You have no idea.


Your are being very defensive. I obviously struck a nerve as my post was intended to do.

 

Well said.

 

Well finding the key to how the earth was formed could very easily be used to discover new things about the plates that caused the tsunami, the geological makeup of the earths crust as well as 1000's of more things including new elements/composits. Life or fossils on mars could give us new ways to treat disease. All those suttle missions put up tons and tons of scientific equipment like GPS and survalence equipment that is now helping with the tsunami, some of it actually predicted and measured the earthquake that cause the tsunami. So to say what is it going to do for us is like saying what is electricity going to do for us the first time man discover how to make it. We don't know ans we shouldn't be so short sighted so that we damn the hard work of others that might save the world in the future. Hey 100's of millions of years from now we're going to either have to leave this planet or end up fried from the sun. think of this as just putting a few pennies in the piggy bank when you were a kid. It's not nearly that significant now as it will be millions of years from now.

 

Shit happens. In the grand scheme of things the tsunami of '04 was a very minor disturbance. Much worse will happen in the future and more than likely you/we wont be around to see it. But that doesn't make it any less likely to happen, indeed, you can count on it happening. Those future disasters will happen wether we send probes to other worlds or not. Our (the worlds) ability to deal with those disasters will simply reflect the scale of those disasters. The point being, if the powers that be had deemed it nescessary to have a tsunami warning system for the Indian ocean and then actually built it then the disaster would not have been as great as it is, however, we would still be recieving pictures from Titan.

The only saving grace is that we, as a global society, are slowly awakening to the natural threats that exist in this universe.

 

if u want us to spend money on homeless people so they can buy alcohol then by all mean please use your own money to do that.

but i'd rather have the money used for research and development because the result from r&d outweight more than just saving a handful of life.

r&d can improve wutever it is that is needed in the future.

 

The portion of our federal budget that goes to NASA is about one-half of one percent each year. It's not enough to solve the world's problems. No amount of money could ever eliminate human suffering.


Personally, I think landing a probe on Titan is a remarkable human acheivement.

 

Well all of these arguments have convinced me that we shouldn't spend another nickle on human suffering, that we can never spend enough to make a difference so why try. We should turn our backs on those in need today while doing R&D so that someday we can help somebody in a way we can't today.

I get it now.

 

Exploration is basic human nature. Humans have looked up at the stars and wondered whats out there for centuries now. Our planet is just a small pixel in the universe. Unknown "things" and life exists beyond our world, exploring these will help us understand ourselves better.

As for the tsunami and other disasters, disease, poverty, war, blah blah... hey shit happens.

 

That's the coldest, cruelest thing I've heard in a long time.

 

^ Cold and cruel but true.

No amount of money spent or technology could have prevented the tsunami. Unless you're God, no one can prevent or stop nature.