I'm a huge advocate of space exploration and a proponent of the "Mission to Mars" concept. However, for whatever reason, its not receiving a whole lot of traction either by mainstream media, politicians, or corporate pioneers. There is the occasional mention of a new potential space shuttle or the space trip to the moon but they only receive minimal interest.

I would like to see a more serious promotion of the U.S. Space program, NASA, and future missions. Not for the sake of profitable travel but for the sake of humanity's future. I believe space exploration is the future of our nation and of this planet. I think humans future existence will hinge on our ability to explore other planets and cultivate new colonies on these planets. Whoever controls the Earth's orbital sphere will militarily control the world. If not the U.S., I fear nations such as China or Russia could use that power to drastically remap the Super Powers of this planet.

In conclusion, our nation needs to maintain an emphasis on space exploration and developing new technologies that enhance our ability to protect ourselves from space but also allow for future space travel to other planets.

Curious to hear others opinions on this subject.

A colossal waste of money--if you wanna blow that much money, go for time traveling. That I might be interested---a human colony on Mars in a silly myth.

__________________
"Some men eventually stumble over the truth but they usually pick themselves up and walk on as if nothing ever happened."
-Winston Churchill

"But though there is no difference in this respect between the best demagogue and the worst, both of them having to present their cases equally in terms of melodrama, there is all the difference in the world between the statesman who is humbugging the people into allowing him to do the will of God, in whatever disguise it may come to him, and one who is humbugging them into furthering his personal ambition and the commercial interests of the plutocrats who own the newspapers and support him on reciprocal terms."
-George Bernard Shaw

I disagree; I feel we cannot afford to not make this a reality. Our planet has its limits and we will need to reach out beyond its orbit for additional resources and scientific curiosity.

Mars has more limits than earth does for a human. We would HAVE to take Earths resources to even make Mars habitable much less somewhere anyone would want to spend a lifetime. Gimme something big--worm holes--anything but Mars ? Ain't gonna happen.

__________________
"Some men eventually stumble over the truth but they usually pick themselves up and walk on as if nothing ever happened."
-Winston Churchill

"But though there is no difference in this respect between the best demagogue and the worst, both of them having to present their cases equally in terms of melodrama, there is all the difference in the world between the statesman who is humbugging the people into allowing him to do the will of God, in whatever disguise it may come to him, and one who is humbugging them into furthering his personal ambition and the commercial interests of the plutocrats who own the newspapers and support him on reciprocal terms."
-George Bernard Shaw

I agree with you, but it will not happen until profitability and/or military advantage is closely achievable, given the enormous initial investments involved.

No wealthy government will spend on space expansion unless it will give it a leg up on another government (and fairly quickly; no multi-generational projects). Right now that basically means satellites, mainly for intell-gathering. There is not yet any particular advantage to having, say, a station on the moon.

No wealthy private business will spend on space expansion until it will result in profits within its leadership's likely tenure. Right now that basically means satellites, mainly for communication.

I imagine that at some point it may pay off to mine other planets but we're not done with this one yet.

We'll get there someday, I think, and interesting times will ensue. It's probably a good way off, though, and just like we aren't going to start seriously integrating alternative energies into our infrastructure until we seriously start to have no choice, we won't be truly utilizing other planets until we really feel that we have to.

Once those commercial endeavors start, though, expansion of population is near-inevitable. After a few generations of humanity coming to see living off-planet as a mundane possibility, and after a few generations of various nations warring over off-planet resources, both the technology and will to move to other planets will be abundant enough for some serious colonization.

I'm thinking it will be a lot like Europeans taking the New World. Lots of pioneering, wars, trading, and eventually new nations. Oh, and heaven help any indigenous life forms.

I think of space as the Scientists heaven. There just HAS to be life in the great beyond. I personally still prefer time travel. We haven't even touched time. Think big. A whole new dimension that will make Saturn 5s look like ants.

__________________
"Some men eventually stumble over the truth but they usually pick themselves up and walk on as if nothing ever happened."
-Winston Churchill

"But though there is no difference in this respect between the best demagogue and the worst, both of them having to present their cases equally in terms of melodrama, there is all the difference in the world between the statesman who is humbugging the people into allowing him to do the will of God, in whatever disguise it may come to him, and one who is humbugging them into furthering his personal ambition and the commercial interests of the plutocrats who own the newspapers and support him on reciprocal terms."
-George Bernard Shaw

That's a very cool idea, but the thing about other planets is that we can actually see them and that we know we can get to them.

