Matrix Dragon Wrote:Yeah. My desire to have mankind continue reaching for the stars isn't really based in logic, or an interest in what science can achieve out there. It's the desire to go out there, to see what's there, what it's like. What's it look like on Mars through human eyes? What are the asteroids like up close? What does micro-gravity feel like? What IS it like to play golf on the moon, and would I be just as bad there as here? What's out there? It's the ancient human instinct of 'what's over the next hill?' on a cosmic scale.
To clarify, I agree with you. I was in fact just remarking to my girlfriend less than a week ago how wonderful it would be to be able to see another planet (specifically Jupiter) up close and marvel at its size. But I think the best way to ensure that for future generations is to build on what works - and the vast costs accompanying human spaceflight at the moment make exploration and science in space far rarer than it could be. We'd never have had a man on Europa no matter what at this point - but maybe we could have had a robotic lander there by now. And maybe the discoveries made by a much larger generation of unmanned probes would allow us to find ways to actually make it economical to gets larger weights out of atmosphere, and thus facilitate space travel for humans in the future.