4 ms·

Do you really think that we know everything about the moon that there's to learn? That, if we researched the moon with new scientific methods developed since th

Do you really think that we know everything about the moon that there's to learn? That, if we researched the moon with new scientific methods developed since the 70's it would not tell us anything new? Sure, an economic benefits analysis may show out that we don't expect any (direct) breakthroughs coming from moon research that will be worth the money. Fair enough. But saying that it doesn't make sense is overly negative. In the worst case it'd be an exercise in (applied) human space travel and closed life support, which is also far from a solved problem... I suspect visiting the moon needs to be "easy routine" before we can even start seriously thinking about human settlements on Mars. (and maybe we could try growing vegetables on the moon before the Chinese do it :-)

sami36 14y ago
You make a good point. We might not have learned everything that we could. My point is we've learned enough. That was phrased poorly. That being said, going to the moon would require huge investments. Allocating resources doesn't happen in a vacuum, there is so much we can do with money that would be a smarter & more productive allocation of capital than going back the moon. I'm not against sending robotic probes a la Curiosity or pathfinder. But I'd have a hard time advocating for a new Apollo program or a moon base unless & until some clear benefit is established. Regardless, the point of the article was the inefficiencies of government. What I was arguing for is the pointlessness of bringing up this argument in light of the questionable returns of a moon enterprise. There are many other ways in which you could compare the efficiency of government investment vs private capital (cancer research, infrastructure building, education, healthcare )
smacktoward 14y ago
Just because there may be things to learn on the moon doesn't mean we have to send humans there to learn them. Robots would work just as well in most cases. And since sending robots is cheaper than sending people, we could send more robots for the same amount of money, thus increasing the amount we learn.

sami36 14y ago

You make a good point. We might not have learned everything that we could. My point is we've learned enough. That was phrased poorly. That being said, going to the moon would require huge investments. Allocating resources doesn't happen in a vacuum, there is so much we can do with money that would be a smarter & more productive allocation of capital than going back the moon. I'm not against sending robotic probes a la Curiosity or pathfinder. But I'd have a hard time advocating for a new Apollo program or a moon base unless & until some clear benefit is established. Regardless, the point of the article was the inefficiencies of government. What I was arguing for is the pointlessness of bringing up this argument in light of the questionable returns of a moon enterprise. There are many other ways in which you could compare the efficiency of government investment vs private capital (cancer research, infrastructure building, education, healthcare )

smacktoward 14y ago

Just because there may be things to learn on the moon doesn't mean we have to send humans there to learn them. Robots would work just as well in most cases. And since sending robots is cheaper than sending people, we could send more robots for the same amount of money, thus increasing the amount we learn.