NASA to spiral down the drain.

[DarkCloud]

I'm sorry, but this is my point. Private Industry will not step in to send people to the moon or build a Hubble Space Telescope, so it falls upon government agencies to do so.

If there is economic incentive to do those things, private industry will be there in a jiffy.

If there isn't economic incentive- then why do them?

If there's no monetary benefit from sending people to the moon, then there's no reason to do it- it's even more pointless than giving free government welfare handouts to everyone in the form of a tax rebate check.

I like space, but isn't it a better idea to explore the depths of the oceans first? Many of those technologies necessary for such exploration will benefit the world more proximately than space technologies that frankly have no return on investment and are little more than prestige projects. And as an added bonus, sea exploration can lead to technologies that MAY make space exploration more viable!

Space weapons make sense.
As can tourism.
Space exploration, not so much.

Explore and Exploit the oceans first!

[Lonestar]

Originally posted by DarkCloud


If there is economic incentive to do those things, private industry will be there in a jiffy.

If there isn't economic incentive- then why do them?

(1)There wasn't any monetary incentive for the Manhattan Project either.

(2)Part of Science means we may not get the monetary benefits until later, or we may get monetary benefits out of it from an unexpected source. The LHC would be considered a waste of money under your premise.

[Naked Gents Rut]

The LHC would be considered a waste of money under your premise.

Don't read the spoiler, KH...

Spoiler:

The LHC is a waste of money!

[DinoDoc]

LHC?

[Naked Gents Rut]

LHC?

http://www.zimbio.com/CERN+Hadron+Collider/articles/437/CERN+Large+Hadron+Collider+Profligate+Waste

[DanS]

Originally posted by Lonestar
And it still does it order of magnitudes better than private industry.

Even if it did (which I don't concede), it wouldn't make NASA's cost structure any lower or the things that it does any more sustainable.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Naked Gents Rut
Don't read the spoiler, KH...

Spoiler:

The LHC is a waste of money!

I tried that on him already. It turns out he agrees

Takes all the fun out of everything

[Naked Gents Rut]

I suppose no halfway reasonable person could disagree with that.

[DarkCloud]

(1)There wasn't any monetary incentive for the Manhattan Project either.

You did notice I went on to say I supported governments spending money on Space Weapons (although, of course, such things are outlawed by treaty) but in theory, I could support Space weapons because they offer a clear benefit to a country- and arguably a clear economic benefit since they allow a country to defend itself against military and economic assaults.

For example:

Spoiler:

If Norway were to put a satellite in space that could disable American and Russian spy satellites, that could arguably be a good use of Norwegian oil funds since it might allow Norway to hold Americans and Russians for ransom much as pirates in the Gulf of Aden currently hold ships for ransom.

---

(2)Part of Science means we may not get the monetary benefits until later, or we may get monetary benefits out of it from an unexpected source. The LHC would be considered a waste of money under your premise.

- Yes, it is. I find it fascinating, but it is a waste of money. Thus, the only reason I am ambivalent about the cancellation of the Superconducting Supercollider in the United States is that so much money was already sunk into the white elephant that it was a bit odd to cancel it after the concrete was already poured.

- What has spending bizarrely large amounts of public funds on Research for the sake of pure, unprofitable research gotten the human race?
1) Columbus was searching for a better trade route.
2) The original space research into telescopes have benefited humankind greatly in the fields of optics; still, these were created by hobbyists and entrepreneurs. I see nothing wrong if an entrepreneur wants to pursue a hobby or a lark in the hopes of making large amounts of cash. But a public government should not be funding such things unless the benefits can be pointed to.
3) The space program in America did help with several technological advances from what I recall; but also, almost all of the actually useful advances would have been invented within a few years time due to synergies with private and other (more profitable and useful) government programs. The reason the inventions are useful is that they are designed to attack problems on Earth.
--
I find it interesting to read how the military bases some of its technologies on toy manufacturers- the most inventive people are those whose livelihoods depend on them producing inventions... pure uneconomic science is not dedicated to output, but merely fantastically theoreticizing (such as about string theory) that ultimately leads to many dead ends (and some good ones) but there is not as much incentive to reach the good ends if you get paid either way. Prestige can encourage, but the threat of not having food on the table is more encouraging. (Caveat: Research programs rewarding performance are perhaps as good as profit-driven research programs... but there's a problem there, the people will be fearful to dream "big" and think of bizarre solutions to problems if they fear they have to output- so basically a performance-driven research program will have similar results as a profit-driven research program... Note: In the poor economy Google is scaling back on its "random beta testing research groups"... One wonders why? Because outside of Gmail, (possibly Google Reader and News) and Picasa, its research groups have invented few hits (especially in proportion to the amount of time spent on odd things)- they aren't exactly producing toward what people want.)

Wonder why computing power can double every 18 months? (or faster)... because there's economic demand. The PC makers are responding to the market and as such, they can invest the time, talent, and money into computer design. When there's a market and a payoff, people will produce due to positive reinforcement and competition.

Sadly, space lacks much of a market. I have great hope for space tourism however! If anything can justify ships to the moon, it would be space tourism. (or, alternatively, the discovery of some rare metals which would not cost a prohibitive amount to transport back to earth).

[TCO]

NASA killed those guys on the space shuttle cause they are a bunch of bearocratic politically correct hodads.

[MarkG]

bearocratic?

a state run by bears?

[TCO]

Wassup Markie? Let me know if you need any columns written.

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Naked Gents Rut

The LHC is a waste of money!

Duh.

[KrazyHorse]

In fact, the waste caused by the LHC is arguably far greater than the cost of the entire project would indicate...

[KrazyHorse]

I think that the opportunity cost involved in keeping a large fraction of the world's smartest people on a project which is of no use to anybody except themselves dwarfs the 8 or 10 billion dollar price tag of the machine and salaries. Note that most of these brains aren't directly employed by the project, but would be forced to do something else if there was not expectation of new data in the near future. The important factor here is that most of these people are driven by non-pecuniary motives in choosing their line of work, so their labour is worth far more than their salary would indicate.

A similar statement may be true of NASA, though with far less brainpower being wasted.