5 ms·

I am sorry but the attitude of half of this thread is simply disgusting; from 'haha' to you better provide food before creating space missions. I was just as sk

I am sorry but the attitude of half of this thread is simply disgusting; from 'haha' to you better provide food before creating space missions. I was just as skeptical about the budget and our capabilities (Yes, I am an Indian - if that wasn't obvious already) but I, even after having actually suffered from poor infrastructure and have seen failed launches as well as people suffering from hunger, support the cause wholeheartedly. If you have a problem with how your government's aid money is being spent in India, please go forward and lobby for the aid to get cut off. How we spend our tax money is a decision that we should be allowed to make. Honestly, I am surprised that HackerNews has the sentiment of pointing out expenditures on science to be extravagant and unnecessary by using social conditions as excuse, while there is so much more we could save by changing our military, social or economic standpoints. US's military budget was $663.84B in 2010 [1] while United Nations budget was just around $5.2B during the same time [2] and it's not that United States is all free from hunger or food insecurities [3]. So please, whichever country that you belong to will have issues just like us. We probably have a lot more of those than you do, but we have the right to decide which of those do we want to tackle now at the expense of being behind in our long term goals. And I request you to keep your preferences to yourself and stop forcing your morality/ethics/logic onto us in such private matters. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_budget_of_the_United_States [2] http://www.un.org/en/hq/dm/pdfs/oppba/Regular%20Budget.pdf [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunger#In_the_United_States

gadders 14y ago
You have the right to determine how you spend your own money. Whilst you are still taking handouts from other nations, then it is not a private matter. The US does spend a lot on their military, and they may have some very deprived areas where people have less food than required (but I highly doubt anyone in the US starves to death). Likewise, though, the US doesn't have young girls whose job it it to collect other peoples faeces with their bare hands [1]. I would say a country that has that doesn't need a Mars mission. [1] http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=o0vpXaPf_9AC&pg=PT62&lpg=PT62&dq=dalit+girls+rose+george&source=bl&ots=LaJva0SDkZ&sig=J9aTmU9mmbzMD6ZPNUja5SkF03g&hl=en&sa=X&ei=1ZMrUOGDBuOi0QXZ7YG4Bw&ved=0CEwQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=dalit%20girls%20rose%20george&f=false http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=o0vpXaPf_9AC&pg=PT62&...
- biggfoot 14y ago
  Of course the entire country of a billions makes all their women folk do such acts, don't we? You are right. How do we even dare!
  - gadders 14y ago
    Of course you don't. I realise India is a country of great contrast, with a mix of modern cities and less developed rural areas. I also think (and hope) that India becomes a greater power than China. But having a Mars mission whilst taking state aid is like spending your unemployment benefit on an iPad whilst your children go hungry.
    - spitx 14y ago
      Or like bailing out the Greeks and the Irish when parts of your own country are on the verge of destitution. Perhaps this explains the recent nazi unrest in the East German state of Brandenburg. http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/masked-neo-nazi-immortals-storm-germany-web-article-1.1135968 http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/masked-neo-nazi-immort...
      - gadders 14y ago
        Don't get me started on the EU.... :-)
    - ajays 14y ago
      You keep bringing up "whilst taking state aid", despite the fact that India does NOT take much of state aid from the US: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_foreign_aid http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_foreign_aid
      - gadders 14y ago
        I'm British.
plinkplonk 14y ago
Never ever feed the trolls. - Old Internet saying. (This argument always always comes up and goes nowhere, and is a well known time sink. People who keep bringing it up in every other thread are trolls. Lots of people with nothing to do but hate and or give unasked-for advice jump on these known timesinks if you give them your attention. Not worth responding to them. Respond to people who have something useful to say. Meanwhile India (like every nation on Earth)does what it does, depending on local perception of policy needs and all the blather on Teh Internetz by people who have ideas on what she "should" be doing is irrelevant. Don't lose your temper, because it just ends up making trolls happy and derailing useful discussion)
smoyer 14y ago
As an Indian I think you and your countrymen (used in the gender-neutral sense) do have the right to criticize/guide your country's spending. And with respect to the US's military budget, you have to think of it as our form of welfare. Most of that budget goes to overpaid company executives, managers and maybe even engineers. Our economy would be in tatters without that spending (or maybe we're in tatters now but would be naked otherwise). I'd love to see more of our budget employ people doing useful things (directly employ I mean) ... and space science seems like a good long-term investment. So I'll cheer for India's success and lament its problems along with you, but I haven't a right to dictate its policy.

gadders 14y ago

You have the right to determine how you spend your own money. Whilst you are still taking handouts from other nations, then it is not a private matter. The US does spend a lot on their military, and they may have some very deprived areas where people have less food than required (but I highly doubt anyone in the US starves to death). Likewise, though, the US doesn't have young girls whose job it it to collect other peoples faeces with their bare hands [1]. I would say a country that has that doesn't need a Mars mission. [1] http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=o0vpXaPf_9AC&pg=PT62&lpg=PT62&dq=dalit+girls+rose+george&source=bl&ots=LaJva0SDkZ&sig=J9aTmU9mmbzMD6ZPNUja5SkF03g&hl=en&sa=X&ei=1ZMrUOGDBuOi0QXZ7YG4Bw&ved=0CEwQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=dalit%20girls%20rose%20george&f=false http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=o0vpXaPf_9AC&pg=PT62&...

biggfoot 14y ago
Of course the entire country of a billions makes all their women folk do such acts, don't we? You are right. How do we even dare!
- gadders 14y ago
  Of course you don't. I realise India is a country of great contrast, with a mix of modern cities and less developed rural areas. I also think (and hope) that India becomes a greater power than China. But having a Mars mission whilst taking state aid is like spending your unemployment benefit on an iPad whilst your children go hungry.
  - spitx 14y ago
    Or like bailing out the Greeks and the Irish when parts of your own country are on the verge of destitution. Perhaps this explains the recent nazi unrest in the East German state of Brandenburg. http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/masked-neo-nazi-immortals-storm-germany-web-article-1.1135968 http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/masked-neo-nazi-immort...
    - gadders 14y ago
      Don't get me started on the EU.... :-)
  - ajays 14y ago
    You keep bringing up "whilst taking state aid", despite the fact that India does NOT take much of state aid from the US: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_foreign_aid http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_foreign_aid
    - gadders 14y ago
      I'm British.

plinkplonk 14y ago

Never ever feed the trolls. - Old Internet saying. (This argument always always comes up and goes nowhere, and is a well known time sink. People who keep bringing it up in every other thread are trolls. Lots of people with nothing to do but hate and or give unasked-for advice jump on these known timesinks if you give them your attention. Not worth responding to them. Respond to people who have something useful to say. Meanwhile India (like every nation on Earth)does what it does, depending on local perception of policy needs and all the blather on Teh Internetz by people who have ideas on what she "should" be doing is irrelevant. Don't lose your temper, because it just ends up making trolls happy and derailing useful discussion)

smoyer 14y ago

As an Indian I think you and your countrymen (used in the gender-neutral sense) do have the right to criticize/guide your country's spending. And with respect to the US's military budget, you have to think of it as our form of welfare. Most of that budget goes to overpaid company executives, managers and maybe even engineers. Our economy would be in tatters without that spending (or maybe we're in tatters now but would be naked otherwise). I'd love to see more of our budget employ people doing useful things (directly employ I mean) ... and space science seems like a good long-term investment. So I'll cheer for India's success and lament its problems along with you, but I haven't a right to dictate its policy.