Before I post the following comments and questions, please be advised that I have long loved space exploration.

Thanks.

Let's consider the following question: Why do we spend so much money, effort, and time exploring space? Comments welcome.

Points and counterpoints or questions:

1. Search for water on the Moon... Even if the Moon is found to contain water, a few snapshots taken of the Earth from the Moon clearly shows where the water is, and large-scale reverse osmosis machines routinely churn out millions of gallons of pure drinking water from the oceans for many arid countries with coastlines.

2. Search for extraterrestial life... With thousands, if not millions, of species being discovered each year right here on Earth, some of them rather exotic, why spend billions seeking life away from Earth, particularly on Mars? If we ever did find life there, it's entirely possible it was transported in imbedded ejecta from a large meteorite impact with Earth, possibly sling-shotted around Venus, to collide with Mars, thus depositing earlier forms of our own life.

3. SETI... Isn't it highly likely that our "window" with which we listen for others is a reflection of our very, very narrow technological innovation, a mere one-millionth of the time we humans have been on our planet? Isn't it likely that even a hundred years from now we'll using form of radio, light, or other as yet undiscovered but exotic technologies for communications? Isn't it reasonable to assume that if that technology were in use today, we'd never be able to detect it because our current instruments are so crude compared to what might be in place then it's like Marconi trying to pick up the laser reflected off a DVD with his first wireless set? If the previous assumptions are reasonable, why in the world would we think we'd be able to spot any signals, unless they were emitted not only during the one-millionth period of time when the aliens were progressing as we are today, but they just happened to be sent such that they would arrive when we'd be listening for them using today's technologies? That's a 1/1*10^-12 (one in one trillion) chance, roughly, of receving that signal from any given civilization. With those odds, there'd half to be half a trillion civilizations out there before we'd have a 50% chance of spotting just one of 'em (excuse the flawed stats, but you get my drift).

3. The ISS... If it was to be used as a jumping off point for further exploration (Moon and beyond), please see above. If just for pure research, wouldn't it have been cheaper to devise unmanned ways of performing the experiments and conducting the activities?

4. The pillow... If it's so late here, and I'm so tired, why aren't I in bed?

Thanks, folks - I look forward to your responses in the morning.

__________________
If I set the budget, we'd have Ares and more. Unfortunately, I don't set the budget, and Ares is just too expensive and too far out for us to accomplish our goals within the budget we were given.

If we halt the ISS, all versions of Ares, and transport Orion and Altair aboard DIRECTv3's Jupiter family of Shuttle-Derived Launch Vehicles, we just might make it back to the Moon by 2020.

Answer: Why limit our options? Do it all, or don't bother.

__________________
The last time I felt a warm fuzzy feeling, I was informed by my doctor that it was just gas.

My take:

1.) Finding usable water on the Moon would be a tremendous boon for colonization, and it would probably have some interesting chemistry in its own right. For the record though, I'm more interested in the Moon's raw geology than its natural resources, for colonization or otherwise.

2.) Finding life on Mars transported from Earth would be big news. Finding life independent of Earth would be big news--win-win. Even if panspermia contaminated Mars, that doesn't mean that it's the case it happened to Europa, or Enceladus, what have you. I also think think the search of off-world life period is the most important project in the history of the species, but I have my biases.

3.) I partly agree with you on SETI; the search is inherently chauvinistic about the motives and technology of ETI. However, it's what we have to work with. I think the chances of SETI succeeding anytime in the next century are infinitesimal, but as the cliché goes, you have a 100% chance of failing anything you don't try. For me, not looking is much worse than wasting a (relatively speaking) small amount of cheddar banking on the minuscule chance of finding ETI, especially when the stakes are so high. Finding ETI would cause a scientific and cultural paradigm shift we can't even begin to imagine, so why not?

4.) I'll be first person to agree that I think ISS is a grotesque waste of money; however, we've sort of painted ourselves into a corner with it.

__________________
"Call me old-fashioned, but I think fire is magic. And it scares me a lot."

--The State

I think the Jupiter Moon named Europa has life under it's ice

Water on Moon:
Assessing the Moon’s natural resources is a prudent step in weighing the costs and possible benefits of future missions. If water, oxygen, hydrogen and metals are found to be accessible in the lunar environment, it would likely increase commercial incentive while facilitating future missions by astronauts. Besides searching for water, they will be mapping and evaluating the lunar terrain and acquiring data in preparation for future long-term missions.

Search for ET:
Finding life on Mars – however remote or extreme, would radically change most people’s perceptions of ET and prove conclusively that we are not alone in the universe. Such a discovery would generate a wave of public enthusiasm that would likely inundate NASA with funding to increase and broaden their programs. While I personally feel there are more likely candidates for life in our solar system, Mars being the closest and most accessible, provides at least a viable training ground for future exploration.

