[discostu]

Yeah let’s abandon all space exploration, that way when the earth inevitably becomes uninhabitable (next ice age, large rock, polar reversal, sun turns off, all of these things WILL happen at some point) we’re all still stuck here and the entire epoch of human history will have been completely pointless.

Space exploration is the only thing that really matters. Anybody that doesn’t think that is thinking short term.

[bvw]

You want to abandon ALL space enterprise?

[rottndog]

Space exploration is the only thing that really matters. Anybody that doesn’t think that is thinking short term.

I think the point of the article here is that for the cost of the manned shuttle program, and manned space flight in general, we could have and can do exponentially more space exploration and research using unmanned technology.

The space shuttle was fun to watch, and there was a huge benefit as far as national prestige. But you can't argue that we have advanced the ball as far as we could have by other means.