[QUOTE]Originally posted by Rick Hesel
I'm a strong supporter of space exploration, but this proposal is misguided and another example of our dear president's election-year grandstanding.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by matt_inva

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by valentine

 

Matt - I don't know. I believe that our parents' generation saw an even more amazing span of development in their lifetime, at least with regard to those developments for which they were responsible, rather than simply witnesses. When they were born, horses were still a common form of transportation. And yet, it was their generation that sent men to the moon. It was their generation that invented the SR-71 (Kelly Johnson was the lead engineer on the SR-71 project, and also designed the P-38 Lightning, which went into service in 1938!). We have kind of made general advances along a broad front. Their generation achieved higher pinnacles.

 

I heard someone, can't remember who, make a very powerful argument that the achievements of the 19th Century were far more profound. He put 19th century achievements side by side with those of the 20th century and asked, "Which would you give up?." In every instance, it was the 20th century achievements that I concluded I could more easily live without.

One comparison, for example, was electricity or the computer? Which could we most easily live without? No question in my mind. The internal combustion engine (1807) or the jet engine?
A lot of things we think are products of the 20th century orginated in the 19th. The hydrogen fuel cell -- the much talked about "new" idea for powering automobiles, was develped in 1839 by Sir William Grove.

It is always the conceit of people now alive to think that their era is more inventive, progressive, or creative than that of the past. A close reading of history would reveal otherwise.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Rick Hesel
I heard someone, can't remember who, make a very powerful argument that the achievements of the 19th Century were far more profound.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Dallas
Matt - I don't know.