Intelligent Discussions

DS

Fenderbender
This thread is dedicated to the educated,socially responsible posters here that enjoy a good debate.
Education is not a prerequisite,any well thought out opinion will be acceptable.
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Lets discuss the Mars mission.The curiosity is set to move ahead 3 metres tomorrow.
Is this good for America?The world?,or just a big waste of money.
 
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moreluck

golden ticket member
This thread is dedicated to the educated,socially responsible posters here that enjoy a good debate.
Education is not a prerequisite,any well thought out opinion will be acceptable.
******************************************************************************

Lets discuss the Mars mission.The curiosity is set to move ahead 3 metres tomorrow.
Is this good for America?The world?,or just a big waste of money.

Most Americans don't know what a meter is....just sayin!
 

DS

Fenderbender
Most Americans don't know what a meter is....just sayin!

They must be aware that it represents a certain length of distance.
Joyce,this is not "most Americans",it's the brown cafe,and since they are
here,they know how to google.By the way,it's spelled metre everywhere else
in the world.Do you actually have an opinion on my Mars topic? I bet you do.
I would rather have had that than just sayin !
 

klein

Für Meno :)
I suppose it (this thread), turns into the metric system again.
NASA calculates in metric, so do all medications.
I even noticed Coke and Pepsi are selling by 2 ltrs in the USA instead of half gallons or by oz's.

I can't care less, but I was very pleased that Canada went metric while I was away in Germany. Because I have not much of a clue what oz mean.
Even when I do my own "do it yourself jobs" at home, I use the metric messurement - it's just so much easier. Esspecially using a tape messure.
 

rod

Retired 22 years
I think the Mars mission is a friggin humongous waste of money. Seriously---what the hell good will being able to get to Mars do? From what I read- for a few minutes at high noon on Mars's equator the temperature might get to 70 but for the most part the planet is BITTER cold-------like minus 225 degrees cold. How the hell do you dress for that?
 

klein

Für Meno :)
I think the Mars mission is a friggin humongous waste of money. Seriously---what the hell good will being able to get to Mars do? From what I read- for a few minutes at high noon on Mars's equator the temperature might get to 70 but for the most part the planet is BITTER cold-------like minus 225 degrees cold. How the hell do you dress for that?

Dress to kill ? ;)
 

klein

Für Meno :)
You do mean 10 center manager ! LOL

Btw, could you imagine an imperial currency ststem like the UK once had ?
I still don't remember how many shilling and a half, quaters or eight it made to make 1 pound.

Too bad you didn't adopt that as well, and call us carazy for using 100 pennies to a dollar.
 

DS

Fenderbender
I think the Mars mission is a friggin humongous waste of money. Seriously---what the hell good will being able to get to Mars do? From what I read- for a few minutes at high noon on Mars's equator the temperature might get to 70 but for the most part the planet is BITTER cold-------like minus 225 degrees cold. How the hell do you dress for that?
Thank you rod for responding with a heartfelt comment.
I see it differently.
I think it should have been a manned mission.Who knows what the earth may benefit from the resources that Mars may have to offer.
Is that -225 farenhight or celcius?
Bundle up,like going for a walk in Thunder bay in the winter :)
 

wkmac

Well-Known Member
Lets discuss the Mars mission.The curiosity is set to move ahead 3 metres tomorrow.
Is this good for America?The world?,or just a big waste of money.

DS,

Those are good questions and I have mixed emotions on it. I can understand the "waste of money" POV because you can't see a true outcome or quantify what you are going to get. At the same time from a scientific POV, the study of Mars may answer valuable questions. There's the transpermia hypothesis and what if we learned that life existed on Mars before earth? What would that mean or would it mean anything at all? If life was there, what happened? Can we learn something that we should avoid here? Many questions, few answers.

I do think if we are going to venture beyond, it should be a global and open source effort but that would make it a purely scientific and learning project and we still have too much of the "for flag and glory" in us so not sure if that part can or will change. Again good questions but no definitive answers. Hard to argue with Rod's point especially on the cost when so much can be done here.
 

texan

Well-Known Member
I have mixed feelings about it.
I was so awed and proud as a child watching the moon landing as a young lad.
Proud of the US and awed by the pictures and findings.
The research and development of NASA has benefited mankind. The list could not be posted here.
I posted meter to feet converter url.



Convert from meters to feet
 
The billions spent on space exploration and the resulting technological advances that can be transferred to terrestrial use is really quite comparable to the billions spent on earth by corporations in development to new technology. Think of the space exploration as sprinkles on the sundae.
 

wkmac

Well-Known Member
Tex,

Reading your post brought back memories. We went down in 1982' to see a shuttle launch which of course was delayed but it turned out to the good. We went on a tour of the place and we actually got to go out to the pad (about 400 yards away) and see the shuttle up close so to speak. That was some sight indeed but then we did come back for the actual launch several weeks later(pissed my supervisor off for calling out of work for 2 days) and WOW what a sight it was! I can only imagine what a Saturn 5 was like.

July 69' I remember riding back home in the car from my grandparents house listening to the moon landing on the radio. I was leaning over on the back of the frontseat looking in locked stare at the radio like the voice itself was the picture of the scene. Got home later and watched the actual moonwalk on TV. I don't think a soul in our town wasn't somewhere glued to the TV set watching that. In some respects, seems like yesterday and yet at the same time seems long ago.
 
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