This article is old, so if it's already been discussed, feel free to point me to the page. I heard about the article recently through the Dome-L email list for the planetarium community.

In an April 8, 2004 article entitled "The Wrong Stuff" in the New York Review of Books, Steven Weinberg criticises the use of manned space missions (and therefore Bush's "New Vision for Space Exploration") as opposed to robotic missions. Weinberg says just enough to likely convince the average ignorant layperson, but doesn't give any actual facts or statistics anywhere, just lots of handwaving.

Interestingly, he's arguing Science vs. Science, not the typical pseudo-science that gets this treatment. In my opinion, there are many good arguments for manned space travel (in addition to the ones Weinberg mentions for unmanned), but I have to admit I'm not sure where I would find facts to back them up.

I think you should let us know what you think the arguments in favour of manned space flight are, so that we can debate them.

I'll be perfectly honest, and say that I agree with the article entirely, and think that manned space flight is unable to achieve anything that robotic missions could not achieve more cheaply, and without the risk to human life.

Obviously the human brain is able to analyse information and make decisions in ways that would be beyond the capabilities of the most sophistocated modern computer systems. In practice, however, it's far more productive to let the human brains remain safely on earth, and let remotely controlled robots do the actual travelling.

I don't think that many people would seriously argue that human pilots are of any use on flyby or orbiter missions. The task of controlling such a spacecraft is well within the capabilities of modern (or even 1970's) computers). The scientists on Earth decide what observations they want to make, radio the commands to the spacecraft, it faithfully does as it's told, and radios back the data. The scientists can analyse the results, and decide on what observations to make next. Missions of this sort have been flown for years, and I think it's fair to say that they work very well.

You might be thinking that it's better to have a man aboard to quickly decide on new observations if he notices anything interesting. I doubt that this would help in practice, however. Analysing data takes time, and I doubt that an astronaut would be able to reschedule observations in real time. Besides, an orbitting spacecraft can always be ordered to make a new observation at a later date if the scientists notice anything unusually interesting. Of course, you could also launch a large fleet of unmanned orbiters for the cost of a single manned one.

In the case of a landing mission, you might expect a human to be of some use, but I doubt that it would be worth the immense amount of money involved. For the cost of landing a single human mission, you could land hundreds, or even thousands, of robotic missions. Even if a human geologist could work more quickly than a robotic geologist, I doubt that he could achieve the same ratio of scientific return to money spent. Also, the robotic alternative has the advantage of not risking human life.

I look forward to reading other people's opinions on this subject. It should be interesting.

Someone made the point that we are celebrating Opportunity travelling over 2km having been there for months, when Apollo astronauts got much further than that during a measly few hour EVA.

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Freedom For Fission A breath of fresh Iodine-131

And someone (me!) pointed out, in Martian Chronicles, that a story about the Endurace crater exit plan mentioned:

I was recently struck by the comment made by black smoker-discoverer, Titanic-explorer Robert Ballard in a Discovery Channel documentary. He talked about an Aha!-moment for his current advocacy for telepresence. He was taking some scientists down in a submersible, maneuvering the craft or its tools by looking at a video image on a monitor, when he felt a presence over his shoulder. One of the scientists was watching the monitor, too.

He asked the scientist why he wasn't looking out his porthole, seeing with his own eyes, since there was the considerable effort, cost and risk of taking human eyeballs to that depth. Why would the precious porthole go unused? The scientist just said the video view was better. Hmm.

I don't know the answer. It seems like both measures should be pursued. I do want people in space. Someday. I just wonder how many hundreds of rovers, advanced from the present and getting more capable every day, can be sent somewhere for the cost of one human mission.

Or, should we avoid religious discussions?

Keywords: rov robot submersible submarine video monitor display screen shoulder porthole view ballard cameron

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No Buck Rogers, no bucks.


The public is not going to pay for a space program that does not have a human element.

OK, but remember, you asked.

Here's my opinion...

I happen to agree with you. Robotic missions are preferable...at least in the near future.

But, I can't help but think, what about the far future?

I sincerely believe that "some day", humanity will have to leave this planet. After all, Earth's resourses are limited. This day might not come for thousands of years, but I do believe that it will come.

If what I say turns out to be true "someday", then my question becomes why wait. Let's "get on with it".

Humanity's destiny awaits...out there...amongst the Stars.

thanks for the read

good information!

I'm so sick of this tired old debate: man vs. machine. It's so 60's. I think it's a meaningless dichotomy until we decide why exactly we want to go into space. Science? Sure, I love science space science as much as anyone, but what really thrills me about the future prospects for space travel is the kind of things that robots simply never will be able to do (unless they replace us): go on vacation, colonize, etc.

If access to space were cheap enough that more than just a few handfuls of government employees per year could go, imagine the kind of science that could be done (among other things). Which is why I'm in the field I'm in (space access).

BTW, I don't believe this new Moon/Mars initiative in its current form brings us any closer to achieving the above. In fact, I've found that the people that are the most cynical and skeptical about this whole thing are my fellow aerospace engineering grad students, who should be the most excited about it. We're continuing to hear about more of the same boneheaded decision-making that has been the hallmark of NASA's human space flight efforts for our entire lifetimes.

