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[10ebbor10]

Meanwhile, MarsOne still isn't death. Link.

Though they're having significant financing problems, and their indigogo thingy doesn't look like it's going to make it.

[Tack]

America is basically the biggest collective joke in the universe.

Have a care for the things you say in the Space Thread.
Not because of whatever Americans take offense, but simply because the universe is infinite and by association that statement is incredibly arrogant.
Just a Thought.

[Solifuge]

The biggest joke in the universe is probably a terrible pun written by the constellations, as viewed by an intelligent species on a planet in another galaxy somewhere. At least a few thousand light-years long.

[alway]

The biggest joke in the universe is probably a terrible pun written by the constellations, as viewed by an intelligent species on a planet in another galaxy somewhere. At least a few thousand light-years long.

*5 billions years ago*
"The universe will collapse in approximately 1 trillion years if we don't do anything! Our calculations show that if we can transpose vast quantities of dark matter and their associated galactic clusters into a set of specific patterns, we can prevent the collapse!"
...
"Hey, uh, so I did an analysis of the patterns we can rearrange the dark matter into to prevent the universe collapsing; one of them looks like it spells out 'Help, the universe is collapsing.' from my home planet."
...
"DO IT."

[AlbertoFord]

I like it. Consider though: Mars has planet-wide dust storms, what, once every three years or so? You'll eventually need to worry about dust accumulation. Spirit and Oppy apparently had problems with that, although theirs was more due to covered solar panels. There isn't much accumulation per storm so it won't be an immediate problem, but if you're talking about a planet-wide ground-based system, keeping them uncovered will eventually be necessary and problematic. Perhaps a new fast-moving rover that's just a pair of arms and a broom? =P

Curiosity mission seems like waste of money to me..I think this money should be used to make better life on Earth.

[Cheeetar]

Curiosity mission seems like waste of money to me..I think this money should be used to make better life on Earth.

At which point will life on Earth be good enough that a small expenditure on exploring anywhere other than Earth would be feasible to you?

[MaximumZero]

NASA missions generally have a return on investment of five to one. For every dollar we spend to do space stuff, we get five back. If NASA weren't around to organize and propel the R&D, you wouldn't have things like memory foam, enriched baby food, cordless vacuums, solar cells, scratch resistant lenses for glasses or artificial limbs. NASA has developed tons of technologies, which they call "spinoffs", that are in commercial use today. Like being able to change the channel on TV without getting off the couch? Thank NASA.

We give them less than a penny of every tax dollar. Imagine what life could be like if we spent the money allocated to the BSA spy network on something productive and useful, like innovation and science.

[Dutchling]

[10ebbor10]

A person with a single post, replying to a post made 6 pages ago, with a negative and irrelevant (to that discussion) statement. Something here is suspicious.

[Reelya]

Isn't it funny how those "don't spend any money until life on Earth is perfect" people only ever complain about space exploration and basic science research? Or complaining about the pittance spent on foreign aid.

You never hear those people e.g. talking about e.g. $800 million spent making the Lord Of the Rings trilogy, or 10's of millions on video game budgets, or the much bigger government expenditures on wasteful corrupt medical schemes and weapons. Even a 1% tax on ice cream would probably bring in more money than all the science and space exploration budgets.

Why is it only "smart" stuff that makes up like 2% of the national budget that gets singled out as the sole reason the world is hungry?

[10ebbor10]

People complain about that which they don't understand.

[10ebbor10]

On a side note, we forgot something Happy Birthday Opportunity.*

On a more serious note, Opportunity could be shut down in the near future, if it doesn't survive the budget cuts.

Oh and China's rover on the moon might have broken down Link. This is not a good year for rovers.

*_{No, you don't get to come back. Not even if you do a really good job.}

[Aklyon]

Didn't even know China was on the moon in the first place. Isn't there a xkcd somewhere about using patriotism to support NASA's budget?

[kaian-a-coel]

Oh and China's rover on the moon might have broken down

*obligatory made in china joke*

More seriously, it really is sad. A rover is still a rover no matter whose flag is painted on it. Science has no frontier.

[Descan]

I dunno, it might be pretty hard to get a rover intact into the core of the earth.

That's a pretty big boundary.

Also, using your original word of "frontier", dude science* is all about frontiers. Space, ocean, mind, earth, they're all frontiers.

*Dudescience. Sweater is not optional.