News that makes you say WTF! (46 Viewers)

[ZoSo]

couple of years old now but still pretty fucked up

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/06/...-u-s-troops-in-mideast-more-than-nasa-budget/

they should give nasa like $200 billion every year so they can build a warp drive

 

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[ßöмßäяðîëя]

I agree, we are so cheap on some things...

 

[ZoSo]

imagine the trillions spent on iraq and afghanistan given to nasa instead

 

[ßöмßäяðîëя]

......and how much shittier the economy would be.

 

[ZoSo]

who cares if you can explore the universe

 

[ßöмßäяðîëя]

I didn't mean it like that. Those wars, although dumb and nonsensical, secured a lot of jobs, both in the military and elsewhere. NASA takes a lot of money for R&D, but doesn't employ a lot of people. The military took in kids who would have worked at MickeyDiesel's the rest of their lives, the government contracts to companies who took on a fuck ton of employees.

It's crazy what a ten-year war does for an economy. That's a bit what the last Metal Gear was about.

 

[ZoSo]

I know that wars are generally good for the economy besides govt. debt, but still nasa is the best. I think what they could do would be some of the most important work for humans in general alongside medical research.

 

[ßöмßäяðîëя]

In terms of realistic goals, medical research at USAMRIID or the CID is much more realistic than anything NASA could do. It would take NASA trillions of dollars to do anything.

 

[Nzoric]

I didn't mean it like that. Those wars, although dumb and nonsensical, secured a lot of jobs, both in the military and elsewhere. NASA takes a lot of money for R&D, but doesn't employ a lot of people. The military took in kids who would have worked at MickeyDiesel's the rest of their lives, the government contracts to companies who took on a fuck ton of employees.

It's crazy what a ten-year war does for an economy. That's a bit what the last Metal Gear was about.

Which is exactly why Im so furious st the states for starting that shit.

 

[ZoSo]

In terms of realistic goals, medical research at USAMRIID or the CID is much more realistic than anything NASA could do. It would take NASA trillions of dollars to do anything.

but it would be totally worth it, could you put a price on interstellar travel?

they've already said that they are doing research on warp drives and that they maybe could actually be built and don't require the massive amounts of energy like initially thought.

you might think it's impossible but what would the people of 1000 years ago or even 100-200 think about today's tech...

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anyway nasa will start getting more funding soon when the chinks start putting men on the moon

 

[Sheik Yerbouti]

That's racist!

 

[ZoSo]

 

[Hængebøffer]

The Saudi sheik

 

[swag]

couple of years old now but still pretty fucked up

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/06/...-u-s-troops-in-mideast-more-than-nasa-budget/

they should give nasa like $200 billion every year so they can build a warp drive

I kinda have to agree with Burke here. That article was not only written poorly, it was written in such a way where they showed little understanding of economics. It backfired for me in trying to make either point.

 

[ZoSo]

I don't think it discredits the fact that the US spent more on A/C than NASA...

 

[JuveJay]

I know that wars are generally good for the economy besides govt. debt, but still nasa is the best. I think what they could do would be some of the most important work for humans in general alongside medical research.

I wouldn't restrict it to or put it all on Nasa, space exploration in the future is going to have to be a global venture. Just recent years have shown that.

 

[ZoSo]

well most other space organisations don't have the possible available funding like nasa does

 

[swag]

I don't think it discredits the fact that the US spent more on A/C than NASA...

But it's a dumb way to look both at expenses and science. This is why the single line-item veto in government is policy stupidity. Speaking of science, when the SSC (Superconducting Supercollider in Texas) got shut down by Capitol Hill in the 90s, politicians were citing things like $125,000 for landscaping as a sign of its outrageous and out-of-control expense. Never mind that for something with a radius of 27km -- and an area of over 230 square km -- comes out to only $500 per square km of land. That will plant you, what?, four trees for a whole square km?

So the fact that you can pick a number to look at an A/C bill and compare it to NASA's budget isn't even apples to apples. It's more like comparing apples to DVDs.

Worse still, when you get people citing numbers like that in isolation -- as they did with the SSC in the 1990s -- people get a minute data point with zero perspective to go along with it. So it's data that makes us all dumber rather than smarter.

 

[swag]

Now here's some great WTF news: Italy is figuring out how to govern itself around Berlusconi while the US govt shoots itself in the forehead, unable to move forward:

Lawmakers to Break With Berlusconi
http://stream.wsj.com/story/latest-headlines/SS-2-63399/SS-2-342836/

Who'd have thunk the Italians could teach the Americans about how to run government and politics?

 

[ZoSo]

Even if you compared it to say the military budget, you could still say it's apples vs toothpaste because they both serve different purposes. The main point of the article is to show how little nasa funded when more is being spent on air conditioning alone in a foreign country for the military.