Nasa spending on outer space...what about Earth ???

[Zap]

Strongy makes a good point. We can try to prepare now for a possible asteroid or comet colliding with the Earth so that when we discover one with an undesireable course, we have the know how to deal with it. We also have the option to wait until we discover one coming for us and use the (probably) few months that we will then have to try to learn what to do. I would choose the former.

Nasa has already sent probes to analyze comet dust to try to learn about what comets are made of, exactly. Nasa has also successfully landed a probe on an asteroid. That would be the first step in pushing that asteroid into another trajectory.

From what I've seen, Nasa wastes a huge amount of money. However, not all of the money they spend is wasted. They are also accomplishing quite a lot.

The next potential Earth impact probably won't happen in our lifetime. But, then again, it could happen in a year. We just don't know. We're not devoting nearly enough resources to looking for objects with Earth crossing orbits. If you're not looking for it, you either find it by accident or you don't find it. Neither option is palatable.

[Rankenstein]

I'd go further than Strongy. If we are to survive as a species we have to get off-planet and into other solar systems. It's not a maybe, i's a fact. Of course, we may have billions of years to achieve that but as Mr Stronginthearm intimates, we may equally well have less than a hundred years. Development of space technology and the ability to colonise other planets is vital.

NASA's waste is a separate question if you ask me.

[Zap]

Originally Posted by Rankenstein

I'd go further than Strongy. If we are to survive as a species we have to get off-planet and into other solar systems. It's not a maybe, i's a fact. Of course, we may have billions of years to achieve that but as Mr Stronginthearm intimates, we may equally well have less than a hundred years. Development of space technology and the ability to colonise other planets is vital.

NASA's waste is a separate question if you ask me.

Couldn't agree with you more! (On both points)

[robert s.]

Originally Posted by StrongInTheArm

Anti-matter. (I'm trying to be more concise today)

on this i agree with you 100 %, but as far as i know, NASA is not really into anti-matter research and science.

anti-matter is one of the prime fields of CERN, is it not?
http://livefromcern.web.cern.ch/live...rn/antimatter/

still, again, i agree with you that we need NASA and ESA. the money, which is spent by these organisations is not "wasted", we need the research. as rankenstein says, the far future of mankind is in outer-space. (If we do not screw up that much that we do not make it into the "far-future".)

[StrongInTheArm]

Hey I'm not letting Rank and Zap out bid me, have you guys not seen this
<<<<.

I insist we get off this planet and pretty quick too.

I don't think we need to colonise other planets though, we would face the same problem being statically based. A moveable space station/habitat seems better.

A decade orbiting Saturn, another around the moons of Jupiter, then off to Neptune and back for the next millennium celebrations on Earth. Now that is a time scale.

And Astro you twisted my words dude.

[John Scott]

Originally Posted by Rankenstein

I'd go further than Strongy. If we are to survive as a species we have to get off-planet and into other solar systems. It's not a maybe, i's a fact.

I personally do not think that any other planet can support us. Not without extreme (prohibitively extreme) measures.

I do believe that technology has made it so that earth can support many, many more billion humans than were feasible in the past.

[StrongInTheArm]

John makes a valid point, we are trapped within the vicinity of the inner planets for the foreseeable future by our own technological inadequacy.

http://space.newscientist.com/articl...ter-drive.html

Terraforming Mercury, impossible. Venus practically impossible, but maybe one day. Mars is the only conceivable option, but developing the technology to do so will take many generations I think, if it is possible at all.

It makes more sense to develop 'space station' based communities for now and develop the technology to live in space first. When a person can be born, live a fruitful life and die in space is when we can think of other solar systems. Perhaps by then we will have the technology to make travelling these vast distances feasible.