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My first space mission!

OK. There are a few factors going on here.

One. People are more general and more versatile than robots--a person on site can do orders of magnitude more than an equal mass robot.

Two. People require life support.
Two-a. Long term microgravity is harmful to people.

Three. Speed of light lag adversely affects interactive robots.

All pretty obvious, right? The upshot is that on short missions, like to the moon, people are clearly superior to robots. On short interplanetary missions, like to Mars, the advantage tilts towards the robotic. On long interplanetary missions or shorter missions to truly inhospitable planets, the advantage is clearly towards robots. I think even now the advantage would be towards humans on a Mars expedition, especially if you could amortize the cost of a cycler--a thousand tons or so for a manned Mars mission could return more science in a shorter period of time than a thousand tons of unmanned robots.

Of course, the situation isn't static. Robots are improving (slowly); they're becoming more autonomous (which helps with the speed of light lag). Space drive and life support systems by and large aren't improving, so the robotic advantage is becoming greater.

DOH! I forgot to say...

Welcome to the board, Uninvited Guest!

Sorry, that chestnut has been invalidated. By far the most popular with lay public NASA missions have been Mars Pathfinder (robotic) and Hubble (human-serviced, but could have been replaced by unmanned boosters for less cost than each Shuttle service mission).

There are good arguments for human presence in space, but that is not one of them.

Yeah, but how much data did they collect and, more importantly, how much did the data cost relative to what might have been gained robotically?

If you asked the average person the purpose of the Mars Pathfinder missions, they would say that they were precursors to the human exploration of Mars. If you told them that we would NEVER actually go to Mars, they would ask, "Then why are we spending the money?"

If looking at pretty pictures were sufficient, the travel industry would be nonexistent.

You've hit it on the nose, AtomicDog. Furthermore, the interest in Pathfinder/Hubble/MER is a direct result of the public getting involved in space. We can download pretty pictures, see in pretty close to realtime the discoveries as they are made, and argue over every detail on messageboards. The manned space activities (ISS and shuttle) are mundane by comparison-- sure a space station is sortof cool, but nothing revolutionary, especially as it doesn't seem to have a real purpose. Plus, the public doesn't really get to participate in ISS activities (possibly a less savvy PR department?) unless they pay $20 mil for a visit.

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Do try not to take me too seriously.

You're pretty much on, Ilya, but I think I should point out that the mission by far the most "popular with the lay public" was Apollo 11.

Of course, that leads to the fact that future manned exploration and development needs to be more than just going for a short time and coming back. It has to lead towards a largely self-sustaining presence.

Economics. That is the ONLY thing that will drive humans into space before our grandchildren's life time. If nanotech takes a big leap and we can make some cheapie family-sedan-asteroid-franchise-mining-rigs then we might see our grandkids up there on a mass scale.
Looks more like my grandkid's kids every day. This sucks. I wanted to live on the moon already. Where'd all the profit making endeavours go?
We should have been sooooo cool by now that we should hardly be able to stand ourselves.
Trav Rogers In SPAAAAAAACE!

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Feynman
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Science is a way of trying not to fool yourself. The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.

Religion is a culture of faith; science is a culture of doubt.

I was going to stay out of this conversation but Uguys pushed my button so here's my view for what it's worth.

A robotic presents in space is as close to worthless as it is possible to get by spending that much money. To get anything worth while from a place, you have to be there.

For years I looked at pictures, movies, videos, etc. of Hawaii. My thoughts, "What's the big deal?" I finally went there on business. The smells, sounds, tastes, textures and sights told me soooooooo much more than any of the robotic information I had recieved.

The same was true for Tahiti. You can look at all of the travel log films/videos in the world. All of them combined will tell you one ten thousandth of what being there will.

I spent years listening to words and pictures of Viet Nam, produced by Dan Rather and the other morronic hacks. Being there was the ultimate reality check.

I get sick of hearing the hand wringing worry warts who whine about "...risking a human life in space...". Trust me. Much less has been bought with much more human life. Humanity has spent millinia dieing during their explorations. The fact that we have lost so few lives in the world space programs, tells me that we, as a spiecies are such lazy louts that we are no longer worth our daily bread.

If NASA put an add in my local paper saying "We need people to go colonize Mars. There is a 90% chance you will die just getting the colony set up." I'd be sending my application that day.

Earth is getting so crowded that we can no longer sustain ourselves without significant technology. The future is out there somewhere, not here.

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It's just one of those damn things of which there are many few. -- Dan Blocker

I wonder if the reason that no government is willing to send people out permanently is that it is not in their interest. An asteroid for example has a huge amount of resources and as a result would completely mess up the economy if somehow the resources were transported down here.

Also any one with that amount of resources (and suitable number of colleagues) would not be subject to any form of control by an earth based government.

Remember that columbus (and his peers) only got funding to go to what they thought was china and india. There would be a suitable pay off for the government supporting them. Plus it was only a few ships for a big pay back. Space is exactly the opposite. In space it costs alot to get out there with, very small economic pay back.

I therefore think that it will only be the private sector that will get us properly into space. Even then it will take someone very brave/stupid/adventurous to get out and live in deep space.

[edit to bury massive quoting error compounded by a double-post.]