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[alway]

Then there's also, y'know, the entire multi-billion dollar satellite industry providing your weather forecast and the satellite television you may be watching it on. And which also makes GPS possible. Among other things.

And where would I be without GPS? I dunno.

More than that, I would assert that there has been no greater push for young children to go into STEM fields than that inspiration provided by the Moon landings. STEM fields for which we currently have an increasing need to import talent from other countries due to lack of interest in the US. That undermines the entire basis of our post-industrial economy.

[GreatJustice]

Furthermore, what kind of criticism is "just an improvement on older technology"? All new technology is an improvement on older technology in some way, even if it is a disruptive improvement that totally obsoletes the old method. That's what technological development is.

"Invented the heart pump" is a new technology. "Improved the heart pump" is an improvement, obviously.

Go for it, but make sure you don't include the advances based on already existing knowledge or technology, so good luck. Once again, you seriously don't know what you're talking about in this field. If you continue to claim the private sector is better at, well, everything, then I guess you're just going to continue doing so and I'll just assume you're trolling for the sake of fun. I can't see why you seriously seem to think that NASA contributes nothing.

Allow me to make this more fair, then; can you name me a NASA invention that very likely would not exist (in its present form) without NASA? Something that the various people working at NASA hypothetically working on their own wouldn't have created?

For the DoD there's the Internet, for example (without ARPANET it might exist, but it would have been quite a bit different from what exists today).

Also, might I ask, have you ever worked for NASA? Because the last person I asked who previously worked for NASA basically summed it up as being lots of red tape, bureaucracy, and waste with the occasional worthwhile invention coming once in a while.

The DoD gets more money than any other government department. They are afforded billions upon billions and can create black technology that is 20-30 years from being white technology. The DoD can throw 20 billion dollars at a project and scrap the whole thing in a day if they want to investigate something else, a similar fund would be more than NASA's yearly budget. Furthermore, the DoD's innovations are in war. NASA's innovations tend to be more of the "improve the lot of all humankind" type. The latter has more value than the former.

Again, do you have example of something that truly revolutionized the way people live invented by NASA?

Also, keep in mind that NASA is hardly living on pennies here. Since 1960 it has had a budget generally between ten and thirty billion dollars adjusted for inflation per year.

Then there's also, y'know, the entire multi-billion dollar satellite industry providing your weather forecast and the satellite television you may be watching it on. And which also makes GPS possible. Among other things.

And where would I be without GPS? I dunno.

Invented by the DoD. Whoops!

Didn't I just cover satellites by the way? They weren't invented by NASA, weren't first used by NASA, and would exist in the modern day either way.

[darkrider2]

Wasn't the internet first invented to share research data between labs? And weren't republicans dead against making it bigger too?

Also, the "it would exist if NASA didn't do it anyway" is in no possible way a valid argument anywhere.

Sure the theory of relativity would still exist if Einstein didn't do it first, but it would have come some time later.

I mean, the DoD hasn't done much except for improve upon the gun for the last 100 years.

[Frumple]

Credit where credit is due, I wouldn't say that's entirely true. Some civilian stuff has come out of the military budget in the last century, definitely. What has enriched society from DoD spending certainly hadn't been enough to justify the sheer amount that gets sunk into it, though, even remotely. It's... what, equal to the combined spending of the next 20-something countries below us (in expenditure, mind)? Large enough to be farcical if it weren't fact.

As fact it's merely ridiculous and somewhat disgusting

[kaijyuu]

The problem with defense research is it's narrowly focused. Sure, some things can be used elsewhere; walkie talkies are pretty awesome kid's toys. But the majority of the research goes into weapons. Not exactly a worthwhile expenditure.


If we were to reappropriate the funds into something far wider in scope (including space stuff like nasa), then we'd be getting a lot more actually useful stuff. I shouldn't have to explain the positive consequences of that (including economical, since that's the #1 thing on so many people's minds).

[jester]

Im fairly seriously against the us DoD, but in their favor: Internet.

[Heron TSG]

Spoiler: Holy crap, I think this is relevant. (click to show/hide)

There is a silver lining to a massive weapons R&D department: The stuff they make on the side can turn out to be very useful for civilian use.

[lemon10]

Spoiler: Holy crap, I think this is relevant. (click to show/hide)

There is a silver lining to a massive weapons R&D department: The stuff they make on the side can turn out to be very useful for civilian use.

Yes, some of the stuff then develop on the side could be usefull, but its a pretty terrible ratio (compared to what would happen if we invested tens of billions(?) of dollars more annually in NASA/Pure research).

[10ebbor10]

FYI, the modern version of the internet was developed by a scientist CERN, in order to distribute data from one of their previous particle arcelerators. They only thing DoD did was connect some university computers, while the CERN's version actively transmitted and relayed data. So you can't say they invented it, as others woud have done it anyway, and in fact, did it better than them. Besides, the DoD defense has wasted tons of money too.

As for things being improved upon. In a way you can say anything is an improved version of something else. Most things NASA, or any other space organization did, are imrpovements on other technologies, but that are things that wouldn't have been done on Earth. Examples include various medical technologies (Research into Caisson disease, osteoperosis, human reaction to different pressure, heart related diseases), sattelite technology, firefighting equipment, material science, ...

But really, at the moment NASA is wasting tons of money because they constantly have to cancel projects to fulfill congressional mandates (Space Launch System, for example) and to keep some other projects alive. Doubling their budget would allow them to actually do something again.

[MonkeyHead]

Most importantly I feel is that doubling or even tripling NASA's budget isnt that tricky for the USA to do - just throw a few billion less at your defence industries.

[10ebbor10]

NASA's current budget is 0.47% of the total. Which is about  one third of the budget of homeland security.

