It failed... you think it's worth launching $800 million dollar duds?

Someone needs to get a grip, Mars sucks.


M

Didn't fail. They just need to reboot it.

I just hope it's twin, due to land in a couple of weeks, doesn't have the same problem.

And you're missing the whole point of this Mars Exploration stuff.

Lower gravity, thinner atmosphere, think of the racing man! Almost zero wind-resistance! Okay, so aircooled engines are out. . .

Oh! That's worth $800mil! WOOHOO!

<_<


M

lemmy think for second ...

spend $800 mio total to get the rover to mars,
another $1000 mio. for NASA per year to fly a bunch-o-guys to mars.

OR

$1000 mio. a month to play war-games in iraq.


what do you think, which one is more important in the long run
and which one is going to cost A LOT LESS ?


did i just start another flame war?
Andy

Yeah, Saddam was only killing Iraqis, it's none of our business.



Cool, I have just enough money to pay my bills, I guess it's time for a 30 day vacation in Hawaii.

M

hopefully, no one will have to remotely "reboot" you while you examine the sand in Hawaii ...

Andy

Esel!


M

You just wait. When they find the Iraqi weapons of mass destruction on Mars, who will be laughing then?!!?

-Tony

The Uranians?


M

Geeze Miles, don't scare me like that... I thought ou won the lotto with the numbers I gave you!

.........b

Andy, why do you and I bite on these OT thread every time?
I agree, there isn't much that we need on Mars right now but we should still be spending money on it before Iraq! Some day we might need Mars. Iraq will still be there.

OK, gotta do it.....

There is intrinsic value to knowledge apart from the economic. While on the previous space thread, the economic return of space exploration was addressed ($7 benefit to $1 expended as I recall), there HAS to be further exploration. Be it here on good ol' Earth or out in the cosmos. We need to explore! Where would any advance in humankind come from were it not for adventure? Intellectual or physical. Where would the improvements in our cars come from in the last 30 years were it not for exploration in internal combustion and the flow of gases? Was the economic benefit always obvious? Never! It takes balls to put it on the line and see what we find. One can never judge the future benefit of exploration by todays yard stick (meter stick for those on base 10). Foresight is NEVER 20/20 and it is easy to be a naysayer. However, hindsight will tell whether we made the best damn bet in the world or pissed away nearly a billion $ on a golf cart on Mars.

But be that as it may, man has to know. Whether anyone feels that knowledge has a $ value at present. Knowledge is an end in itself.

Very well put, Scott. If you don't push the envelope you won't find out what is out there. At least there is some vision of the future, not just raising taxes and giving it away on social programs.

(here come the flames from the left)

Paul

Nope... Flames from the RIGHT. Privatize it.

$7 return on a dollar? PROVE IT. Show me the money. It's BULLSHIT!

brought to you by people who make up statistics to have their way

Anything out there, can either be imagined, sythesized, or simulated HERE, FOR NEXT TO NOTHING!

We have PLENTY to explore, right here on Earth.

I am all for huge, expensive telescopes in space, when you can figure out a way for us to fly to the next nearest star, CALL ME, you bunch of science fiction freaks!

This is my lifetime, you are throwing money away, wait til I am dead.


M

I got news for ya, even with Hubble they have yet to find another Blue Planet. Steve

So what parts that we currently use on our 35 year old cars have ties to the space program?

How about the carbon fiber brake pads and those cool carbon fiber fan shrouds.

I can't believe the computer/techies that are on here that don't support the proposed space program. Don't you all see this as future income and employment?

Paul

There might not be another blue planet. That's why we have to learn to live on a red one, now, before Saddam uses all his "nucular" (as Bush would say it) WMD to destroy the earth.
hum, what should we spend our money on.......?

I say give the people 24/7 telescope channels on TV, and telescopes a mile wide, anything but sending another loser frikken Radio Shack racecar probe to a rust ball.


M

hey red, time to up the dose!!!!! (humor intended)


appreciate your postion but will choose to disagree.

and as far as the cost/benefit quote, as indicated, i reported what i remembered. however, i went on to say knowledge is an end to itself. i will never sway from that belief. i acknowledge a lot of bullshit science out there (e.g. entry/exit wound studies on dead dogs) but an amazing amount of transferable information is gleaned from the most unlikely sources. thank god for the guy who threw an under cooked loaf of bread into a bucket of water and tested the result a week or so later (we call that beer now)

and how would we find out how to do that if we never even tried to fly to the next f**ing planet !?!?!


Andy

i'm all up for space exploration. this country wouldn't be what it is today if it hadn't been for those guys with the itch to explore and expand their horizons.

just look at the economic boost portugal got out of finding america!
(too bad they couldn't make it last, but that's another story in itself)

Andy

If NASA wants a close-up view of Mars, why don't they just point the Hubble at it?

I thought the Indians were already here?

Paul

they were. but no one had told the europeans that.
so for them, it was like finding water on mars.

Andy

they have. more than once. very nice pictures, btw.
but that doesn't give you any soil-samples, now does it?

Andy

Hubble is good but it can't find water or single cell organisms.

Didn't you see the Casino off to the right of Plymouth Rock?
(or is that just a Canadian joke?)

I don't drink.

Why do we have to go to Mars? Why? Why do we have to go to another planet? Why?

