Our View: Space exploration should continue to be a priority to lay the groundwork for future innovations.
OUr Earth president Rebecca Wood, interdisciplinary perspectives on the environment and English junior, was named a NASA earth ambassador and will attend a program on climate change starting next week. This award, while a prestigious opportunity for Wood to contribute to climate change research, illustrates the current danger facing NASA’s space program.
With the government focused so firmly on deficit reduction and budget cuts, NASA is on the chopping block. The White House asked agencies to submit 2013 budget proposals 10 percent below this year’s, which means at least a $1.85 billion cut to NASA’s usual $18 billion budget, according to its website. And it’s obvious from the climate in Washington that the agency is at risk for many more cuts. Congress has focused its cuts on the space program, funneling more money to earth science research.
Green initiatives are incredibly important, but space exploration is also essential. Missions to look at obscure phenomenon or peer back to the beginnings of the universe may be expensive investments that take many years to pay off, but they will pay off. And now we must invest in our future scientific understanding, laying the groundwork for important research that will lead to the next revolutionary technology.
On July 8, after 30 years and 135 flights, the last of NASA’s space shuttles launched for the final time. Now, when American astronauts go to the International Space Station, the U.S. will have to pay the Russians an estimated $55.8 million for a ride on their spacecraft, according to the Associated Press — an irony not lost on members of the “space race” generation.
The U.S. is facing many difficult decisions about how to fight the national deficit, and it is understandable that some would look to a program like NASA to bear the brunt of that burden. But this viewpoint is harmful and misinformed.
Let’s put aside for a moment that NASA’s budget was only 1.5 percent of the estimated federal budget in 2010. The new technology made possible by space exploration continues to revolutionize our lives. Recent innovations from the agency have resulted in hydroponics technology allowing food production without proper soil, tiny medical cameras, bacteria-based oil-spill cleanup and even nanotechnology-improved hairstyling products. Not to mention the hundreds of important everyday technologies that would not exist without the space program. Satellites, anyone?
John F. Kennedy said, “We choose to go to the moon ... not because [it is] easy, but because [it is] hard.” That hasn’t changed; the U.S. is facing its share of hard choices where NASA is concerned. We can only urge politicians to think beyond the present and make the right decisions for the future.
AT A GLANCE: Products made by, for NASA
• smoke detectors
• Velcro
• wireless power tools
• satellite TV
• digital medical imaging
• polarized sunglasses
• scratch-resistant lenses
• complex robotics
• better sports safety equipment
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kdbp1213 7 months, 3 weeks ago
let's encourage private companies to do the research. maybe the usa's unemployment would go down if private companies would hire people to do research? maybe competition among private companies would stimulate research? who can bring the best products to market?
wait. am i encouraging free enterprise?? private ownership? people actually earning a living in the private sector rather earning off of big brother's dole? citizens actually doing for themselves? do we still believe in free enterprise in the usa?
besides, we have social issues on earth that need handling. why do want to populate & ruin another planet? let's fix earth and it's population's problems before we go harming another planet..................