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Trump's NASA cuts would destroy decades of science and wipe out its future
- 0cf8612b2e1e 1y agoAre these people so deluded by American Exceptionalism they think this spending is unnecessary? Or is it that they do not care about anything but accumulating a few extra dollars?
- hkpack 1y agoIt looks like yes and yes.
- deadbabe 1y agoOr until you know… some future President restores the NASA budget?
- bryanlarsen 1y agoThe budget will shutdown many projects that have been running for decades. Those projects generally can't be restarted.
- deadbabe 1y agoSo we will see the end of James Webb telescope?
- whatshisface 1y agoIt's possible. It depends on how deep the cuts are and how much freedom scientists have in choosing. Scientists would prefer to save the major data collection projects, but the political side has stated a preference for manned exploration. What we know will be lost is all of the less politically armed but more useful small projects, including the ones that are used to study our home planet.
- deadbabe 1y agoWell, manned exploration does sound pretty cool though.
- bryanlarsen 1y agoSounds like a good summary of the Trump administration -- fund the high profile, low bang for buck projects and cut the boring high bang for buck projects.
- deadbabe 1y agoPutting people on a moon isn’t low bang for the buck IMO.
- bryanlarsen 1y ago> $200B to put a man on the moon vs < $100M to put a robot on the moon.
- deadbabe 1y agoIt is not that massive of a cost. $3 to $4 billion to put men on the moon. And if you’re doing it regularly you can eventually make optimizations to cost and bring that price down at least to 10%. But we’re out of practice. It’s been almost 60 years.
- nashashmi 1y agoThat will be a new NASA institution. The old NASA will be gone.
- LarsDu88 1y agoBut of course by then the 19 in flight space probes would have floated into the abyss of space costing even more money to redo those project from scratch...
- blindriver 1y ago[flagged]
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- kahirsch 1y agoThe Republicans are planning to increase the deficit.
- neaden 1y agoI mean yeah, pretty easily. We just have to you know, not have a massive tax cut for the rich people that the Republicans are currently trying to pass.
- somanyphotons 1y agoIt's all a tradeoff, will we get a better future from these nasa projects, or from spending the money on the currently planned tax cut extentions? I'd argue that the tax cuts aren't as useful as nasa
- blindriver 1y agoI'm completely against the tax cuts, even though I think getting rid of tax on overtime and tips directly benefits lower income households and will be a stimulus for the economy.
- vmchale 1y agoBefore Trump/Vance nuked US reputation the interest on US bonds was low and provided a safe asset to investors. Spending on scientific research was a no-brainer.
- zeroq 1y agoNASA budget for 2024 was $25 billions. DoD budget was $850 billions. Just saying...
- srameshc 1y ago
- oldpersonintx2 1y ago[dead]
- duxup 1y agoTalk: "America first!" Actual policy: "America... whatever..." The scale of anti-science policies is historic in their scale and even breadth of topics.
- pixl97 1y agoOligarchs first... much like Russia.
- whatshisface 1y agoThat was at first, then Putin started having them murdered. If you think about it, there isn't much of a reason for the individual that is allowed to have all the power to share it with anybody.
- vkou 1y agoMostly the ones that piss him off.
- philipov 1y agoThere were different cliques of oligarchs. Putin had the ones opposing him eliminated, and kept the ones that supported him.
- sorokod 1y agoThe more accurate model for the Russian government is a Mafia family with Putin being the Capo dei capi. The murders are the visible symptoms of the various factions fighting each other.
- FuriouslyAdrift 1y agoNot Mafia but Vor... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thief_in_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thief_in_law
- pixl97 1y agoYou do the hard work of getting the oligarchs to buy up and consolidate the private assets first. Then it's even easier to take those large asset bundles.
- decremental 1y ago[dead]
- frogperson 1y agoTrump admin is just so selfish and parasitic. How do they not understand that science, research, and innovation are what drive the economy they are trying to rob? Truly evil and incompetent.
- duxup 1y agoI recall a quote from Trump about environmental issues was something to the effect of "I'll be dead by then." It fits his approach to everything.
- retroam 1y agoExactly this…it is individualism to the extreme. I don’t think they believe that cutting funding is in the best interest of the collective. But their activists want this so they will do it. It is hard in politics to link cause and effect so the nation as a whole won’t learn from this. I am really heartbroken about all of this. It is possible to reform without burning everything down.
- tokai 1y agoIf you can extract more while harming everyone its an over all win for these types.