What good is it going to do us? (*US*, all of US)

Average Joe is bespectacled by stars the moment you mention space travel... to another planet. Joe saw it all on TV, he imagines a World with transporters, and purple sex bandit alien women. He loves football, and doesn't really care about where his money goes, once the US Government has it... -"God, just don't let the IRS audit me!" said Joe.- He saw the headline, while heading off to the sports page, "$800 trillion dollars shipped to Mars"

Joe accidently caught something on the news about GOVERNMENT SPONSORED HEALTH CARE, while he was waiting on a pre-game show, the Jersey Knockers were facing off against the LA Poonswagglers, LA 89-4... anyways, Joe thinks he'd love FREE healthcare.

Individuals are losing everything. Since we don't have borders anymore, the jobs that pay $25 an hour and less are being taken by people who will do it for $6 an hour, live with 39 family members, all making $6 an hour in a one bath apartment, and then the people left with jobs are going to pay for their 'guest worker' healthcare.

Pretty cruel thing to happen to a person. Declare a mandate (ie; Mars, Healthcare, program.. whatever) and then force the money out of his grandchildren's children's children.

Anyways, launch what you want at Mars, and get a free tit job... just remember the Holy Roman Empire.


M

"My family has had nothing but trouble with for'iners since we came over here" from M*A*S*H.

Paul

The Average Joe I saw on TV this week got to kiss a beautiful Ex Miss America contestant.
He definately wasn't thinking of Mars

Miles,
You just don't what us to explore space 'cause we may find out where you're REALLY from!

Paul

And before that getesses wAAAY out of hand, let me qualify that with 'illegals'.


M

Ya but Bush wants to register them all so that they will vote for him......and than maybe he can kick them out or force tham to pay taxes. Not a bad idea I think. (couldn't have been his own)

How will illegal tax payers, paying less money than the people_who_used_to_have_their_jobs, for more money, help us?

It's a terrible idea, I am writing in Al Sharpton.


M

FACT: The illegal taxpayers will not make enough to pay, so they will get a big refund, and healthcare, and someone has to provide healthcare for the people that used to do those jobs... those $25/hr jobs.. that now pay $6 to illegals.

That's my prediction.. I have crystal balls.



Affganystan need a space program!


M

You're right, the poor don't pay taxes anyway.

Easy, right now they are making $4/hr and paying no taxes.
Once it is out in the open they will be making $5-$6/hr and $1.50 will go to taxes.
$1.50/hr x 40-50 hours /week x millions of illegal workers = big money in the government coffers. (and big bussiness still get to keep their slave labour)

Poor, but... what I am saying is all these things cut the middle class out, and turn this country into a slum!! It's painful! I can't bear to watch!



The big problem might be something like people without money, can't buy anything. heh


M

They have a space program, a cheap one. We call it OPIUM

If I'm not mistaken I thought I read that the US has over 13 million illegal workers. If thats right its about 1/3 the Canadian population, ouch. That already cuts out a good chunk of the middle class.

Maybe you didn't hear what I said..

The people making $6 an hour, will be filling the place of plumbers, and roofers, and other skilled trades... for instance, on Hilton Head, those people used to make $25-$40 an hour, and the companies that employed them got $65-$75 an hour for their work.

So, to recap, instead of 5,000 people netting $45,000-$80,000 per year, we now have all those people without work, and 5000 illegal people netting $12,000-$15,000 per year, and getting a tax refund, while spend all the money in another country, and have head transplants on my dime.

Ok, phew! Glad I got that cleared up. I see your point.


M

I guess I don't understand your tax laws enough. Up here everyone who makes over 5K a year has to pay some tax.
I don't think that proposal of Bush's will bring more illegal workers into the country, just expose the ones who are already there.
If they are collecting refunds then something will have to be done about it.
But that we will have to leave up to Alfred. (what name is he going by this week?)

C'mon M...People in that income bracket do not even begin to pay income tax. If they're legal, maybe get an earned income credit (?) Don't get that one...just more subsidisation.

Like our third greatest president said "Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidise it."

you said:

"Mars sucks ..."

and i disagree. can't we just all love this little red planet?


as for the taxes, i'm not so sure that all or even half of the illegal workes here take away jobs from the middle class.
dunno about the rest of the country, but pretty much all the hispanic illegal workes i see around here do jobs no one with the educational level and skillset of Miles would even wanna touch.
and those jobs have never paid $25 and hour either.

Andy

I think we really should be spending more. A lot more. I think the Moon and Mars should be made ready for colonization to take some of the weight off Earth. I mean, the population is at over 6 billion and skyrocketing. We can either let nature do its thing and create massive famine when there is more people than food, killing off billions and stabilizing the population, or we could set up other planets as a sort of overflow parking lot.

Supposedly, it is possible to make Mars a blue planet within 150 years.

I can only assume this is done with a very large paintbrush?

We need to start thinking about the future... Some things are more important than Iraq.

Americans spend more on pizza each year than we do on our space program.

But I love pizza

The illegals here do get all the building trades jobs, and they make 12-15k/year ... the house prices haven't changed, still $300k on the lowest low end. There used to be legals doing those jobs, for 3x the money.



uhhh.... nevermind, just go back to watching the auction.



M

I think it was worth going to Mars because that started the thread that produced the timeless diddy
We Like the Moon ! http://www.rathergood.com/moon_song/
I am forever grateful to NASA

The Silver Surfer