just because the stars may never be visited by us, doesn't mean the knowledge is useless. I think learning the nature of the universe should be a top priority of humanity, but I also believe there is no deity coming to save us from ourselves. I don't want to argue exactly where the gov is wasting money, but what we have is foxes guarding the hen house.
No not useless -- there'll always be some level of value -- but in the greater context of things, not providing useful information for the majority of humanity.
For example, we could study every feature and aspect about the pencil I have here on my desk too, but it wouldn't be relevant for nearly all people. The same thing for studying some unnamed stars billions of light years away from us. The nature of those stars... will never affect us, other than maybe being an interesting topic for a select few.
Personally, I'd rather we spend our space money on developing a space elevator. We've finally found materials that can make it possible (carbon nanotubes), and the ability to to do anything meaningful in space is predicated on our abilities to get into space -- which is not cheap.
It sure is expensive getting into orbit, no argument there. I thought Obama shut down the shuttle program? don't we hitch rides with Russia now? A space elevator would be nice.
Those rides aren't free. As noted above, they're about $424 Million
per launch. That's about 1/3rd the cost of a space shuttle launch, but still an incredible amount for what I see as a useless endeavor at this time (manned missions in space).
I'd so much rather put up telescopes, send out probes, rovers, etc. to other planets than waste our time and money at that space-station hotel above earth studying how to keep more humans up there.
I agree.
Maybe most people care more about things that are relevant to their everyday life... like celebrity gossip and fashion trends...
But how can you (@Bionic-Badger) say that answering questions about the existence of us and everything we know is useless?
Because it's in the past? It has no utility in any person's life (besides obtaining research grants or notoriety)? It'll never make a difference besides
just knowing it?
Don't get me wrong, I think knowledge -- even for the sake of knowledge -- can be interesting and good. However, besides simply knowing something, what are we really gaining by looking at objects that are billions of light years away? What problems does that knowledge solve? There are many "infinitely" deep and complex systems we can investigate with applications beyond pure knowledge as well.
From my own perspective, studying space is good because, well, it's an interesting read and the pictures are cool. Aside from that though, it does little for me. I don't think it's much different for nearly all of humanity either -- if people have even considered the question in the first place.
Maybe if we could reveal more about our place in the universe, humanity could finally get it's ass out of the imperial age and work toward a common goal.
No amount of science and understanding is going to change that problem. It's not a function of
knowledge but behavior and social structure. The only way to work toward a common goal is to ensure everybody
thinks the same and that people are
kept in their place. We already have the capabilities to enforce that, and we've already suffered it too. It's nothing to be aspiring towards. Our greatest advancements have come from independent thinking, conflicts, competition, and disagreement. Even evolution is based on that kind of diversity and competition. Without that, we'd stagnate and ultimately die.
But I suppose most people think it's more "useful" to trade bullets and bombs for gold and oil, rather than knowledge and resources for more knowledge and resources.
I don't believe that the trading of knowledge and resources is less competitive and destructive than the exchange of weapons and currency. They're merely conflicts at different levels. Sometimes the use and trade of weapons and currencies are even preferable -- they're at least tangible.