SETI:
With our current technological limitations, I feel that SETI is pretty much an exercise in futility. In over a half century, SETI has covered about one fifteen millionth of just our own galaxy. At this rate it would take some 750 million years just to complete the search of our own galaxy! On the other hand, SETI is a relatively inexpensive project and it does generate public interest so perhaps its PR value warrants its existence.

ISS:
The benefits of an international space station are enormous and far reaching. I think NASA said it best:
The Pillow:
I’ve had the same problem with insomnia since college. When I wake up, I grab some rocky road ice cream from the fridge, take 2 Benadryl and read a few BAUT topics. It usually takes about a half hour for the Benadryl to kick in and I’m back to my pillow sleeping soundly.

For the same reason perhaps, that we “came out of the caves” so to speak.

Thanks, Romanus. Some questions:

Why colonize at all?

Why would it be important? What purpose would it serve except to say, "see - we were right - there is life out there!"

I'm not sure I agree, as most people these days already take it on faith that we're not alone.

Glad we agree. I propose we conduct an economic feasibility study, and if it's not viable, scrap it or give it away to whichover country wants to take over the project.

__________________
If I set the budget, we'd have Ares and more. Unfortunately, I don't set the budget, and Ares is just too expensive and too far out for us to accomplish our goals within the budget we were given.

If we halt the ISS, all versions of Ares, and transport Orion and Altair aboard DIRECTv3's Jupiter family of Shuttle-Derived Launch Vehicles, we just might make it back to the Moon by 2020.

Shipping water back to a planet that is lousy with water would indeed be ridiculous. Having water on the moon means you don't have to ship it up our ridiculously steep gravity well to a moonbase, however.

Hydrogen is an essential ingredient in just about everything useful to life, not to mention the fabrication of plastic, engine grease, sealant, ect. It's also the most efficient fuel for nuclear rockets and enables engines that exceed 1000 sec Isp in space, which would enable further expansion into the solar system. (However, the amount of water, if found on the moon, probably is too limited to be blowing away by the ton as rocket fuel).

__________________
http://amssolarempire.blogspot.com

Ok, Jamini - I'll bite:

I agree - but this still doesn't justify why we should build a base there in the first place

I'm all for space exploration and getting public sentiment behind those efforts. But at what cost? And where should we put the money - in space exploration? Fighting the war on terrorism? Countering global warming? Reorganizing the world so that the squalor 90% of the people on our planet slowly disappears?

We just don't have the budget for all of them. Probably not even two of them.

Ok, agreed, particularly with the screen saver that taps idle processor time from around the globe to analyze the signals.

I can see how combustion physics and the quality of life issues relate to tangile needs, but the rest are fairly pie in the sky goals. Obtainable, and they sound nice, but doing without them would hardly crimp anyone's style, and the research done up that's actually tangible to our needs here on Earth could probably be done down here.

[quoteThe Pillow:
I’ve had the same problem with insomnia since college. When I wake up, I grab some rocky road ice cream from the fridge, take 2 Benadryl and read a few BAUT topics. It usually takes about a half hour for the Benadryl to kick in and I’m back to my pillow sleeping soundly. [/QUOTE]

__________________
If I set the budget, we'd have Ares and more. Unfortunately, I don't set the budget, and Ares is just too expensive and too far out for us to accomplish our goals within the budget we were given.

If we halt the ISS, all versions of Ares, and transport Orion and Altair aboard DIRECTv3's Jupiter family of Shuttle-Derived Launch Vehicles, we just might make it back to the Moon by 2020.

It's far too small to make a dent in any of those problems. Particularly global poverty. If you could relieve poverty by giving people money, you could just run trillions of dollar bills off a printer, and no one would ever want for anything again.

__________________
http://amssolarempire.blogspot.com

Re Mugaliens:

1.) Why colonize at all?
--I'm lukewarm on colonization, at best; I was only referring to the fact that if it were undertaken, on-site water would be useful.

2.) Why would it be important? What purpose would it serve except to say, "see - we were right - there is life out there!"
--One could say that about a great many scientific discoveries with little practical application, like geophysical studies of the Earth's core, superheavy element transmutation, or the synthesis of thousands of new organic compounds every year that are destined to be no more than blurbs in the latest Chemical Abstracts. Yet, people devote their lives to these subjects because they feel that the results are important.

3.) I'm not sure I agree, as most people these days already take it on faith that we're not alone.
--Scientists don't.

__________________
"Call me old-fashioned, but I think fire is magic. And it scares me a lot."

--The State

Scientists are few and far between. The vast majority of the rest of us pay the bills that fund science, so naturally, we taxpayers are interested in how, precisely, it will benefit either us or society as a whole.

