Tuesday, January 23, 2007
The Man and the Moon
An article appearing last week in Science declares dire times for the field of Astrobiology. Yeah, I never heard of Astrobiology either. In any case, astrobiologists study life on other planets, as well as life found under extreme conditions here on earth which usually means either very high (mountains) or very low (deep in the ocean) UV environments. The field is crucial if we are seriously interested in human exploration or survival on other planets.
Regardless, the point is that NASA is seriously cutting funding and naturally, NASA is the main source of funding for such research. And astrobiology is not the only field suffering from diminishing NASA funds. The National Research Council claims that by 2010, the number of instruments in space observing the earth will be diminished by 40%. This is an unbelievable statistic considering the damage we are doing to our ozone. Suppose we shape up and begin to curb global warming, how will we know we’ve made a difference if we can’t image the polar ice caps or the earth’s oceans?
So if NASA isn’t funding astrobiology or earth-observation, what the hell are they funding?
According to the Times, the President’s space priorities are conducting a manned flight to mars and establishing a permanent base on the moon. I’m so glad that our president has his priorities straight on this one. It will take about two years for humans to reach Mars using our current speeds in space. During that time, any human in space will experience dangerous loss of bone mineral and muscle mass. In other words, in addition to serving little purpose, a human mission to mars is not physically feasible. And what purpose would a permanent station on the moon serve? Consider the current uselessness of the International Space Station. The only reason our country participates anymore is to avoid feeling left out, and to fufill an international promise made a long time ago.
Nearly fifty years after sputnik we’re unable to imagine another country visiting the far reaches of space before we do. We’re even willing to spend billions of dollars and sacrifice our science for it.
