http://rt.com/usa/167944-nasa-plans-colonize-mars/
NASA may not be planning to put a human on Mars until the 2030s, but
the agency’s top scientist said colonizing the planet is a key part of
its agenda – as well as its search for extraterrestrial life.
In a wide-ranging interview with the Guardian, NASA’s chief scientist Dr. Ellen Stofan emphasized that the quest to find alien life is focused primarily on our own solar system, where potential targets include Mars, Jupiter’s moon Europa, and Saturn’s moon Titan. In order to most effectively survey Mars for signs of life, though, Stofan said putting humans on the ground, and establishing a presence there, is a big priority. - RT
Apparently life on Earth is not worth the same attention as potential extra-terrestrial life, which is kind of odd since humans live on Earth and all scientists are human.
All humans have basic requirements to be able to live. All scientists are human, therefore all scientists have basic requirements to be able to live. This leads to the question of Why are scientists not focusing on improving our access to these basic living requirements?
Those requirements include food, water, shelter, non-toxic environment. You'd think that ensuring our continued survival on this planet would be more important than traversing the solar system looking to answer questions which may settle our curiosity, but that
essentially have no real effect on our lives.
I am not against exploring this world or any other. What I do not agree with is our focus of resources (including the brainpower of all those scientists) on things that do not improve life for all of us here on Earth. There are so many problems that need solving, problems that affect all of us in the long run, so why is so much of our focus turned toward things that are either useless or simply destructive?
Obviously the answer to the latter is Money, but the former question is not so clear cut. Yes I am sure that someone makes money from science - I am not naive in that I believe otherwise (just think how much money is pumped into NASA alone) but there is certainly an element of, let's call it "humanity", in the profession of science. The people who are doing the research are truly interested in the answer. Sure, sometimes someone gets a big ego and acts dishonestly and yes, most of them get paid substantially more than the average Joe, but there is still an impression of real passion.
Now imagine if every scientist had that passion for making this world a better place for everyone, but especially for the impoverished and neglected. Things would look much different I imagine. Imagine if scientists were more interested in human nature than in Mars. You may say that psychology and other medical and mental health professions put more than enough investigation into this aspect of our lives - I would then suggest that you investigate this belief objectively. Investigate how much the healthcare industry really knows about human nature and you may be surprised. The first thing you will notice is the use of certain key words like "theory", "assume", "propose", "maybe" and so on - because no one really knows for sure. There are a whole lot of theories which have all been studied and most have been found to be at least partially relevant. Then you get a few more theories that simply posit that all those other theories are at least partially correct. All these researchers and theorists are supposed to be objective and impartial, but they have all taken sides and proclaimed themselves to be of a certain opinion which throws impartiality out the window.
Those who are privileged enough to have received a "good" education and have access to things like psychologists and the internet have also been lulled into a passive acceptance of everything and a fierce protectiveness about their beliefs so that no one ever questions professions like psychology and the lunacy of how we live. It doesn't make sense to do the things we do - to go to space while children are dying because of a lack of clean drinking water, or to argue about which school of thought in psychology is better than another without realising that we don't actually know all that much.
NASA may not be planning to put a human on Mars until the 2030s, but
the agency’s top scientist said colonizing the planet is a key part of
its agenda – as well as its search for extraterrestrial life.In a wide-ranging interview with the Guardian, NASA’s chief scientist Dr. Ellen Stofan emphasized that the quest to find alien life is focused primarily on our own solar system, where potential targets include Mars, Jupiter’s moon Europa, and Saturn’s moon Titan. In order to most effectively survey Mars for signs of life, though, Stofan said putting humans on the ground, and establishing a presence there, is a big priority. - RT
Apparently life on Earth is not worth the same attention as potential extra-terrestrial life, which is kind of odd since humans live on Earth and all scientists are human.
All humans have basic requirements to be able to live. All scientists are human, therefore all scientists have basic requirements to be able to live. This leads to the question of Why are scientists not focusing on improving our access to these basic living requirements?
Those requirements include food, water, shelter, non-toxic environment. You'd think that ensuring our continued survival on this planet would be more important than traversing the solar system looking to answer questions which may settle our curiosity, but that
essentially have no real effect on our lives.
I am not against exploring this world or any other. What I do not agree with is our focus of resources (including the brainpower of all those scientists) on things that do not improve life for all of us here on Earth. There are so many problems that need solving, problems that affect all of us in the long run, so why is so much of our focus turned toward things that are either useless or simply destructive?
Obviously the answer to the latter is Money, but the former question is not so clear cut. Yes I am sure that someone makes money from science - I am not naive in that I believe otherwise (just think how much money is pumped into NASA alone) but there is certainly an element of, let's call it "humanity", in the profession of science. The people who are doing the research are truly interested in the answer. Sure, sometimes someone gets a big ego and acts dishonestly and yes, most of them get paid substantially more than the average Joe, but there is still an impression of real passion.
Now imagine if every scientist had that passion for making this world a better place for everyone, but especially for the impoverished and neglected. Things would look much different I imagine. Imagine if scientists were more interested in human nature than in Mars. You may say that psychology and other medical and mental health professions put more than enough investigation into this aspect of our lives - I would then suggest that you investigate this belief objectively. Investigate how much the healthcare industry really knows about human nature and you may be surprised. The first thing you will notice is the use of certain key words like "theory", "assume", "propose", "maybe" and so on - because no one really knows for sure. There are a whole lot of theories which have all been studied and most have been found to be at least partially relevant. Then you get a few more theories that simply posit that all those other theories are at least partially correct. All these researchers and theorists are supposed to be objective and impartial, but they have all taken sides and proclaimed themselves to be of a certain opinion which throws impartiality out the window.
Those who are privileged enough to have received a "good" education and have access to things like psychologists and the internet have also been lulled into a passive acceptance of everything and a fierce protectiveness about their beliefs so that no one ever questions professions like psychology and the lunacy of how we live. It doesn't make sense to do the things we do - to go to space while children are dying because of a lack of clean drinking water, or to argue about which school of thought in psychology is better than another without realising that we don't actually know all that much.
I agree, what about building such places here for people who definitly can use it right now. But then there are the struggles of politics and economics, and governments fighting each other over resources and power... I think this is what stops a lot of scientifics and such from implementing these things into other countries, because its not as clear cut as to go there and do it. There are often many factors involved, which have to be adressed on a political and economic level.
ReplyDelete