- fzeroracer 1y agoOne of the big problems of having a government ran by an oligarchic gerontocracy is that none of the people in charge are going to care about long term effects because they'll be dead before it affects them. So they maximize short term value extraction and destruction. It's not strictly a far right issue either, the dems are feckless and useless for similar reasons being that any sort of long term consequences does not matter to them.
- Braxton1980 1y agoAre both sides equally bad?
- leptons 1y ago
- msgodel 1y ago[flagged]
- nemomarx 1y agowho said he's not cutting enough?
- palmfacehn 1y agoFor a starting premise, we might define "enough" as a balanced budget.
- hackyhacky 1y agoIf a balanced budget is your goal, only two steps are required: reduce military spending, increase taxes. No need to cut research. In practice the current budget bill is wildly unbalanced and will vastly extend our debt, despite extensive cuts to important programs.
- alistairSH 1y agoWe could zero out the military budget and that still doesn't get us anywhere close to balanced. Even cutting 100% of discretionary spending barely does the job. We either need massive cuts in mandatory spending (fundamental changes to social contract) or increased revenue (politically not viable). There's also near zero evidence we actually need a balanced budget for a healthy economy.
- tokai 1y ago>increased revenue (politically not viable) Is that really true? Seems like its just an issue of how you frame it.
- alistairSH 1y agoThe party that controls all three branches of the federal government is pushing a budget that cuts taxes and increase the deficit. There has been zero talk from them about balancing the budget. And there likely won't be, because if they do, they won't be able to use it as a cudgel to beat the Democrats when party control eventually swings the other way.
- tomalaci 1y agoThese kind of policies and that amortization tax law for software development will probably encourage quite some exodus of talent. Would it be to Europe or South East Asia, though?
- whatshisface 1y agoA large part of our talent acquisition would stay home, as the Asian countries, especially China, are expanding their investments. American students would go to work in European universities due to the lesser language barrier. When the US was a developing country a large number of children of wealthy families were sent to study in Europe. I don't think the idea of looking outside the US for knowledge would be natural to many people of this generation. I wonder what the effects on our culture will be - it would certainly reduce the pride.
- Intralexical 1y agoI think at least some of them will come up to Canada. No language barrier, and close enough geographically and culturally to keep most of your connections. We pay less but live longer on average. Seeing all this unfold is doing amazing things for our national pride, ironically.
- FuriouslyAdrift 1y agoCanada is on the brink of serious economic trouble... Recession, housing costs, restricted immigration choices coming soon. This has been brewing for years but the US trade war sped up the timeline. https://nationalpost.com/opinion/high-immigration-is-worsening-canadas-economic-problems-says-report https://nationalpost.com/opinion/high-immigration-is-worseni...
- HPsquared 1y agoUSA pays engineers like 3x as much as those places. It's still global brain drain destination #1.
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- palmfacehn 1y agoWherever budget cuts are proposed, you can rely upon detractors to present the issue in apocalyptic terms. If we believed all of these claims, then it would be impossible to cut the scope of government spending. Furthermore, if we accepted the premise promoted by some commenters here, then research, which is presented as incredibly valuable - would be unable to be funded or valued in the private market. For these reasons I regard this topic to be filled with political hyperbole. Yes, there will be occasions where valuable research is funded by the state. It doesn't follow that this is the only way to fund research. Arguments can be made for either case. Depending on your ideological background you may find some of them amenable. Pragmatism may also play a role. However, presentations like this are completely divorced from reason.
- whatshisface 1y agoYou think you could fundraise billions of dollars for science from private sources? You're talking about a $100B (spread out over the next decade) bill on the sidewalk. I don't think there's anything less realistic than the idea that there would be that amount of money available for the asking but unclaimed...
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- dsign 1y agoI don't agree with the GP either, but I'm pretty sure there are more than 100 B of private capital which are, on the big scheme of things, being spent on quite frivolous things.. if at all. Which reinforces your point: some things good for society as a whole need to be funded by taxes.
- biophysboy 1y agoThe key is that they are investing in frivolous things rather than fundamental medical research because the latter is higher risk and lower reward in money terms. As you say, its precisely the opposite when the metric is future human health.
- roenxi 1y ago[flagged]
- vkou 1y ago> If Californians have a problem with this, they do have the option to fund the science themselves That's rather difficult when the federal government takes their tax money, and then: 1. Best-case: Spends it on their cronies and the states that elected it - while gleefully witholding disaster aid from Cali. 2. Worst-case: Spends it on great-leader-army-parades and illegally kidnapping people and deploying the military against California. Let me turn it around - if flyover country is convinced that immigrants are ruining their glorious utopia, and is willing to destroy fundamental American rights and values to throw them all out - why the hell is it sending it's thugs into blue states? Their 'help' isn't wanted, especially when we get to foot the bill for the shakedown.
