Ships Traveling the Galaxy in the ST universe.

[wulfio]

So NASA isn't the government?

They have taken on, and continue to work on projects that will far exceed the term of the ones who were in office when they began. ISS? Mars mission? Hell, they've even allocated resources for R&D on a "warp drive". You can't get any more long term than that. How about Pioneer 10 for example? It was launched in the 70's and only stopped sending back data about 10 years ago.

The Department of Defense set up the Star Wars program which far outlasted Reagans term...

There's a million examples of projects beginning while someone is in office, and the project will far exceed their term.

 

[Ithekro]

I must be geting more and more cynical over time then. That or I keep listening to people that keep saying such long term projects are foolhardy because the results won't be seen for centuries, if ever. (warp drive, deep space exploration, and colonization projects specifically) and thus seen to brush them off as pointless projects.

 

[wulfio]

That's understandable. It's easy to get bogged down by others. I choose to ignore most people. And instead put more emphasis on reading about things like history, philosophy, human discovery and exploration. Pundits are usually "experts" that want to make themselves seem smart by discrediting other peoples work, and being general debbie downers. I'd rather be inspired than inundated with negativity.

 

[Timo]

So NASA isn't the government?

And even more to the point, the government isn't the government? Bush Jr. readily launched a long term space exploration program without planning on giving it the necessary financial backing; starting is never a problem...

And once something gets going, somebody will find a way to make money on it. Sometimes this is by making it crash and burn, but more often it is by sustaining the project, mutating it, applying it, inventing new rationales for it, and piling up motivation and guilt on others to carry on the project (especially those parts of it that don't make money yet).

Timo Saloniemi

 

[phredy]

We have a World Series which doesn't include very much of the world, talk about the far corners of the world when everyone knows that the globe isn't pointy, and discuss the Arab World when there isn't another planet inhabited by Arabs orbiting the sun. Perhaps in the future the word galaxy has come to mean some closely related terms that when you use them, it's assumed that everyone knows the context.
For example, a galaxy might also refer to the group of stars which form around a supernova and the energy barrier is the shockwave of the explosion itself, or even something as mundane as the local star group.