the use of the monitor.... Space shuttles and high-powered telescopes are no different.

Answer 9

Interesting question. When the Apollo program ended in the early 1970s, one of the stories I remember is why the U.S. spent $17 billion dollars and what did we get from it. There's always pros and cons to anything.

Science and technological innovation are pros. Space science created jobs and fosters technological innovation into products that we may eventually use everyday. Of course, there's a trade off. If you spend money on manned exploration vs. robotic space exploration, the robotics programs get less funding for their programs.

So here's what we got presently - President G.W. Bush announced that we should go the moon and then onto Mars with manned exploration. This means that NASA, which only has so much money to spend, has to divert its focus from hard space science (the robotic missions) and sometimes you have to admit the less sexy missions are usually the hard science ones into the manned space program, ie. get the International Space Station finished and then, come up with a new spacecraft to get us back to the moon etc.

Manned space programs are sexier for funding since it involves people, i.e. mostly the astronauts - human interest stories. The problem right now is that the Internation Space Station which was supposed to be doing lots of hard non-sexy science, just isn't doing much at all. Most of the time, the astronauts are doing human physiological experiments on how humans cope in space, which is important for manned missions to the moon and Mars, but it's not the hard science experiments the Station was supposed to be doing. The other primary function of the astronauts are to keep the Space Station running - they do a lot of maintenance on the Station.

Think of what we have learned via the two kinds of space exploration? manned vs. unmanned. The Apollo missions did the most for manned space flight in terms of hard science (the moon rocks), but the robotic missions from Pioneer to Spirit and Opportunity have done a lot more for recent hard science space exploration than the present space shuttle program and space station program combined.

It's a lot cheaper to send robots into space to explore than it is to send people, but we as a species do like to explore and humans in space are often more interesting than robots in space.

So what to think of the present funding direction for NASA? Would it be cool for a human being to land on Mars? Since our species does like to explore and challenge ourselves, it would be cool to do it, but at what price?

Many scientists would agree that robotic space science does more for exploration than any manned program could do.

If you want an interesting good view of robotic missions, try reading: Roving Mars: Spirit, Opportunity and the exploration of the red planet by Steve Squyres.

If you want a controversial view of the International Space Station, try Phenomenon the lost archives Up for Sale episode DVD. Premise is that the U.S. sponsored the International Space Station to keep the Russian space program running.

That's my two cents.

Answer 10

I too would like to think its for exploration however , I feel that it is a race, a competition with other nations to be the best... we need to work together and come up with a solution for a better world start here and then branch out ... I mean come on what the f&*K are we doing anyway??? Cancer, AIDS, Poverty , Hunger, Homeless ... aye aye aye.... always the same story... money, money , money.... what if you could only trade smiles and warm wishes.... ???

Answer 11

Any exploration sames to waste money, time and lives. How many died in exploration of the new world without knowing how it was going to come out.