Quote:
Originally Posted by Angst
I respectfully disagree. You place too much emphasis on exploration/colonization. What matters most is the information gained per dollar spent. We learn far more from projects like the Hubble space telescope and the Large Hadron Collider, on a per dollar basis, than we we learn from planning a mission to Mars.
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To put the amount of money spent on space-related things and the LHC into perspective, (and forgive me for not remembering exact figures, but my point should be clear)...it costs about the same to run the LHC as it does to build 2 fighter jets.
People complain about the money spent on space exploration, but seem relatively comfortable with CEOs of businesses earning billions of dollars when families are struggling on minimum wages doing all the hard work that get the CEO his hugely disproportionate salary.
I realise it's difficult to see direct results of space exploration (and often science in general), but no bad can come from understanding our universe better, and most likely huge breakthroughs in science will come from the LHC and space exploration, and those breakthroughs have the potential to benefit humanity in ways we can't even dream of.