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Why Explore Space? A 1970 Letter to a Nun in Africa.

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Re: Why Explore Space? A 1970 Letter to a Nun in Africa.

#91

Post by [deleted] »

yequalsx wrote: post #27
mynameishere wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Health generally improves with the underlying economy, not because of charity. The underlying economy is going to correlate with damn near other statistic one way or another. More credibly, the "War on Poverty" was an abject failure in every way.

Can you source your information on the abject failure of the "War on Poverty"in every way? I'm sure you were speaking in hyperbole so I'm not expecting that literally this be shown to be a failure in every way. The term "War on Poverty" in the U.S. specifically refers to initiatives started by the Johnson administration. Do you refer this or some other war on poverty?

[deleted]

Re: Why Explore Space? A 1970 Letter to a Nun in Africa.

#92

Post by JohnsonB »

GlennS wrote: post #90
JohnsonB wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>How is a nun in middle of Africa meant to have even a basic understanding of how a specific government's budgeting and economic system works? She can't have read a few books on economics? His explanation was pretty basic and nothing that couldn't be found in econ 101 textbooks. He essentially just assume she was uneducated.

A nun, in the 1970s, in Zambia, is not going to have easy access to economics textbooks.

As if she lived there her whole life, never had a standard education, never had any opportunity whatsoever to access a standard library?

Re: Why Explore Space? A 1970 Letter to a Nun in Africa.

#93

Post by Gustomaximus »

jxcole wrote: post #9

I don't know if this makes me cruel, but whenever people talk about donating money to starving children in Africa, I always imagine the following: If I were to donate some amount of money to starving children in an impoverished nation every year I could, theoretically, bring some of them out of starvation. However, these children would then grow into adults, and then these adults would have children of their own. The…

I think this logic is fine if you then donate to a cause that seeks to solve the longer term problems. But otherwise despite being a short term solution, feeding a hungry child means a hell of a lot to that person. And if you found yourself in a similar situation I think you would be happy for someone to skip the logical arguement and just give you a meal.

Re: Why Explore Space? A 1970 Letter to a Nun in Africa.

#94

Post by simonbrown »

MarkMc wrote: post #62

I don't buy the argument. A $100b space mission is going to have a bigger benefit to the desperately poor than a $100b medical research program? No way. But then, why does the space program need to be defended like that? People prefer buying big TVs, big cars, big houses instead of giving the money to starving Africans. So why not view the space program as just an extension of that?

Because the government is the one spending the money.

Re: Why Explore Space? A 1970 Letter to a Nun in Africa.

#95

Post by waterlesscloud »

joering2 wrote: post #33

Ok, so the story with microscope was a good one. I was initially shortsighted. But coming back to the recent Mars mission, anyone has any ideas, more or less accurate/detailed, of how this particular mission will/could benefit our civilization? This is a serious question.

We're learning more about Mars. It's pretty much precisely the same benefit Spain, France, Portugal, and Britain derived from early expeditions to the New World.

Re: Why Explore Space? A 1970 Letter to a Nun in Africa.

#96

Post by tomjakubowski »

genwin wrote: post #63
Spooky23 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do some Googling. My grandparents were all born in Ireland from 1905-1920. My father's father was one of 6 children, my mother's mother 1 of 13. All families lost at least two children each that I'm aware of -- stillbirths were often kept secret. The point is, when you have incredibly poor country, excessive influence of religion, poor health and a high child mortality rate, you have more children, both planned and u…

I suspect that excessive influence of religion led to all those other problems.

Excessive influence of religion leads to poverty, poor health, and a high child mortality rate? Do you have any sources to back this besides a general feeling that religion is "bad"?

Re: Why Explore Space? A 1970 Letter to a Nun in Africa.

#97

Post by pavel_lishin »

chimi wrote: post #10
ghotli wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Man if that's true it really ruined my day. Do you have proof?

Do you need proof? If so you can watch the 60 minutes expose on their insider trading: http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=7388130n/ They don't just do this in the military industrial complex, they do it across the board, making decisions that benefit their portfolios and constructing their portfolios so their decisions get benefits from laws being passed. http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/11/15/ethically…

> Do you need proof?

Yes. What kind of a question is this?

Re: Why Explore Space? A 1970 Letter to a Nun in Africa.

#98

Post by pavel_lishin »

joering2 wrote: post #33

Ok, so the story with microscope was a good one. I was initially shortsighted. But coming back to the recent Mars mission, anyone has any ideas, more or less accurate/detailed, of how this particular mission will/could benefit our civilization? This is a serious question.

But coming back to the man grinding the lenses for the count, who at the time had any idea what use his particular occupation could have benefitted their civilization?

Re: Why Explore Space? A 1970 Letter to a Nun in Africa.

#99

Post by JamesLeonis »

ninguem2 wrote: post #2

>He was a member of the German rocket development team at Peenemünde Just the guy to be answering ethical questions...

Einstein was German as well. Do we discount him as well?

Most of our early rocket scientists were ex-German scientists taken from Nazi Germany.

Re: Why Explore Space? A 1970 Letter to a Nun in Africa.

#100

Post by vilda »

joering2 wrote: post #33

Ok, so the story with microscope was a good one. I was initially shortsighted. But coming back to the recent Mars mission, anyone has any ideas, more or less accurate/detailed, of how this particular mission will/could benefit our civilization? This is a serious question.

When first transistor was invented, they haven't thought of microcomputers or mobile phones. Whey would not imagine CAD systems or modern biomedicine.

When first microscope was constructed, the author did not and could not know anything about bacteria or anything other microscopic.

Your question is unanswerable yet.

Got it now?

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