Should NASA's budget be increased?

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

Private enterprise is moving faster on space exploration at this point.

Of course, how much of this is due to budget cuts and the fact that private enterprise knows what to do because NASA did it before them?

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

No, why? NASA should probably be abolished entirely.

May I ask why?

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

If anyone can justify why NASA should even exist, let alone have its budget doubled because MUH SPACE I'd be happy to listen.

The numerous innovations they create alone are enough to justify a funding increase in my view. Furthermore, I don't like the way you so casually dismiss space exploration as a way to get points among the cynical crowd as you hate on people who want to explore the universe and get answers. Would you have opposed the Homestead Act because of "MUH WEST"?

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

If anyone can justify why NASA should even exist, let alone have its budget doubled because MUH SPACE I'd be happy to listen.

The numerous innovations they create alone are enough to justify a funding increase in my view. Furthermore, I don't like the way you so casually dismiss space exploration as a way to get points among the cynical crowd as you hate on people who want to explore the universe and get answers. Would you have opposed the Homestead Act because of "MUH WEST"?

Right, but by that logic we should be praying for a third world war since plenty of side-innovations come out of that. Focusing on tangential possible benefits isn't convincing.

Please, Oak, you're better than this.

Starry-eyed (sorry) talk about "exploring the universe" or whatever isn't good justification for spending billions of dollars as far as I'm concerned - what are we exploring? Does it make a tangible difference to anyone's life if we know that there's a certain type of rock on the moon? Particularly when the private sector space industry is rapidly becoming a thing...

If we don't have stars in our eyes, then what will fill the void? Dust and dirt and the inexorable creep of the rising oceans? That new rock we find on the moon could power our civilization for decades to come as the human race spreads itself out among the stars. And billions of dollars is nothing to the United States budget, especially when it helps to increase our knowledge of the universe and our place in it - unlike you, I am a believer in the idea of knowledge for knowledge's sake, and that seems to be the point where we differ, going our separate ways as the cynical apathete and the idealistic (for idealism is what got us where we are today) dreamer. Without dreams, we wouldn't have anything to strive for.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

If anyone can justify why NASA should even exist, let alone have its budget doubled because MUH SPACE I'd be happy to listen.

Markets don't handle R&D particularly well. Before government competence was murdered by implementing and expanding The Great Society, our government did R&D quite well.

Shut up about the Great Society, and stop capitalizing the "the". It's not The Great Gatsby set in 1965 and starring Lyndon Johnson, though I would pay good money for that.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

If anyone can justify why NASA should even exist, let alone have its budget doubled because MUH SPACE I'd be happy to listen.

The numerous innovations they create alone are enough to justify a funding increase in my view. Furthermore, I don't like the way you so casually dismiss space exploration as a way to get points among the cynical crowd as you hate on people who want to explore the universe and get answers. Would you have opposed the Homestead Act because of "MUH WEST"?

Right, but by that logic we should be praying for a third world war since plenty of side-innovations come out of that. Focusing on tangential possible benefits isn't convincing.

Please, Oak, you're better than this.

Starry-eyed (sorry) talk about "exploring the universe" or whatever isn't good justification for spending billions of dollars as far as I'm concerned - what are we exploring? Does it make a tangible difference to anyone's life if we know that there's a certain type of rock on the moon? Particularly when the private sector space industry is rapidly becoming a thing...

If we don't have stars in our eyes, then what will fill the void? Dust and dirt and the inexorable creep of the rising oceans? That new rock we find on the moon could power our civilization for decades to come as the human race spreads itself out among the stars. And billions of dollars is nothing to the United States budget, especially when it helps to increase our knowledge of the universe and our place in it - unlike you, I am a believer in the idea of knowledge for knowledge's sake, and that seems to be the point where we differ, going our separate ways as the cynical apathete and the idealistic (for idealism is what got us where we are today) dreamer. Without dreams, we wouldn't have anything to strive for.

In other words, you want the government to spend other peoples' money to fulfill your own (highly subjective) dreams and ideals about space?

In some words, yes - the entirety of government is spending each other's money (or not) to fulfill our own highly subjective dreams and ideals about society. And I did mention the myriad innovations that come either directly from or by way of NASA, like freeze-dried food and cochlear implants.

Furthermore, AD, the moon landing came after the Great Society.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

snip

In some words, yes - the entirety of government is spending each other's money (or not) to fulfill our own highly subjective dreams and ideals about society. And I did mention the myriad innovations that come either directly from or by way of NASA, like freeze-dried food and cochlear implants.

Furthermore, AD, the moon landing came after the Great Society.

NASA doesn't justify its costs.

So who are you a sock of again?

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

Moon colonies are fools good. We should go straight to Mars, and there's a decent chance we will in the next 10 years. The question is will it be done haphazardly with no governmental oversight by corporations, or in a orderly fair manner by NASA and its foreign equivalents.

Mars has long been uninhabitable, and that's a fact. Was inhabitable maybe millions, billions of years ago? Yes, but since then it's simply not going to work.

Somebody said that it couldn’t be done
      But he with a chuckle replied
That “maybe it couldn’t,” but he would be one
      Who wouldn’t say so till he’d tried.
So he buckled right in with the trace of a grin
      On his face. If he worried he hid it.
He started to sing as he tackled the thing
      That couldn’t be done, and he did it!

Somebody scoffed: “Oh, you’ll never do that;
      At least no one ever has done it;”
But he took off his coat and he took off his hat
      And the first thing we knew he’d begun it.
With a lift of his chin and a bit of a grin,
      Without any doubting or quiddit,
He started to sing as he tackled the thing
      That couldn’t be done, and he did it.

There are thousands to tell you it cannot be done,
      There are thousands to prophesy failure,
There are thousands to point out to you one by one,
      The dangers that wait to assail you.
But just buckle in with a bit of a grin,
      Just take off your coat and go to it;
Just start in to sing as you tackle the thing
      That “cannot be done,” and you’ll do it.

- Edgar Albert Guest