What is the point of the Space Shuttle program?

Question

In the 25 years that the program has been in existence, has anything of value whatsoever been accomplished?

Answer 1

Answering that question would be as ridiculous as asking it.
OKay, I had to edit my answer once I saw all the ridiculous "answers" to the question I am reading. Testing of new drugs, scientific study of the origins of the universe, studies on the earth's weather patterns and greenhouse warming, studies of the feasibility of plant growth in zero gravity, the repair of numerous satellites otherwise lost, and hundreds more benefits too numerous to list. The shuttles have also SAVED us money in that they have been reusable spacecraft, in place of hundreds of new ones. Overall, I have to admit, the program has not moved at the pace originally intended, but it has benefitted you directly in dozens of ways you don't even realize. P.S. - to the sarcastic guy below - NASA is not attempting to simply return to the moon and collect rocks like the missions of the early 70's. The effort to return by 202 carries an enormous new objective - to establish a permanent moon base and use that base as a jump off point for manned travel to Mars. If you believe that our future ancestors will not be relying on space heavily for resources such as energy, medicines, and even crop growth, then you are not even slightly aware of hte challenges our little Earth faces in the coming decades. We are choking our earth, burying it underlandfuills, spewing waste into the oceans,a nd melting our polar ice caps...think guys...THINK

Answer 2

I think NASA is a great organization, I think the moon landings were an amazing technical feat and the space station like wise, however, what do we really learn from having a spacestation that we would not learn with unmanned spacecraft?

My answer is, probably not very much. Up untill now, not a whole lot of research has taken place on the station, certainly nothing that has benefitted man in a significant way. Will that change once the station becomes fully operational/complete, probably not.

Growing plants and crystals in space is probably fun, as is observing fruit flies etc., but what does that have to do with man and improving life on this planet?

Building a a moonbase does what? Is the moon a stepping stone to the universe, well, unless we invent a amazing form of propulsion the answer is no. At current speed, reaching the nearest potentially habital planet would take many generations.
Besides, who wants to spend the rest of their lives in an aluminum can, cramped for space, without anything to see for decades? Certainly not I. Now mind you, I would love to go into space, a trip to the moon would be nice, but I would want to live here on earth with green grass, snow and nonfiltered air.

Is there spinoffs from the space station, there might be, but even NASA would have a hard time saying what they were and how the space station has brought them about. Sure we have a zero gravity wrench, but why do we need one? Well, because we needed it for the mission, other than that, it is a useless piece of eqiupment. Velcro did not come about from the space program, neither did Teflon or a host of other things purported to be spinoffs, although they were used.

Maybe we have a space station because we can have a space station and we think it is "cool", satellites are not "cool", although they certainly have done more for us than the spacestation ever will. If going to the moon was so important, why did we stop going so quickly, that is after we beat the USSR? What did we learn from the moon missions, to live in space? Okay, but why live in space, what is the point, survival of the species? Reread how far it would take to go anywhere habitable, who would support such a mission if the earth was dying?

I think what we learned and what we continue to learn, and this might be of the real importance, is that Earth is our best hope and that Earth is our home. Not some farflung planet or the moon, but this little insignificant speck in the universe we call Earth.

Does this mean I want to stop funding the ISS , no, but I am also not under the illusion that it is anything other that an "amazing technological triumph" with little or no real purpose. Now, people will and should argue that it has real benefits, that it has spinoffs that improve life and that science performed on the station benefits us, I am just curious what it is and even more so, how this science couldn't have been achieved without man in space!

Answer 3

Your question indicates you have not been paying attention. The space shuttle program has produced countless tangible benefits for everyone on earth, at a cost that is a small fraction of what the current US administration has wasted for the purpose of getting more cheap oil for the president's golf buddies to sell--and that has turned out to be a failure.

If you are worried about the cost of the shuttle program, please realize that NASA DOES NOT SPEND MONEY IN SPACE!!! THE MONEY FOR THE SPACE PROGRAM IS SPENT ON EARTH!!!! Do not become confused about that again.

NASA spending creates jobs and pays for research programs in industry and universities that have produced countless new developments in electronics and computers, medicine, basic natural sciences, and even home economics.

So to answer your question in its own terms, yes, indeed many things of great value have been accomplished. We would not be sitting here typing these messages to each other on our personal computers using satellite technology if these things had not been needed along the way for the space program.

Answer 4

25 years ago, it was envisioned that this "reusable" fleet would facilitate space travel and the space station.

Personally, it seems to have been an experiment that partially failed in it's original mission. Excessive resources were used to keep the shuttle aloft, it was much more complex than anyone anticipated apparently and the resources may have diverted from other programs.

Trips to Mars and bases on the moon have been withheld all these years. So prehaps you are right.

There are intangible benefits of the space program realized over time by experiments in the space station, improvements to technology and such.

Answer 5

Probably the biggest accomplishment is the fact that IT can be done. Along the way, we have done numerous things, such as launching satellites, various space telescopes, conducted material science experiments, etc. It resulted in many new fundamental technologies. Some of those technologies has resulted in products, some has not.

Has the whole program an enormous drain on national resources? Yes. Has the whole program enormously more expensive than originally anticipated? Yes. Has everything initially anticipated achieved? No. Can *most* of the things done much less expensively in other ways? Yes.

Has the whole program been a disappointment? It deepens on who you ask. If you ask me, no. It has met many successes and we learned along the way.

Answer 6

Of course something of value has been accomplished....

NASA has succesfully milked trillions of dollars out of the United States people. If that isn't an accomplishment of value I don't know what is.

Personally....I like NASA's new goal....to try and land a man on the moon by 2020. Yes...this is a very original idea. Too bad we don't have the technology to do it right now. Or....wait a minute didn't we do this 40 years ago? Hello...Earth to NASA....anyone home?

Answer 7

The only thing I can think of that had any significance was launching the Hubble and some of our other exploratory missions. Putting up the ISS, the military and the com satellites could have been done much more cheaply. Instead of designing a vehicle that could have evolved into a better system as technology advanced, we designed and launched a machine that was doomed to be obsolete even before its first mission.

Answer 8

The idea was to provide a relatively cheap, re-useable vehicle to launch equipment into space. It didn't work out that way.

Answer 9

The most important legacy of the space program will be the eventual colonization of extrasolar planets. This will be mankind's assurance against extinction.

Answer 10

i ought to propose you to do your human being study and draw your human being conclusions. should you imagine our flesh pressers did this to "save" money, Pfft! the money will be shifted to cover the fee of yet another puppy project. they don't provide a crap about paying down the deficit. THEY as in all of them.