Mars

I'd rather it be spent on this than some fat lazy family.

best of both worlds watch Wall-E

To justify NASA's bloated budget.

NASA budget $18.4 billion. US military budget $902.2 billion.

Oh, you're right.. They could just donate those money in the church

alright, I am not trying to start a fight, but please please explain your thought process on this as I keep asking people who don't view science as a great way to spend money and never get an answer...almost every great thing we have is because of science and mathmatics...I was hoping by now we would be exploring all of our planets, but we are not because people don't value science..and it gives us all the great advances in healthcare/technology/warfare ect ect ect... please explain to me why we should spend less on learning about science...PLEASE give me an intelligent well thought out answer to this position you have..(I'm guessing you can't even come close...I have never met anyone who could)

Understanding our solar system and the Universe is pivotal to the future of humans. One day for some reason we will have to leave this planet and settle elsewhere if humans are to survive. Thus this work that NASA and every other space agency do is fundamental to long term survival.

So yet again some dumbass makes a statement, I challenge them to give a good answer, and they can't....I stated I didn't want to start a fight, because I had the assumption you had half a brain...now I want to start a fight...you are the perfect example of an idiot conservative....You have your talking points and have absolutely not one reason to back any of your ideas up... I am not a liberal by any stretch of the imagination, but conservatives are complete idiots..either make a statement as to why you have such an opinion, or retract it, or...find something sharp and jump on to it(preferably around your heart region as their will be a shorter duration until you are no longer with us.)

I am astounded how few people understand that

And almost everything to do with science and mathematics has absolutely nothing to do with NASA.

NASA is not a synonym for science, so why are you pretending it is? Perhaps people just see it as a huge waste of time and expense to check out barren, uninhabitable planets when, for example, 95% of our own ocean, covering 70% of this planet, is still unexplored.

NASA Budget: $18bn
NOAA Budget: $5bn

He didn't say anything remotely like "we should spend less on learning about science". For someone who can't spell simple words like "mathematics", who doesn't know the basics of sentence construction, and who can't even read or comprehend what other people say, I don't think you're in any position to demand 'intelligent well thought out answers'. You're asking him to argue a point he didn't even make.

He said the budget of NASA is bloated. That is all. It's not an issue that concerns me much, but perhaps he believes that money would be better spent on science or medicine here on Earth, on providing free and/or more advanced healthcare or on environmental protection or research. Things that have more direct and immediate benefit to humanity than trying to find microbes on a hostile, uninhabitable planet.

As for loonies who believe we should explore space in case we ever need to leave Earth... *facepalm* If we ever need to leave Earth then it's because we have fucked things up beyond repair here, a planet with an atmosphere and environment ideally suited for human survival, so I'd love to know how we'd last five minutes anywhere else. If we fuck this planet up, we don't deserve to survive.

Personally I don't really give the budget for NASA much thought, and space exploration does capture the imagination of people, which is the real reason it receives far more than, say, NOAA, which has arguably more direct scientific importance and relevance to humans. I think if we're looking for things to cut, there's no better place to start than the truly obscene 'defense' budget.

I can understand why some people object to NASA's funding though. Hundreds of billions of dollars, half a century after we 'landed on the moon', Google can take a clear photo of your car on the driveway, but NASA can't produce a decent, conclusive image of the Apollo 11 site. Real value for money.

if they find something strange i will eat my pants!

No need for human curiosity. No need to explore. Let's all just believe God created everything. It's free.

Let's just stay on our own planet. What has space exploration ever done for us?
People did fine in The Stone Age, so why the hell do some insist on progression!

If God wanted us to be on another planet, white people would already be living there enslaving everyone else.

It will be like the Moon Mission. We'll find nothing of any use and never go back.

AK you know I respect you but. Best we find another world we can send a couple of dozen people to first before we start dreaming of all going there. Or making sure we don't have to go. Which would be easiest and the only way to save more than a few dozen people.

If the "Ancient Alien" believers are right and they visited Earth 3,000 to 4,000 years ago. Odds are they died out on their planet or realised saving it was better than trying to leave it.

For scientific research.
For national pride.
To stimulate the economy in pumping $$ used by many contractors firms.
For space exploration, who knows if we ever need to leave the earth at one point?

loved it!

All could of been done with much better results.

A dream that's absurd.

At the present rate we devour the Earth's resources and the rate we grow the technology to get people to an inhabitable planet. We will all be dead first.

Best we save the World we have rather than thinking we can get to and live on another one. And if we ever do, who do you think will be going?

Your ability to turn a computer on is a marvel of nature.

