I've always felt like I'm the only one who's totally confused why we're wasting so many resources on pointless space travel when there's so many problems on earth we could better spend time focusing on, right?
I don't at all believe it's faked, I feel it's just ridiculous to think so, but I almost wish it was. Maybe if we found out we've never even been to the moon, you'll see us stop worrying about racing to Mars in history's greatest and most wasteful manhood measuring contest, lol.
I really wonder what great things could be done if we redirected resources and intelligence towards something useful like ending world hunger and war?
- While global hunger is still a problem for a multitude of reasons (none of which have to do with relatively small space exploration budgets, however), we have
dramatically reduced world hunger over the last 60 years that space travel has existed (in spite of a growing population), and in large part directly because of it or by technologies and scientific research and scientists inspired by it. Just in the 25 years since the early-90s alone we've gone from 1-in-5 people being chronically malnourished to 1-in-9. We still have a long way to go, but we are greatly improving the situation.
- How do you think they determine where the soil is best to grow crops, where
groundwater is most or least abundant, where desertification is happening, how the weather or climate will affect the harvest, where ocean temperatures that affect plankton and krill growth is happening and the associated creatures that feed off them, where pollution is, etc.? How do you think they communicate that data to people in the most remote parts of the world? How do they use GPS to guide ships, planes, and trucks full of resources to the destinations most in need? How do they predict and help the victims of hurricanes (tens of thousands of lives are saved during hurricane/cyclone/tropical storm/monsoon seasons each year and the resulting starvation and disease that would cause), floods, wildfires, and other disasters? Satellites, a byproduct of space travel.
https://spectrum.ieee.org/aerospace/satellites/stopping-starvation-by-satellite
https://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/u-s-uses-landsat-satellite-data-to-fight-hunger-poverty/
- While we're on the subject of satellites, how do you monitor troop movements near borders, naval movements through contested waters, prevent proliferation of nuclear/biological/chemical weapons, determine where mass graves are being dug, monitor nuclear reduction treaty compliance, etc.? Satellites have done more to reduce global warfare than any other technology, and despite outward appearances and anxieties, the world has never been more peaceful than it is right now. Hundreds of millions of people were killed in wars in the opening half of the 20th century before the invention of satellites. They weren't the only factor is reducing warfare, but they were a large part of it.
- NASA's annual budget is
minuscule compared to the overall US budget, currently less than half of one percent, and at its height during the run up to the Apollo Program, when the national budget was vastly lower than it is today, reaching a maximum of 4%. You're not going to make a major dent in ending world hunger by taking away the $20 billion dollars we currently spend on NASA, and yet with that money they've done more to combat it than most aid programs do. The space program has also been immensely profitable for the country and the world due to people working directly on it or with spin-off technologies and research, so it actually makes all the money spent on it back plus more money which could then be spent on aid programs.
(click to enlarge)
- Look at some of the many
spin-off technologies from NASA aerospace exploration and how they can help starving, sick, or impoverished people. And don't forget that the globalization of information and education, which satellites greatly enhance, is the best combatant of hunger and war.
https://spinoff.nasa.gov/Spinoff2008/tech_benefits.html
(click to enlarge)
- Much of satellite and space exploration is being done by private corporations nowadays, not just the government. Nor is our government the only one spending money on space exploration. Europe, China, Japan, Russia, India, Brazil, Israel, and others have also developed space technology to benefit the world.
- When Apollo 13 was in danger, the Soviets stopped broadcasting on the frequencies the astronauts and NASA would need to communicate so there would be no interference. They deployed their fleets to cover ocean territory the spacecraft might splashdown in so they could help us recover the astronauts. At the height of the Cold War the US and Russia developed a compatible docking system so that we could rescue each other's astronauts in space if need-be. This led to the Apollo-Soyuz meet-up.
US and Soviet space scientists maintained cordial relations and shared safety information even when their governments didn't, and sent condolences mourning the loss of each other's dead. Competition in space is better than competition for resources or territory on the ground, and can be a contributor to peace.
- Finally, this letter by a NASA scientist addresses your question directly and is still relevant today:
Why Explore Space? A 1970 Letter to a Nun in Africa
Ernst Stuhlinger wrote this letter on May 6, 1970, to Sister Mary Jucunda, a nun who worked among the starving children of Kabwe, Zambia, in Africa, who questioned the value of space exploration. At the time Dr. Stuhlinger was Associate Director for Science at the Marshall Space Flight Center, in Huntsville, Alabama. Touched by Sister Mary’s concern and sincerity, his beliefs about the value of space exploration were expressed in his reply to Sister Mary. It remains, more than four decades later, an eloquent statement of the value of the space exploration endeavor. Born in Germany in 1913, Dr. Stuhlinger received a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Tuebingen in 1936. He was a member of the German rocket development team at Peenemünde, and came to the United States in 1946 to work for the U.S. Army at Fort Bliss, Texas. He moved to Huntsville in 1950 and continued working for the Army at Redstone Arsenal until the Marshall Space Flight Center was formed in 1960. Dr. Stuhlinger received numerous awards and widespread recognition for his research in propulsion. He received the Exceptional Civilian Service Award for his part in launching of Explorer 1, America’s first Earth satellite.
The text of the full letter is in the link below. It's long but well-worth the read:
https://launiusr.wordpress.com/2012/02/08/why-explore-space-a-1970-letter-to-a-nun-in-africa/
