NASA Avoiding Science

Reading comments by NASA administrator,Michael Griffin, its not to hard to read between the lines that he wants to divert money from science research to the moon base proposal.

To be fair and balanced, it is at the behest of Shrub and his administration has not exactly been to keen on scientific research. The recent talk of a moon base is just bunk. The expense to create a moon base, as cool as it would be, has no practical purpose. Any research on the moon surface can be done cheaper by probes and if need be, the rare astronaut visit.

Gregg Easterbrook, always a good read on science issues, covers it here and here. I recognize that sending men into space has the advantage of appealing to romance of adventure in the human psyche. But it has little practical purpose. To quote Easterbrook, "At this point, the shuttle exists almost solely to service the space station, while the station exists almost solely to give the space shuttle a destination to fly to."

I'm not immune to the romance of space flight. I've been a fan of science fiction since seeing the first Star Wars movie when I was 6 years old. In the early days of the space shuttle program I was glued to the family TV set to watch the launch. It was probably one of the first things that got me paying attention to the news. I would like to see some form of continuing manned space flight but at this point in my life I also recognize the need for some payback. The flights don't have to pay for themselves but they need to push us towards a better future. Currently that's not happening.

I don't completely agree with Easterbrook here. I think the plans for deep space telescopes to research origins of the universe are beneficial, if not in a purely economical sense. But his call for research into more efficient propulsion systems seems on target to me. As long as we are using 1960s technology to launch into space cost effectiveness is probably beyond the pale.