- aaomidi 1y agoSure, let’s start having Californians not have to pay federal taxes. I genuinely am not joking, if the govt wants to go this direction then let’s welcome states rights to keep their money within their borders.
- potato3732842 1y agoIt wouldn't actually be a big deal. Some states would win a little and some would lose a little but it wouldn't be life changing for anyone. The cents on the dollar in and out flows fluctuate a lot year to year. The bigger problem is that damn near every state bureaucracy has forgotten how to actually write and evaluate their own damn rules for all sorts of expenditures that are currently spec'd out on a "follow fed guidelines so we can apply for grants" basis.
- TimorousBestie 1y ago> The cents on the dollar in and out flows fluctuate a lot year to year. This doesn’t imply that the net flows average out to zero.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- davidw 1y agoWell, yes, that's the point. Authoritarians want to consolidate power and loot wealth, not improve things or make the world a better place.
- Theodores 1y agoIt is the art of the deal with Trump and I would say that he is a narcissist rather than authoritarian. Trump has a massive ego and I would have expected him to want the biggest rockets, and to pain them gold. If he did then I would denounce him for spending money on space when America has trillions of debt. I don't disagree with him on everything he says just because he said it. So, with space, my honest take is that it was all just a Cold War thing all along. The space race never was about science and exploration, it was always about rocketry for making more devastating missiles. Sure, Voyager went somewhere, but it was all a cover. It seems to me that China and India are doing space science things now. They can get on with it. We are never going to Mars or the moon to live, earth is our home, and always will be.
- api 1y agoNarcissism is actually, in a sense, a very small ego, an enormously fragile sense of self that requires constant validation from outside. It looks a lot like an addiction, with withdrawal occurring when the 'fix' is not obtained. You can see this clearly in certain individuals with obvious narcissistic personality disorder where withdrawal of approval results in an insanely irrational tantrum where they basically revert to toddler-level psychology. If you're like "wait, is this a grown man/woman?" the answer is yes -- but it's one having a "drug" withdrawal fit. Unfortunately this often makes narcissists very successful at social climbing. They're hyper-motivated to advance because that's how you get the next fix.
- hyperman1 1y agoI've never seen this behaviour trough that lens. Thanks, you've made me learn something unexpected today.
- perihelions 1y agoThe primary source this article's reporting on is https://www.planetary.org/articles/nasa-2026-budget-proposal-in-charts https://www.planetary.org/articles/nasa-2026-budget-proposal... ("NASA's disastrous 2026 budget proposal in seven charts")
- pu_pe 1y agoThe US is actively choosing to become completely reliant on private providers for access to space, which at this point boils down to SpaceX and Boeing. Both seem unreliable for different reasons. I just cannot see it as anything else than a blunder.
- LiquidSky 1y agoThen look harder. The “blunder” was orchestrated by the man who owns one of those two companies.
- api 1y agoThe blunder is choosing only two and including Boeing at all. It should be SpaceX, Rocket Lab, and Blue Origin, and maybe soon Stoke Space.
- bumby 1y agoWere you prescient enough to claim that at the time of the contract or only in hindsight? At the time, most thought Boeing was the safer bet.
- api 1y agoI haven't thought Boeing was a good bet pretty much ever, or maybe not since the 1990s but I was a teenager then. Boeing has been on the same path to decline as old GE was for decades.
- aga98mtl 1y agoUS rockets were always made by private providers like SpaceX or Boeing.
- bumby 1y agoYes, but the government has much more control over all aspects, especially design. That changed with the commercial crew program.
- diob 1y agoSometimes I mourn not finishing my astronomy degree, but ultimately I suppose I went the right direction.
- siliconc0w 1y agoIt makes sense that NASA should abandon the SLS and focus on where there isn't already heavy private investment, space launch already has like 8-10 companies competing. Artemis should be refactored to be much cheaper and launch via private companies.
- IceHegel 1y agoNASA has become the DMV for space. It's not the NASA of Wernher von Braun anymore. That's what we should be going for.
- DiogenesKynikos 1y agoNASA's scientific research is incredible. Almost everyone here is narrowly focusing on NASA's manned missions, but the scientific side of NASA is doing amazingly. The James Webb Space Telescope has performed beyond expectations, and is making fundamental discoveries about the history of the Universe and the properties of planets outside our Solar System. NASA has had a string of highly successful scientific missions. Yet the Trump administration is proposing to completely gut NASA's science funding. If these cuts go through, there basically will be no new NASA scientific missions. It's game over for astrophysics and planetary science in the US.
