A Penny For NASA: The Petition

[shado_temple]

A movement was recently started to increase the US funding of NASA from .4% of the federal budget to a full 1%; that is, a penny on the tax dollar. The cause was more or less started by a Dr. Neil DeGrasse Tyson, an astrophysicist who pushes the idea that a resurgence of NASA programs could revive the US's interest in math, science, and, more importantly, the future.

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There's a petition currently being passed around, hoping that the topic will at least come up in discussion, if nothing else. You can find the petition here [http://www.change.org/petitions/increase-nasa-s-budget-to-1-penny-on-the-dollar#], if you're an interested US citizen.

What are my fellow escapists' thoughts on this? Is it something we should push in a time of economic turmoil? Would it actually help revitalize the science and technology fields in the eyes of the general public, or would it just be considered unnecessary spending for things not immediately helping them? I fully realize that many here aren't from the US, but I feel that the overall sentiment of the movement is something that can be discussed.

 

[ED-Tw0 ZeRo N9nE]

Wow, what an embarrassment, shame on everyone who passed this thread up. I guess everyone is so caught up in the Mass Effect bullshit to care about anything of real value. I would use the "I don't want to live on this planet anymore" meme, but that wouldn't be appropriate because there's no way off of it now. Seems like people are happily content to PRETEND they're in space instead of ensuring humanity ever ACTUALLY gets to that point.

 

[OneCatch]

Not from the US, but yes, yes you should!
It's ridiculous that the NASA budget is only about 2.5% that of the military (and that's not including R&D grants and subsidies and tax breaks to military companies)

 

[Loop Stricken]

Not from the US, but yes, yes you should!
It's ridiculous that the NASA budget is only about 2.5% that of the military (and that's not including R&D grants and subsidies and tax breaks to military companies)

This.

If it helps any, lie to the government and say there's oil on Mars. Get there, set up colonies, shamefully admit there is NO oil on Mars, but there's definitely some on Neptune, or something...

Just keep going like that.

 

[Chanel Tompkins]

*signed*
Not that I particularly expect it to help much. The main problem in the US is that people forget that research done out in space and for space is helpful back on earth, and not just done for the sake of "faffing around in space".

 

[OneCatch]

Not from the US, but yes, yes you should!
It's ridiculous that the NASA budget is only about 2.5% that of the military (and that's not including R&D grants and subsidies and tax breaks to military companies)

This.

If it helps any, lie to the government and say there's oil on Mars. Get there, set up colonies, shamefully admit there is NO oil on Mars, but there's definitely some on Neptune, or something...

Just keep going like that.

LOL that could work.
Ooooor, get NASA to produce a dossier detailing WMD development on Pluto

 

[Heronblade]

So long as the government has little to nothing to gain from the NASA program, it will never receive the funding it deserves. The fact that NASA's track record of late has been utterly abysmal does not help at all.

In my personal opinion, it is time for a new organization, one primarily funded by private interests, and run by civilians.

 

[planet.tyler]

I'm not a US citizen though my daughter is and I used to agree with giving space programs all the money they wanted but there is a problem these days that few know about and even fewer acknowledge; the resources required to develop technology to the point where traveling to even another solar system would be possible just are not there anymore. For the most part they lie in landfill and in the form of useless crap produced for the sake of making a few dollars. Maybe if all the remaing resources from our planet were used now we might make it off this planet but then you have the problem of billions dying from hunger and illness as precious resources are spent on what amounts to a gamble. From where I stand the human race has missed the boat on this and while I really do hope that I'm wrong, I fear we are planet bound now.

 

[CoffeeBoy]

NASA will not get more funding until they are no longer a poorly-managed money pit.
All of their projects become sacred cows, regardless of outcomes versus goals.

I am not implying that nothing worthwhile comes from NASA, just that they have lacked effective management for quite some time.

 

[Redweaver]

maybe if NASA had actually produced something useful in the last few decades they wouldn't have got their budget cut to hell...

also they would look better if they stopped hiring crazy bitches who drive cross country in dirty diapers to stalk people... just saying

Someone has never heard of Velcro.

Not to mention the microminiaturization boom that lets you carry a supercomputer in your pocket. (That would be an iPhone or similar if you didn't get it)

And I find it odd, the idea that if they produced more they'd get more funding. But don't they need funding to produce? Catch 22 much?

 

[Zer_]

maybe if NASA had actually produced something useful in the last few decades they wouldn't have got their budget cut to hell...

also they would look better if they stopped hiring crazy bitches who drive cross country in dirty diapers to stalk people... just saying

Someone has never heard of Velcro.

Not to mention the microminiaturization boom that lets you carry a supercomputer in your pocket. (That would be an iPhone or similar if you didn't get it)

And I find it odd, the idea that if they produced more they'd get more funding. But don't they need funding to produce? Catch 22 much?

none of those came from the space program in the last few decades nor do we need a space program to further either of them... and actually the microminiaturization boom was pushed by the military not the space program... hell technically the whole space program can be attributed to the military push

and it's not a catch 22... the space program stoped producing results so they cut their losses and stop funding the most useless parts... no point in pouring money into sometime that is yielding no useful results... if NASA had spent more time on projects with actual real world applications and less time wasting millions sending people needlessly into space to do nothing that can't be done on a lab ground side they would still be getting full funding.. pending some breakthrough that allows space travel to be worth the cost there is no point in sending a-holes into orbit and thus NASA doesn't need as much funding

hell the civilian space industry has made more advancements in launching objects into space and the earth side applications of the technology involved than NASA ever has ... let them do it no need to waste tax money on it

10. Invisible Braces
9. Scratch-resistant Lenses
8. Memory Foam
7. Ear Thermometer
6. Shoe Insoles
5. Long-distance Telecommunications
4. Adjustable Smoke Detector
3. Safety Grooving
2. Cordless Tools
1. Water Filters

More:

5: Pushes in Solar Power
4: Enhancements in Insulation
3: Improvements in Water Filtration**
2: Successes in Soil Remediation
1: Advances in Substrates (Fertilization, used in food production, golf courses, etc...)