Incorrect. We did find something of use and a number of companies have been gearing up to go back and get it. It's called Helium-3 and it can provide virtually limitless clean energy. Here's a quick overview: http://www.explainingthefuture.com/helium3.html

The Nazis have all the Helium 3.

The real reason is science is our new religion and we should proceed with it, if like 90% the pop who think we are alone and special you should think that it is in our best interest to spread the life we have been gifted with

I'm waiting to see what happens in relation to the previous "labelled release" experiment and subsequent discoveries about extremophiles

http://www.newscientist.com/article/...after-all.html

they think there is something living there.

the martians are coming

Jobs

$2.5 Billion isn't just money burnt up. It's $2.5 Billion of goods and services into the US economy which creates about 3X that amount. Study after study proves the fact of dollars spent ripple through an economy. On any business.

A NASA job at $60K a year is spent on food, clothing and so much more.
Would you really rather just give $60K on welfare or $60K on a highly skilled technical employed person and advance science?
Every dollar spent on NASA has returned at least 8X in benefits. Not going to waste the time, you know what Google is. Look it up yourself.

I hope they find something other than rocks

some pissed off aliens headed for earth

People are fucking stupid. Namely you.

Do you not understand that if it wasn't for NASA and the US Government and the money they invested forty years ago you wouldn't have a computer on your desk right now, no less the Internet.

Did you know that roads are built safer now because of NASA? Scratch-resistant Lenses were created by NASA for space - the same exact ones I'm wearing now. Ear Thermometers, Shoe Insoles, Long-distance Telecommunications and cell phones, Smoke Detectors, cordless drills, water filters, memory foam, Anti-corrosion Coating, hearing aids, frozen food, CAT Scans.... All of this in hindsight seems very obvious now, but do you think if NASA didn't do work with shoe insoles in the 1960s during the Apollo missions that Nike would have the same sneaker they have now?

We might have cordless drills without NASA, but they would be with technology that was twenty years old. Memory foam might not sound too exciting - big deal, we have new mattresses - but I wonder how that has affected car seats and automobile safety...

All of these things sound so obvious and are so common today, but without NASA and our military we would be twenty - forty years behind in developing such simple items today.

Idiot.

I apologise. I never knew that.

Agree. This is why cutting Government expenditure doesn't always fuel growth. It takes money from one pocket and puts it into another pocket.

Also funding science and research is a better investment than giving someone a tax cut to buy a Chinese made shirt.

My iphone camera takes better pictures than the rover

More NASA - Less Warring and killing! The absolute pinnacle of American genius - genius that redefines itself constantly - year after year..

In spite of what you believe, America does NOT lie in wait, readying itself to blow foreign countries off of the map. No American President has ever tossed darts at a map and said "Why don't we just blow the fuck out of these assholes? I'm bored today..."

America does not own - nor does is dominate - foreign countries. That is not how it works. You read the news that America provided arms to the Congo. Sorry, that's what we are. Countries build relations - whether good or bad - and they support their "allies".

I than God every day - even though I'm not religious - that America is an ally and a friend.

Just to be COMPLETELY POLITICALLY INCORRECT: Does ayone here thing that George W. WANTED the towers to fall. Do you think he wanted terrorists to drive a lane into the Pentagon?

George W has been ridiculed endlessly, but he was doing a "good thing" - he was reading a book to school children. A perfect, idyllic, presidential moment. When he was informed about what happened on 9/11 he shit his pants. He's reading a book to school kids ( without a doubt the greatest inspiration they would EVER receive in their lives... ) and someone whispers ion his here:

Mr. President... We have a problem...

You could see his face turn down. Mr. Bush NEW the party was over. Mocking him for continuing to talk to children was the worst fucking thing your media could have done.

Just like any free citizen, Mr. Bush probably did not accept the realities of the situation when they hit him. Who would? Who would be prepared for that?

When 9/11 hit - and you could read my posts on PornCity if it still existed - I did not sleep until October. Your President - Mr. George W. - initially handled the crisis with grace, diplomacy, and a spine of steel.

Unfortunately, members of his cabinet had more influence (Even the new God Colin Powell) than GW was able to overcome.

George W. Bush was a man who watched Bill Clinton go through eight years of economic growth and watched ol' Bill getting his cock suck by interns. GWB was a party boy.

Alas, the world ended on his watch. Fuck the Aztecs - GWB did a GREAT job after New York was brought down. He was a man with a mission. Angry, yet focused.

Unforunately. GWB listened to the idiots in his caucus. How could he NOT? Colin Powell? A great man - a friend of Jon Stewart and Stephan Colbert... But a spineless coward. I'm a general, but I don't anyone to get hurt "giggle - write a book"

Sometimes, things get bad in this world. Really. Fucking. Bad. I thank God that America is willing to stand up and defend its allies - even when America's allies back away from their responsibilites...