- tchbnl 1y agoIt continues to be a long four years.
- dboreham 1y agoThe plan is working then.
- vlod 1y agoThe All-In-Podcast recently interviewed (1-1) Jared Isaacman (NASA admin nominee) about the bloat. Worth watching the whole interview ~1 hour. [0] Jared Isaacman: What went wrong at NASA | The All-In Interview https://youtu.be/6YdOjoaQTOQ?si=FUeL8mJ6LwHwO_B4&t=1275 https://youtu.be/6YdOjoaQTOQ?si=FUeL8mJ6LwHwO_B4&t=1275
- pstuart 1y agoThere's no doubt that there's waste and inefficiency, but it would be nice if it was addressed by parties who are not hostile to the enterprise as a whole. The concept of a "DOGE" would be wonderful if it actually focused on efficiency of government spending rather than cover to destroy all ideological enemies.
- Whoppertime 1y agoThe concept of "Diversity Equity and Inclusion" would be wonderful if it actually focused on ideological diversity and being welcoming to others rather than being a system designed to produce people with different skin tones and the same opinion, and acting as a racial spoil system
- pstuart 1y agoFrom what I've learned about DEI programs is that the crux of it all is simply to ensure jobs are publicly available and not limited to "insiders". It's been positioned as "Affirmative Action 2.0" by its detractors, and that re-branding is clearly effective as you have been receptive to it. Now I could be wrong, and there could be cases where it has functioned as you suggest. I'm willing to be corrected if compelling evidence is shown. Are you willing to do the same?
- 0xffff2 1y agoNB: _Former_ NASA Administrator nominee. His nomination has been withdrawn.
- dakr 1y agoThe interview where several billionaires floated the idea of getting rid of congress so that private industry can then somehow operate unfettered.
- 0xbadcafebee 1y agoLeading with "Trump" just makes it political/ideological. People need to stop making "the personality" the center of these discussions, because people who like him will just like whatever he does, and immediately disagree with you. Focus on the issue instead and people have to debate on merits rather than ideology.
- LiquidSky 1y agoHe’s the President of the United States and the one (officially) making these decisions. It’d be absurd not to include him in talking about these issues.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- 0xbadcafebee 1y agoI think you could very easily debate the merit of such a cut without talking about who proposed it. If you can't talk about the issue without talking about who proposed it, it's likely you don't actually care about the issue itself.
- LiquidSky 1y agoPretending that Trump isn't a key part of what's going on isn't some kind of noble pure objectivity, it's just being willfully ignorant. Politics doesn't go away just because you ignore it. You have to address reality as it is, not some clean abstraction.
- randomNumber7 1y agoThey will build s.th. working eventually. Even if it costs 10x as spaceX and the Russians laugh about it.
- juancampa 1y agoThis quote about New Horizons is puzzling > The New Horizons spacecraft [...] reached Pluto in 2016 and is currently exploring other distant features of the system [...]. Keeping it running today by receiving its transmitted data and making sure it remains on course costs about $14.7 million a year, or less than 2% of its total price tag. Does anyone know why this would be so expensive? A slice of Deep Space Network time must be expensive but it still sounds like an outrageous figure to me.
- DiogenesKynikos 1y agoHow is that an outrageous figure? You need people for mission operations, to calibrate the data, and to do science with the data. You need access to the Deep Space Network. Beyond that, there is outreach. This can easily come to several million dollars a year. It's a tiny fraction of what we pay on completely meaningless stuff. More is spent on the average US Congressional race every two years, and there are 435 of those. Surely we can spend this much to keep one of humanity's most distant spacecraft working.
- juancampa 1y agoRight, but that budget is enough to pay 60+ $200k salaries. I'd imagine that New Horizons is mostly coasting and there isn't a lot of new data for long periods of time.
- DiogenesKynikos 1y agoLooking at the mission website,[0] there are still a lot of people involved with the mission, spread across science, engineering, operations and management. You would be surprised how much science can be done with an old mission like this, both with the data they already have on hand and with new data. It looks like they have several dozen scientists working on the project (not all necessarily full time). In any case, putting this into perspective, I don't see how it could be a waste to spend $14.7 million / year to keep one of the most distant probes humanity has sent out into space working. 0. https://pluto.jhuapl.edu/Mission/The-Team.php https://pluto.jhuapl.edu/Mission/The-Team.php