.
I think part of it is political, at least for the US. After putting a man on the moon, other investigations there seem kind of anti-climatic and hard
to "sell" to the public.
I know this is a conspiracy board, and there are plenty of theories about what is on the moon. But consider the possibility that what scientist have
been telling us is true: that the moon is just a big dead dusty ball of rock.
Now certainly that can still be of immense interest to scientists. But landing and taking off on the moon is expensive and technologically
difficult--more so than orbital space flight. I think there is a real question of what can be gained there versus the cost. (This probably applies
more to manned missions or an eventual base, rather than rovers)
It is interesting that in thinking about what our astronauts would do on the moon I realized how little I know about what we do on our space
missions. It seems like most of the news is about the launch and the landing and very little is said about the missions, just generalities about
experiments or repairs. Perhaps I'm just not tured in.
But it does raise the question of NASA's role in space.
How much of it is military?
How much of it is scientific?
What are our specific goals these days?
.
[edit on 10-10-2004 by cimmerius]