The past, we have only memories and traces. The future, we have only plans and speculation. "Other dimensions," we can only imagine and theorize about.

I don't expect that we'll run into other life in the great beyond anytime soon (if ever), but I think that the supposition that there's something somewhere in the immensity around us that we'd be tempted to label "life" is more reasonable than the supposition that there isn't. After all, it's happening here; is Earth really so special that not one of any of the other countless dust motes out there shares a similar phenomenon?

If the economy was booming, many more people would be supporting a Mars mission.

Space exploration gives the propeller-heads something to do besides building bigger and better weapons systems.

I say go for it.

The mar's mission are not being supported because they are showing us nothing. They have found something but they are not showing it. We get all this crap shots.

The media and elite want it to have minimal coverage, they want just enough so they can justify where money goes.

If they show you something on Mars that makes the enitre world wonder about it and want more information it will take the audiance away from all the distractions and problems they have created here.

__________________
You see with your eyes, I see destruction and demise, Corruption in disguise, from this f***in' enterprise, Now I'm sucking to your lies, in God we Trust though not his muscles but the Life that he provides, with me as a guide, But y'all can see me now cos you don't see with your eyes, You perceive with your mind, That's the inner, So I'm gonna stick around with God and be a mentor, bust with a few rhymes so mother f***ers Remember where the thought is, I brought all this, So you can survive when law is lawless, Feelings, sensations that you thought were dead, remember no squealing because it's not what God Said....

I do see profitability and military advantage in pushing the space exploration agenda. It's not readily just sitting there for us to grab a hold of but I do believe its there. If we were to just focus on satellite technology alone, there is tremendous potential in that market. Without the satellites we have today, advanced nations would crumble in days. Whoever manages to take the upper hand on orbital control of this planet is going to control the world we live in. If a Russia or a China was to somehow develop a satellite-killing mechanism or orbital drone w/ missle systems, they could destroy all other countries satellites and hinder them defenseless. At the same time, the satellites they do have in orbit could have the ability to target any location on earth and wipe it out with some sort of laser or missle system or even an electronic/magnetic pulse system which could wipe out a regions electrical components. This may seem far fetched but I don't believe it is and I think our country has the technology already.

The military aspect is only one piece of this grand scheme but an important one. I am interested in what resource potential that could be discovered on another planet. Don't take from Earth to colonize Mars, take what's already there assuming its usable. There are elements and natural resources yet to be discovered that could advance human technology ten fold; we only have to reach out and discover it.

42P:
If all the govt's were not working with each other that would have already happened.

Fact: The world is not what it appears to be. You only believe that the governments have a problem with each other because the news papers and TV says so. You wouldn't know anything about those issue's if it wasn't so. So if you controlled the media, can you make stories up that people might believe? Can you keep people distracted?

__________________
You see with your eyes, I see destruction and demise, Corruption in disguise, from this f***in' enterprise, Now I'm sucking to your lies, in God we Trust though not his muscles but the Life that he provides, with me as a guide, But y'all can see me now cos you don't see with your eyes, You perceive with your mind, That's the inner, So I'm gonna stick around with God and be a mentor, bust with a few rhymes so mother f***ers Remember where the thought is, I brought all this, So you can survive when law is lawless, Feelings, sensations that you thought were dead, remember no squealing because it's not what God Said....

Why can't they play in the ocean--it's big.

__________________
"Some men eventually stumble over the truth but they usually pick themselves up and walk on as if nothing ever happened."
-Winston Churchill

"But though there is no difference in this respect between the best demagogue and the worst, both of them having to present their cases equally in terms of melodrama, there is all the difference in the world between the statesman who is humbugging the people into allowing him to do the will of God, in whatever disguise it may come to him, and one who is humbugging them into furthering his personal ambition and the commercial interests of the plutocrats who own the newspapers and support him on reciprocal terms."
-George Bernard Shaw

i'm pretty sure they do that too!

__________________

Great sci-fi story there, Isaac ! What happened to earthquake that was supposed to level China ?

__________________
"Some men eventually stumble over the truth but they usually pick themselves up and walk on as if nothing ever happened."
-Winston Churchill

"But though there is no difference in this respect between the best demagogue and the worst, both of them having to present their cases equally in terms of melodrama, there is all the difference in the world between the statesman who is humbugging the people into allowing him to do the will of God, in whatever disguise it may come to him, and one who is humbugging them into furthering his personal ambition and the commercial interests of the plutocrats who own the newspapers and support him on reciprocal terms."
-George Bernard Shaw