Even More:

5: Nanoceramics Fight Cancer, Make Hair Shiny
4: Reflective Coatings Save Skylab, Manatees
3: Deformable Mirrors for better focus on imaging devices
2: Nanotubes Look for Life on Mars (Among other things here on Earth)
1: Mars Missions Create Tough Armor (Fabrics, etc...)

MORE!!!

5: Microalgae Nutritional Supplements (Baby food, Yogurt etc...)
4. Space Rose Perfume
3: Speedy Swimsuit
2: Zit Zapper
1: Hairstyling Tools with Nanomaterials

Inventions and improvements with NASA involvement:

Here are a few of the many other medical advances that came at least in part from NASA:

-Digital imaging breast biopsy system, developed from Hubble Space Telescope technology
-Tiny transmitters to monitor the fetus inside the womb
-Laser angioplasty, using fiber-optic catheters
-Forceps with fiber optics that let doctors measure the pressure applied to a baby's head during delivery
-Cool suit to lower body temperature in treatment of various conditions
-Voice-controlled wheelchairs
-Light-emitting diodes (LED) for help in brain cancer surgery
-Foam used to insulate space shuttle external tanks for less expensive, better molds for artificial arms and legs
-Programmable pacemakers
-Tools for cataract surgery


A lot of these inventions were created in part by NASA or done by private firms under contract for NASA applications. Also, NASA and Military research have often times been collaborative efforts. On a final note, it is worth saying that MANY of these NASA inventions have paved the road for future technologies. One small, basic invention can be used to make many, many newer inventions. The ripples in the sea of inventions created by NASA will be felt for at least another century, if not more.

 

[shado_temple]

Wow, what an embarrassment, shame on everyone who passed this thread up. I guess everyone is so caught up in the Mass Effect bullshit to care about anything of real value. I would use the "I don't want to live on this planet anymore" meme, but that wouldn't be appropriate because there's no way off of it now. Seems like people are happily content to PRETEND they're in space instead of ensuring humanity ever ACTUALLY gets to that point.

Holy shit, this thread was noticed by someone. I appreciate the bump greatly; like you, I had just assumed it would get buried under the rage of the day, so I more or less neglected it. Even if there are some who posted on this that disagree regarding the "cause", I'm glad to see that some actually care enough about this topic to at least discuss what we should do with this particular aspect of our future.

 

[Mayhaps]

if you believe we needed to spend the money to put people into space again and again to achieve any of those then you're just stupid... the most NASA contributed to those advancements was dirtside research and a small amount of testing which can and is now being done privately without spending billion in tax dollars to put some A-hole into orbit... which is the whole point their funding was cut and not completely cancelled... there are many more pressing, easier and cheaper forces driving the same advancements... the whole point is NASA does not need the funding to put actual people into space at this point (which is where MOST of their money went)... I never said they were worthless and should be closed just they do not need the as much money.. especially when the private sector is doing better and showing more results than they ever have

you need to remove those "I like Sci-FI and live in a fantasy land of theoreticals" tinted glasses and look at it from a practical viewpoint based in reality

going by your logic we should still be funding wooden ships to sail across the ocean because once upon a time those yielded some advancements

I read your posts and can't stop thinking that you're just copying the arguments made on Bullshit (the show). Maybe I'm wrong but you don't sound to have looked in to the matter before posting.

You forget that research entirely funded by the government can focus on things that benefit the people, not a company. For example at my university (government funded) research is being done to help develop vaccines for diseases that are a huge problem in poor countries, but so far non-existent in most of the rich ones.
No company will do that because the poor farmers can't pay for the vaccine, so there's no profit in developing it.

There are different benefits with both private and public funded research, deal with it.

 

[isometry]

I certainly think NASA is worth every penny and deserves a major funding increase. On the other hand, it doesn't seem like there is anything they could do that would even approach the inspirational importance of the Apollo project.

The public would see going to Mars as a straightforward extension of the same thing we've already done, and compared to the Apollo project they would be right. We were shocked by the Soviets launching Sputnik to 1000km altitude in 1957, and by 1969 we landed three guys over 350,000km away and brought them back safely. The only other unified scientific effort in the same category was the Manhattan project (fission was only discovered in 1938!).

I'm not sure what trillion dollar project would inspire people on that level. Modern semiconductor electronics should be extremely impressive, but it feels like people take them for granted too.


Click here for the 6 megapixel image [http://download.intel.com/pressroom/kits/xeon/7500series/images/NHM-EX-Wafer-Shot-2.jpg]

We hear about "billions of transistors", but we don't think about the intricacy and scale of it. New York City has about 1 million buildings, so the layout of current chips is thousands of times larger. The "roads" are designed so that instead of messy traffic jams the electrons do math just by flowing down them. The whole thing is carved by lasers whose precision is at this point limited, not by our engineering, but the properties of light itself. If all this complexity combined with practical benefit isn't enough to bring appreciation for science to record highs, I can't imagine what it would take.

 

[Esotera]

This is a really bad idea...if there's a petition to invest that money in the private sector, then I would sign it. As it stands NASA is woefully inefficient, and isn't really putting the cost of space travel down.

 

[Loop Stricken]

you could always call the Russians... I hear for a few million they will ferry your ass off planet.. tho given the state of their space shuttles you might be better trying to build a giant slingshot with rubber bands from Office Depot

Ah yes, that would be why the US retired the space shuttle and will now be using Russian-esque pod designs, if not straight-up Russian pods.