The DoD is 19%. And over the past ten years has been increased by 150%

[mainiac]

Didn't I just cover satellites by the way? They weren't invented by NASA, weren't first used by NASA, and would exist in the modern day either way.

So the DoD would just get the satellites into space by strapping them onto Peter Pans back?

Or would they maybe need to develop rocket propulsion along the way... i.e. NASA.

This argument feels like watching a monday morning quarterback argue that he would be a better coach then the head coach of an NFL team.  Sure the other guy might have worked his entire life in the sport, know all the players and the competition, is entirely versed in the minutae of what he does and have the sort of skill and intelligence that could get him a well paying job in an entirely different industry if he was so inclined.  But any time he makes a bad call you are going to think you are better then him because you happened to make the right guess before the fact... or after.

[GreatJustice]

May as well get this out of the way: I don't hate NASA, and when it comes to bad departments, NASA is pretty low on the list. However, it IS quite wasteful and most of its benefits would be present were it simply a part of the DoD.

Now, back to the topic at hand,

Didn't I just cover satellites by the way? They weren't invented by NASA, weren't first used by NASA, and would exist in the modern day either way.

So the DoD would just get the satellites into space by strapping them onto Peter Pans back?

Or would they maybe need to develop rocket propulsion along the way... i.e. NASA.

This argument feels like watching a monday morning quarterback argue that he would be a better coach then the head coach of an NFL team.  Sure the other guy might have worked his entire life in the sport, know all the players and the competition, is entirely versed in the minutae of what he does and have the sort of skill and intelligence that could get him a well paying job in an entirely different industry if he was so inclined.  But any time he makes a bad call you are going to think you are better then him because you happened to make the right guess before the fact... or after.

You do realize that Bell Laboratories was producing satellites as early as 1962 right?

Yes, they reached space via a NASA rocket, but then were NASA not making rockets then Bell and other companies would have had a pretty good reason to start trying to make their own rockets; it wouldn't be terribly unrealistic either, its not like the aerospace engineers, astrophysicists, etc would vanish if not hired by NASA (and indirectly crowding out any alternatives).

NASA's current budget is 0.47% of the total. Which is about  one third of the budget of homeland security.

The DoD is 19%. And over the past ten years has been increased by 150%

Get rid of Homeland Security, then. That's a positively terrible department. While you're at it, the DoD definitely needs to be cut down significantly (Which I said earlier): the US doesn't need a gigantic standing army and a military presence across the world. As with above, I wouldn't say NASA is a terrible department, just a wasteful one.

FYI, the modern version of the internet was developed by a scientist CERN, in order to distribute data from one of their previous particle arcelerators. They only thing DoD did was connect some university computers, while the CERN's version actively transmitted and relayed data. So you can't say they invented it, as others woud have done it anyway, and in fact, did it better than them. Besides, the DoD defense has wasted tons of money too.

As for things being improved upon. In a way you can say anything is an improved version of something else. Most things NASA, or any other space organization did, are imrpovements on other technologies, but that are things that wouldn't have been done on Earth. Examples include various medical technologies (Research into Caisson disease, osteoperosis, human reaction to different pressure, heart related diseases), sattelite technology, firefighting equipment, material science, ...

But really, at the moment NASA is wasting tons of money because they constantly have to cancel projects to fulfill congressional mandates (Space Launch System, for example) and to keep some other projects alive. Doubling their budget would allow them to actually do something again.

Oh, I'm not debating that NASA has made lots of scientific discoveries. It definitely has. But has it produced enough to really be worth it?

The vast majority of its discoveries very well could have been done on Earth, and it produces just as many useless products, failures, and so on as it does worthwhile things. After all, NASA has, from 1962 to today, cost around $750,000,000,000 (adjusted for inflation and rounded, of course). Would you say NASA has produced enough to be worth three quarters of a trillion dollars?

[Heron TSG]

The vast majority of its discoveries very well could have been done on Earth, and it produces just as many useless products, failures, and so on as it does worthwhile things. After all, NASA has, from 1962 to today, cost around $750,000,000,000 (adjusted for inflation and rounded, of course). Would you say NASA has produced enough to be worth three quarters of a trillion dollars?

1. You can't discover the properties of moon rocks on earth. (Well, sort of. Spectroscopy is very limited and can be inaccurate.)
2. You can't expect an R&D program to completely avoid failures.
3. I don't know where you're getting that figure, but 50 years of science and technology for $750,000,000,000 is alright with me.  Social Security and Medicare take that much every year. I'd be overjoyed if it had gotten twice the funding all this time.

[GreatJustice]

The vast majority of its discoveries very well could have been done on Earth, and it produces just as many useless products, failures, and so on as it does worthwhile things. After all, NASA has, from 1962 to today, cost around $750,000,000,000 (adjusted for inflation and rounded, of course). Would you say NASA has produced enough to be worth three quarters of a trillion dollars?

1. You can't discover the properties of moon rocks on earth. (Well, sort of. Spectroscopy is very limited and can be inaccurate.)
2. You can't expect an R&D program to completely avoid failures.
3. I don't know where you're getting that figure, but 50 years of science and technology for $750,000,000,000 is alright with me.  Social Security and Medicare take that much every year. I'd be overjoyed if it had gotten twice the funding all this time.

1. Have the properties of moon rocks significantly increased the quality of life of anyone?
2. I can expect it to not make multi billion dollar failures repeatedly without consequence.
3. "50 years of science and technology" is rather vague. Do you think there would be no science and technology without NASA? For reference, I combined the budgets of NASA from 1962 to 2012 adjusted for inflation, the source of which can be provided on request. True, it isn't entirely fair to do it that way, but then it isn't entirely fair to point out every success NASA has made in the past 50 years and compare it to a single year's budget either.