I'm very familiar with the Apollo Program spin-offs, and still have my 1970s-era pamphlet detailed the more notable ones. I guess my point is that we've come so far with Earth-based technology, that technologies gleaned from continued space exploration are paling by comparison. It's actually quite a flip from the heyday of the space program, when NASA had all the cool tech gear and the rest of us lived with rotary telephones, points and condensors, mechanically-driven hydraulic boosters, simple adding machines (or hand-rung registers), basic wood, steel, brick, and glass for nearly all construction projects, etc.

None of this newfangled, late-60's high-tech stuff!

These days, however, the space program borrows from advances in Earth-bound technologies!

__________________
If I set the budget, we'd have Ares and more. Unfortunately, I don't set the budget, and Ares is just too expensive and too far out for us to accomplish our goals within the budget we were given.

If we halt the ISS, all versions of Ares, and transport Orion and Altair aboard DIRECTv3's Jupiter family of Shuttle-Derived Launch Vehicles, we just might make it back to the Moon by 2020.

Someone has to provide the adult supervision for the universe; we should do our bit.

__________________
For those inclined to oppose human meddling with the structure of the universe or the composition and configuration of objects and groups of objects within the universe, consider:
Whether there is a limit to the magnitude of a modulation of chaos below which order remains invariant? Or, is order but a fiction invented by perspectives applied over finite, however large, time intervals?

ADVENTURE!

SETI is privately funded so it doesn't answer to taxpayers, which is probably a good thing as it would be pretty tough to justify otherwise. But even then the goal is not just to find out if we're alone or not, it is to communicate with other species, share technologies and ideas and perhaps see how others have fared with the same problems we are facing now. I think SETI, especially in its current form, is very unlikely to succeed but if it does it will be one of the most significant events in our history. Certainly more than a tick in the we are not alone box.

Same thing for finding life in the solar system. If we found life that evolved separately from life here on Earth we could get a more complete understanding of what life really is. What forms can these self-replicating systems take? Maybe we can find some processes we can imitate for our own convenience. Again, we are not looking for answers for trivia -- we are looking at fundamental question that have far-reaching consequences.

There are other open questions about the solar system, like the geological and climate histories of Venus and Mars. Maybe these questions have no importance for our lives whatsoever. Maybe they will be absolutely crucial for some reason. That is the nature of all non-applied science. I'm guessing that most people who study these things are doing it for the sake of understanding but it doesn't mean there won't be any practical use somewhere down the line.

In another thread I said that space exploration won't make sense as an economic enterprise for some time. But apart from a science case there are another reason. Space exploration, especially manned space exploration, really does inspire young people. Maybe it does because kids want to be a part of it. Or they see the power of human ingenuity. We really want the next generations to grow up thinking they can make a difference.

So I really do think space exploration is important. But it's still a fair question to ask if it's really the thing we should focus on now and if it is are we spending the money the right way.

The answer to the first question is I'm IMO no. The same amount of money would be much better spent on fighting famine and extreme poverty and improving education. I know it's only a drop in the ocean but it would go a long way for many people. Unfortunately there's just no way to ensure that all or even any of the resources would be spent on that if we stopped spending on space exploration. As it is the question is not Should we spend more money on space exploration or fighting poverty but Should we spend more money on space exploration or less, with no indication what benefits spending less would give. So it makes no sense to compare space exploration to what we think is most important, it only makes sense to compare it to the alternative or the average performance of our governments. The current space exploration programs have their faults but IMO they pass this particular test with flying colours.

So the final question are we spending money on space exploration the right way? I quite like ESA's programs, most of their recent missions were successful and they are doing a lot of exciting stuff in space based astronomy too. But really when we talk about space exploration we mean NASA and the vision for space exploration. I think the ISS was a mistake and so was letting the shuttle fly for so long. The point is that effective exploration, especially manned exploration, costs a huge amount of money. For now the focus should be on developing technologies that would enable us to do more things for less. Looking for water on Mars achieves just that goal so it seems like a worthwhile goal.

__________________
"The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity."

Dorothy Parker (?)

We like to, and it is in our nature to, explore.

__________________
A person's name, or a mark representing it, as signed personally or by deputy, as in subscribing a letter or other document.

Don't get me wrong, as I ran the screensaver until last year when my computer died, but so far as we know, we're on the first step, right? To find out if we're alone or not?

I predict that will take between 300 years and forever.

__________________
If I set the budget, we'd have Ares and more. Unfortunately, I don't set the budget, and Ares is just too expensive and too far out for us to accomplish our goals within the budget we were given.

If we halt the ISS, all versions of Ares, and transport Orion and Altair aboard DIRECTv3's Jupiter family of Shuttle-Derived Launch Vehicles, we just might make it back to the Moon by 2020.

I think our ultimate goal is the colonization of space. We can start with orbital space "cities" and later venture out - it doesn't matter how long it takes for us to drift through space before we reach another solar system, because it will be a "generation ship".
We only have one planet at our disposal - billions and billions are waiting for us.

