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The article basically says we should cut Nasa Funding, including $3billion for the new shuttle replacement. While I've been a big supporter of balancing the budget, I think cutting the NASA budget would be a terrible idea. Really it's only $3 billion dollars. I'm sure the Libyan fiasco will lend up costing that much.What does the rest of Dakka Dakka think?
"I don't have principles, and I consider any comment otherwise to be both threatening and insulting" - Dogma
"No, sorry, synonymous does not mean same".-Dogma
"If I say "I will hug you" I am threatening you" -Dogma
Disclaimer: I am a research scientist working at NASA (contractor, not civil servant), and also not a US citizen.
NASA do an awful lot of stuff--as well as the shuttle, missions to other planets, and so forth there's a huge amount of Earth science going on (also lots at NOAA, but the focus is slightly different there). The NASA budget is not big to begin with, and the recent budget negotiations have meant some painful cuts to key programmes. A huge amount of science is being done without a huge amount of resources, and I am impressed with what is being achieved.
Out of countries with space agencies, in my opinion NASA is the most capable and really the world leader. In Earth science the vast majority of stuff being done internationally is with NASA data. This gives NASA a lot of goodwill from scientists in other nations, and brings money to the USA, as grant proposals from other countries will often include some NASA involvement. Other nations (notably Japan, China, and India) as well as the European Space Agency (ESA) have some significant capabilities too, but NASA's resources (politics can make things a bit trickier within ESA) and expertise make them stand out.
I know that these are financially difficult times, and my personal (biased) opinion is that if something is to be cut from the NASA budget it would make more sense if it were taken from the non-Earth Science areas, as climate science should remain a priority right now, and we need more rather than less funding there. I do think we should continue to explore space and look at possibilities for either manned visits to other planets, or additional semi-permanent bases in space, but I see these as less urgent.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2011/04/22 00:30:43
The people in the past who convinced themselves to do unspeakable things were no less human than you or I. They made their decisions; the only thing that prevents history from repeating itself is making different ones.
-- Adam Serwer
My blog
LunaHound wrote:Doesnt NASA 's space projects also benefits us? like developing better materials for things
Yes, it is also true that research oriented towards NASA missions and equipment can lead to applications in everyday life (the same is true of e.g. military research).
Without going into too much detail, I think NASA is underfunded to a criminal degree. But, lets be honest, I'm a nerdy intellectual posting on a miniature gaming forum, so that's basically a given (as has been reflected by previous comments). What I find much more interesting is the political climate surrounding NASA funding. Its one of those things that lots of people seem to love (even many fiscal conservatives), but never really take a hard political stance on. I'm guessing that's simply a reflection of NASA's small size, and its generally immaterial status with respect to the daily lives of most citizens, but maybe I'm wrong.
Life does not cease to be funny when people die any more than it ceases to be serious when people laugh.
So long as the government retains a monopoly on space travel, yeah, we need NASA. Fortunately, there has been a lot of recent interest in private investment of space exploration.
Hopefully this trend will continue and the government can get out of the space business.
I wish we could give more funding to NASA, but we don't have it. In an ideal world, we could form a global space agency. Currently several different ones work together, but they should just all be united so that their funding can be combined and utilized more efficiently.
Besides, who else is looking out for meteors, asteroids, and other earth-destroying things?
While I'm a pretty big proponent of small government NASA is one area I'd like to see a large increase budget wise. I think killing it off is akin to shooting the country in the foot, were just going to stagnant even more in those areas. I do like hearing about companies such as Google and Virgin pumping money in, but I end up seeing some crazy mega corporation controlling space in a few hundred years. Though I guess the flip side to that is some one government entity instead. One problem I see with a global space program is who determines how much every one kicks in, and what's going to make all the old fat men at the top play nice like with the old fat men on the other side of the world when it comes down to it?
With imported Nazi technology that was outdated before the first man stepped foot on the moon. (And was promptly told not to come back if he knew what was good for him.)
Magos Explorator wrote:Disclaimer: I am a research scientist working at NASA (contractor, not civil servant)
Awesome.
Magos Explorator wrote:and also not a US citizen.
Well now you have zero credibility.
Magos Explorator wrote:NASA do an awful lot of stuff
The problem isn't that NASA doesn't do anything, it is that, more or less, they do not inspire us. The research is important but if you look at how NASA used to be viewed and the number of kids that wanted to work there and now, well, there is a fairly radical difference. It is one of the reasons why they don;t get funding. If they could capture the public imagination and make us feel like we are doing something like exploration as opposed to the effects of gravity on ants in 400 pages there would be more support. That research is needed but we need NASA to be more than a really well funded community college science department. DAZZLE ME NASA!
