Cost Of Nasa

[Khandro]

We now know (to great jubilation), that Pluto has a 'deep crater' and that these images received could be reproduced by micro/macro photographs of the Earth's surface.
Given the problems we face here, are the billions upon billions of taxpayer's money spent on achieving this warranted and if so why?
What benefits has humanity achieved from the space programme and are scientists being allowed to run amok?

[Hypognosis]

@Khandro

By way of a stop-gap answer, what the heck to you expect brainy people to do, all their lives, if you would begrudge them a way to make a living?

For Funks Sake!!

[jim360]

"What benefits has humanity achieved from the space programme..."

Quite a few, but I can't be bothered to do your research for you any more.

[murraymints]

lol@ jim....many spondoolies for sure !

[Old_Geezer]

Because the money spent is a drop in the ocean of the world's wealth, the result more than worth the cost, there will always be problems here on Earth, more than one thing can be funded at the same time, throwing space exploration funds away on other things would not achieve much anyway, and all this is surely obvious to folk ?

[naomi24]

//What benefits has humanity achieved from the space programme //

Here are a few....

http://www.nasa.gov/50th/50th_magazine/benefits.html

Space exploration is progress.

[alavahalf]

I am now very disillusioned having spent my whole life thinking Pluto was a lanky dog with big ears !

[Marshwarble]

The dog was named after the planet, I believe.

If you name a planet (or supposed planet) after a god of the underworld you'll have trouble.

[Khandro]

naomi; But that link comes from NASA itself!! Asking them is akin to asking a barber if you need a haircut.
The cost of NASA between 1958-2015 in total, amounts to $526.18 billion—an average of $9.928 billion per year.
For which we have non-stick frying pans and a robotic arm - which would have been invented (by the Japanese) anyway.

[naomi24]

Khandro, //But that link comes from NASA itself!! Asking them is akin to asking a barber if you need a haircut. //

You asked what benefits humanity has achieved through the space programme. Are you suggesting that what NASA is saying isn't true?

[RATTER15]

Well thanks to the Space programme and views of earth from space has proven the we dont all live on the back of a giant turtle, surely that has to mean something!!?

[Khandro]

^No, I'm pointing to the fact that EVEN THEY can't come up with anything more substantial, - can you?

[Milvus]

It would be a dull world if we stopped exploring, but let's add a couple of things we get from our use of satellites, like weather forecasting, communications, GPS

[jim360]

At least CERN's beginning to pull its weight lately:

http://tinyurl.com/oexv5my

[naomi24]

Khandro, A quick google.

http://science.howstuffworks.com/innovation/nasa-inventions/nasa-breakthroughs-in-medicine.htm

Don't you welcome progress?

[vulcan42]

https://spinoff.nasa.gov/

[sandyRoe]

Aren't non-stick pots and pans one of the spin offs of the space programme?

[Khandro]

milvus;// let's add a couple of things we get from our use of satellites, like weather forecasting, communications, GPS //
Satellites were not invented by NASA, the first, called 'Sputnik' was a Russian invention, and the idea of using them as a global means of communication was first mooted by the science-fiction writer Arthur C Clarke as I remember.
I think exploration of the moon, which is after all part of our domain, was fair enough; and Ratter, it was from that project came the first pictures of Earth, beyond that it is all a tale of diminishing returns in a very big way and simply demonstrates how (some) scientists enjoy spending other people's money to no particular purpose other than self-gratification.

[naomi24]

Khandro, //Satellites were not invented by NASA//

Although you have NASA in your title, I thought your moan was about the cost of space exploration as a whole. Is it just NASA you have a gripe with?

[vulcan42]

If you read the Spinoff reports you will find hundreds of benefits have come from Nasa research. Choosing not to believe them is somewhat naive, would they have got away with lying about inventions that can easily be checked?

[Milvus]

Certainly the Russians launched Sputnik as the first orbiting satellite but to say the Russians "invented" the satellite is wrong. Parallel programmes were being run by the western world at least from 1946. The US launched their first sattellite 3 months after Sputnik on the date they had planned and published. Arthur C Clark certainly published the first article on the possible use of a satellite for mass communication, but going back much further it was Isaac Newton who first published a mathematical study of the possibility of an artificial satellite. Now, so much for history, what actually is your gripe. That the space programme at NASA is a waste and all else is fine or that all space programmes are a waste?