__________________
Mars Society.

My point was that there'd be a benefit if we found them. Maybe most people already know they are out there but it doesn't change the significance of actually finding them.

As for when we'll find them I think it depends heavily on how rare they are. If there are many of them we might find them within 20 years, with SKA, most likely. If they are very rare it might take a long-long time.

__________________
"The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity."

Dorothy Parker (?)

Why colonize? Because it appears to be a big empty Universe - this Solar System anyway. Right now we've got all our eggs in this Earth basket, and it's just a matter of time before we kill ourselves, or run out of the natural materials that might make spaceflight possible.

Wouldn't it be a shame if during the lifetime of the Universe, life only arose once, stuck around for a few billion years here on Earth, and then was destroyed when the Sun went supernova.

Until we get actual confirmation that there's a great big galactic civilization out there doing the hard work of spreading life across the galaxy, I think we need to take it upon ourselves.

We need to assume there's no life until we find evidence otherwise.

__________________
Fraser Cain
Publisher
Universe Today - Free space news delivered by email every weekday.

Why? - To find out if we are the progenitor species .

I think that some things are justified by pure scientific curiosity, and a general desire to go to new places and discover things that no human has ever seen before.

The amount of money spent on space exploration is really a drop in the bucket compared to what governments spend social and military programs. If all money for space exploration were diverted to other purposes, it would make very little difference to those other purposes, but it would result in the loss of something unique.

Be a shame for whom? No one will be around to notice the difference. And even if we escape from this puny solar system, we will only prolong the inevitable. Eventually, the universe will run down; eventually, perhaps, someone will figure out the answer to Asimov's Last Question ("Can entropy be reversed?"), but this universe will be done at some point. Long before that, however, the Andromeda galaxy is scheduled to collide with the Milky Way in a billion or two years, and then life in this galaxy will get pretty dicey, to put it politely.

Should we spread intelligent life, or just the spores of life a la Francis Crick's directed panspermia? Like that new "Earth-like" planet they just found. We could send a probe designed to release all kinds of bacteria to that planet's atmosphere using today's technology; even though it would take thousands of years the bacteria wouldn't care. Eventually, after a few billion years of incubation, a new intelligent species might evolve.

All good answers, folks.

Personally, the more I read here, the more I believe the only viable solution involves space colonies not stuck at the bottom of a massive gravity well. Arthur Clarke's Rama, O'Neil's writings, or Heppenheimer.

Anything less, or stuck down a gravity well, will probably just sit there.

__________________
If I set the budget, we'd have Ares and more. Unfortunately, I don't set the budget, and Ares is just too expensive and too far out for us to accomplish our goals within the budget we were given.

If we halt the ISS, all versions of Ares, and transport Orion and Altair aboard DIRECTv3's Jupiter family of Shuttle-Derived Launch Vehicles, we just might make it back to the Moon by 2020.

Yes, Andromeda will collide with the Milky Way in about 4 billion years, but don't expect that to have any disastrous effect on the individual stars. The two biggest "sharks" in the local group (each with about 1 trillion sun masses, Andromeda has more stars but our galaxy seems to have more dark matter) will just merge without collisions of individual stars. The result will be a large elliptical galaxy.
So - twice as many stars within reach to explore

__________________
Mars Society.

The problem with eliptical galaxies is that the movement of their stars is chaotic, whereas in spiral galaxies, the movement is organized, the stars mostly moving in lockstep. And the main problem for life is not that another star will crash into the sun, but that it could sweep through the solar system potentially ripping the Earth out of its stable orbit and sending it into the cold wastes of interstellar space.

Isn't the space between stars so great (on the scale of planetary systems) that the chances of them making so close a pass is small?

__________________
http://amssolarempire.blogspot.com

By that time, I fully expect us to have the technology to travel to whatever planets we want and survive following them wherever they go anyways.

__________________
http://amssolarempire.blogspot.com

In four billion years?

Nope - we'll be about six years too short, as we humans always wait until the last second before taking action....

Seriously, we'll probably not even be here by then, at least not in bodily form.

__________________
If I set the budget, we'd have Ares and more. Unfortunately, I don't set the budget, and Ares is just too expensive and too far out for us to accomplish our goals within the budget we were given.

If we halt the ISS, all versions of Ares, and transport Orion and Altair aboard DIRECTv3's Jupiter family of Shuttle-Derived Launch Vehicles, we just might make it back to the Moon by 2020.

We went many years without weathersats and lost many lives. You don't know what you absolutely need tomorrow--that results from continued spaceflight.

As for the lame feed the masses arguements--we would never have weathersats with that thinking. But we need more than those. Goddard still has plenty of those.

We have to be more than walking stomachs--and we can't all be farmers.