Amidst the mists and coldest frosts he thrusts his fists against the posts and still insists he sees the ghosts.
It also helps when their research is accurate. The past few scandels where their results have been called into question for being obviously faulty haven't been helping the cause.
There are some private sector space programs, but I would assume these are all launched with NASA research. I doubt that these private space programs could have started from square one. NASA does so much research, I would bet that the US actually makes money off of NASA. I think that NASA's problem is that they probably spend too much of their budget doing important, meaningful work, instead of the flashy stuff that actually grabs peoples attention.
Come on, I love astronaut Ice cream. Lets keep funding that research.
"I don't have principles, and I consider any comment otherwise to be both threatening and insulting" - Dogma
"No, sorry, synonymous does not mean same".-Dogma
"If I say "I will hug you" I am threatening you" -Dogma
micahaphone wrote: In an ideal world, we could form a global space agency. Currently several different ones work together, but they should just all be united so that their funding can be combined and utilized more efficiently.
There are and have been several joint missions between e.g. NASA and ESA or JAXA (the Japanese space agency) where resources have been pooled, for when neither alone had enough money for the mission (or the relevant expertise was spread across continents)--and unfortunately the recent budget means that one of the upcoming NASA/ESA joint missions will be descoped or scrapped (NASA can no longer afford the planned US contribution).
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Ahtman wrote:
Magos Explorator wrote:Disclaimer: I am a research scientist working at NASA (contractor, not civil servant)
Awesome.
Thanks! I do enjoy my job.
Ahtman wrote:
Magos Explorator wrote:and also not a US citizen.
Well now you have zero credibility.
Too bad. There are a lot of us foreign scientists at NASA/NOAA etc.
Ahtman wrote:
Magos Explorator wrote:NASA do an awful lot of stuff
The problem isn't that NASA doesn't do anything, it is that, more or less, they do not inspire us. The research is important but if you look at how NASA used to be viewed and the number of kids that wanted to work there and now, well, there is a fairly radical difference. It is one of the reasons why they don;t get funding. If they could capture the public imagination and make us feel like we are doing something like exploration as opposed to the effects of gravity on ants in 400 pages there would be more support. That research is needed but we need NASA to be more than a really well funded community college science department. DAZZLE ME NASA!
This is a good, and very interesting, point. Something I learned recently is that NASA grants include some funding explicitly for public outreach and education activities, which is something we didn't do to the same extent back home (I am British). I do agree that there's no longer the dazzle factor of the Apollo program out there! I guess that one difficulty is that now mankind have been to the Moon, to get the same 'Wow!' feeling you'd have to go for an even bigger milestone, which becomes both a lot more complicated and expensive. Disclaimer: I work in Earth science, not space exploration.
Related to this, coming up on Saturday May 14th at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (Greenbelt, MD--which is where I work) there is a free open day (called Explore @ NASA Goddard) where you can come on site, talk to people, find out about what's being done. I attended the previous one a few years ago (before I started working there) and it was pretty interesting. In case anyone is curious, the link is here: http://www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/events/explore/index.html
Very easy to get to e.g. DC from there too if people from outside of the area wanted to make a weekend of it.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2011/04/23 02:47:22
Andrew1975 wrote:I think that NASA's problem is that they probably spend too much of their budget doing important, meaningful work, instead of the flashy stuff that actually grabs peoples attention.
It doesn't help that the flashy stuff is pretty mundane these days, launching rockets just isn't as novel anymore. The Mars/Moon missions that have been pitched might help, but they're expensive and require lots of time to set up, and of course the risk of failure presents a problem.
Andrew1975 wrote:
Come on, I love astronaut Ice cream. Lets keep funding that research.
The ice cream doesn't get sent into space, its gross and potentially hazardous to the equipment (crumbs).
Life does not cease to be funny when people die any more than it ceases to be serious when people laugh.
The ice cream doesn't get sent into space, its gross and potentially hazardous to the equipment (crumbs).
It's gross? Dehydrated astronaut ice cream is the bees knees man! If it wasn't for Nasa we wouldn't have tang! I haven't drank Tang in 25 years and would probably find it gross now, but it was awesome when I was a kid.
"I don't have principles, and I consider any comment otherwise to be both threatening and insulting" - Dogma
"No, sorry, synonymous does not mean same".-Dogma
"If I say "I will hug you" I am threatening you" -Dogma
3000
1500
There are a lot of us foreign scientists at NASA/NOAA etc.