But we - you - AMERICA - are beyond that. You are the beacon of light in this world. You define freedom. Americans - even though they may be under constant attack and argue about stupid shit on stupid television programs... America defines the free world.

Not stupid "I'm walking down my street naked" shit, but "Yes,sir (actual quote from an American cop in Rochester, NY ) "You can walk through this town naked as long as no little girls see you... You don't have to put yopur pants on, Sir, but if somebody looks at you and complains, we have a problem..."

America defines what this world is. Not for "better or worse". For the better. This is a beautiful world because America polices it. This is a great planet because America refuses to be constrained buy what we believe in...

Away from the television cameras, if you had a private audience with an American President and you said "Sir, you'll never land a craft on Mars - even if you did anyone inside it would die..."

America IS going to Mars. Fuck the wars, fuck the Democrats and fuck the Republicans - that all makes great fodder for Fox news and Comedy Central, but it is not reality.

America is - inarguably - the single greatest civilization that has ever existed on this planet. America loves it wars. It loves it guns. American has a probem with being fucked around and lied to...

Quietly though, even through all the irrelevant political bullshit, the name-calling (Obama is African! Romney is a plastic bigamist who doesn't pay taxes!) - everything is irrelevant.

Honestly? America should be above that name calling shit. Honestly? America IS above that shit. Does anybody here think that someone is going to vote for Romney because Obama called him a pissy-pants? Do you think no-one is voting for Obama because someone said he's Kenyan?

Give Americans more credit that that - for FUCK sakes. It does not matter what Jon Stewart or Fox News says - Americans will fucking vote for the man they believe in.

It is, oddly enough, as simple as that.

What is not so simple - or easy to explain - is that America will be right in its decision. Even as a pussy, bleeding-hearts.

This is random, rambling bullshit. If you actually read this - I apologize. The point is this: Every free country on the face of the Earth owes its freedom to The United States of America. Every country that is not free? I will not go there.

America, and Americans? I love you all. Every. Fucking. One. Of. You. I'm a pussy pino commie Canadian, but I - and my children - owe The United States of America everything we have.

God knows Canada didn't ever help us...

Goodnight, Ms. Calabash - whereever you are...

I'm people am I, genius?

Oh I see. Because you can't challenge anything I actually said, you construct a strawman to waste your time arguing over instead. Here's a reminder, brains: I said NASA is not a synonym for science. Are you claiming it is?

Feel free to Google "NASA", "synonym" and "science" before your next reply.

I know you're trying your best to look like a dipshit here, but try and riddle this: science existed long before the USA even existed, never mind NASA. A bunch of random inventions != all science. Or even anything close.

In fact almost everything to do with science and mathematics has absolutely nothing to do with NASA. If you have anything to challenge that statement, which should be self-evident to anyone with even the most tenuous grasp of science or reality, well, you'd have already done so. So instead, you may apologize for your mistake and then fuck off.

Blah blah blah blah blah. Now go back and read what I actually said, and then look up the word "science".

Prove it. While you're at it, prove that handing out a trillion dollars a year to any other (non-military) organization or individual wouldn't have provided the same, or even greater, scientific benefits.

You can't prove it, because you're just a typical forum buffoon who revels in his own stupidity and spouts inane opinion as fact.

You should really have this sig below a separator.

I've got no answer to that question.

I love it when people make the argument that since I mispelled something, I have no right to make an argument...I am a 2 finger typer who doesn't take the time to spell check his posts on an internet forum or worry about proper sentence structure...

The best way to advance technology/math/science is to try to do extreme things beyond what we currently do(like go to mars).......then we use the stuff we learned doing that to do more mundane things...see an example here

and here

I do appreciate your funny attempt at logic...your sentence structure is soo very wonderful, but you don't seeem to have a basic grasp the subject

um, who do you think works at NASA???? NASA funds a bunch of really smart people in different fields(like math and science) to push the limits of what they and technology can do....that is what drives us forward.

You really have no idea what you are arguing.

finding life on another planet would be useful if we would just be able to stop killing life on this one

We never sent anything to Mars and we never went to the moon

are you serious?

You also misspelled misspelled.

No, it's quite obvious you really have no idea what I'm arguing.

why don't they land probes here instead of the wastelands they always do? Yes.. These are all pictures from mars.. see more here...

Humanity needs to move out and colonize mars and other planetoids in the solar system. Right now all the eggs are in one basket.
The first trillonaires will be made in space.

50 reasons to go to mars

There's money to be had in zero-grav porn!