Is the “space race” alive and well in the United States? President Bush would like NASA to put men back on the moon by 2020, and then onto Mars between 2035 and 2037. The Russians plan to build a new manned space transport system by 2015 . China plans to send another rover to the moon in 2012. Is Bush’s timetable in jeopardy? President-elect Barrack Obama has made it clear that he does not consider either the moon nor manned Mars exploration a priority in his administration. His transition team looking at spending cuts to the Constellation Project, the successor to the Space Shuttle. This program is supposed to create to a permanent manned base on the Moon by 2020 with a manned mission to Mars to follow. How will this timetable be affected light of Obama’s repeated campaign statements that he does not consider funding for pure exploration a NASA priority? He feels the money should be used for education and infrastructure as well as more immediate impact NASA initiatives such as national security. While he appeared to back off this stance, it was pre-economic meltdown. The bottom line is that while Obama appears to fully support the continued development of more immediate impact NASA initiatives he has very different views than the Bush administration on pure “where no man has gone before” space exploration.
Short sighted or prudent? What are we expecting to accomplish with such lofty goals? I frankly have “First Contact” visions of a Vulcan space ship passing by one day , detecting our spacecraft on its way to Mars and deciding to stop by and say hello. After that everything will change. It will unite humanity in ways never envisioned. Hunger, war, poverty will all be a thing of the past. Well maybe I am stretching things a bit but it sure sounded good when William Ryker and Deanna Troi said it in the movie First Contact. Don’t we all hope that will happen in our lifetimes?
In reality I am in agreement that NASA pure exploration funding should be slashed and realloacted to NASA initatives such a international security. I believe the colonization of the moon is important from a technology advancement and global conservation standpoint. I however question whether NASA as it exists today is the way to go for the long term in pure space exploration. When it comes to space exploration is not that what we are really talking about? We are talking about the long term. The only way to surge ahead beyond our lifetimes may be to take a step backwards in our lifetimes. That step backwards would be to re-structure NASA and divert funding for pure exploration to the private sector. It is already being done to a a degree anyways. Let the free-market create momemtum. NASA should be encouraging private industry to jump into the fray to a much greater extent than they are. It however has been an irresistible force meeting an immovable object. The only way to shake it up may be to cut funding and encourage NASA to encourage others to kick in. In the long term, I believe we would see more private funding, expanded notions of what can be achieved and further advancement of space technology than we would ever see with back and forth NASA budget battles. What would we lose? Space is not going anywhere. The Vulcans will still be there.
December 27th, 2008 at 2:45 pm
Excellent post and I would like to add the following. It is no surprise that NASA has been having problems receiving the funding that it truly needs, and when times are tough, such as the current economic meltdown we are in, then NASA funding becomes even more difficult. The problem with NASA is that it has been dragging it’s feet for to long. Year after year, and decade after decade, of low earth orbit would make any common American citizen bored of what NASA is doing. If the American citizen gets bored with NASA, then it seems logical that Congress gets bored with NASA. That means less funding. No bucks, no Buck Rogers.
Some of the really exciting science related stuff has come from the unmanned Mars robotic rovers Spirit and Opportunity, which have been enormously successful, and relatively cheap. The problem is only scientists and technical people get excited about Spirit and Opportunity. If NASA wants to gain the backing of the American people, they need to speed up the process of human exploration of space. Back in the Apollo days, we went to the moon within a 9 year period. Today, it can take 9 years just to get a NASA program approved by Congress. At the rate that NASA is going, private enterprise will pass it in terms of getting humans back into space exploration. And if not private enterprise, then China will gladly take the role of a global leader in space exploration.
As Barack Obama enters office, he needs to take care of some major problems here in the United States. Which is what he should be doing. But hopefully he does not lose site of the need for humans to move outward into the only remaining frontier, that being space. Humans must explore because it is our nature to be curious. Politicians come and go, but the need to explore space will always exist. If goals for NASA are set to far in the future, that leaves to much time for Presidents, Congress, and the American people to change their mind. When Bush set the goal of sending humans to Mars at 2035, that is to far in the future. Right now we should only focus on getting back to the Moon. Use the Moon as a base or stepping stone for further space exploration. Lets take space exploration in incremental steps. Hopefully space exploration is important to the American people. If it is not, then we as a country will eventually have to step aside as a global leader and let other countries take the torch of space exploration. If we don’t explore, other countries will.
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December 28th, 2008 at 7:18 am
Most of them are saying that it is not real. Even they are giving proof. But i can’t believe weather it is real or just photoshoped.
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February 3rd, 2009 at 11:15 pm
Private sector? There is no monetary value ( at least in our lifetimes ) in space exploration. Do you forget; Only the government is willing to waste money on projects with no return whatsoever.