NASA Chooses Pluto Mission

CheshireCatCO writes: "NASA announced on Thursday that it has selected Alan Stern's Pluto mission proposal, named New Horizons, for phase B study and (hopefully) eventual launch in 2006. Alan is himself one of the top experts on Pluto, and his team consists of many other leaders in the field. It should be a good mission, if only they get the money for it." CNN has a story with some background on the mission. NASA is having a hard time deciding whether the Pluto-Kuiper Express is actually going to launch or not.

Comments

Focus Needs to be on Basic Science and Technology

[Patrick McRotch]

My thought is, if we only get one Pluto mission, so what? It's not as though it will negatively affect anyone on Earth. We need more research into the basic science and technology that will underly future space exploration efforts.

Instead of throwing away money on single-use probes like this, NASA should spend the money to develop REAL interplanetary travel. After all, it doesn't (shouldn't) count as exploration unless humans are there to make the observations. You can't trust a radio feed from across the solar system--not to mention the fact that humans can see much more than unintelligent probes. Until NASA develops Warp Drives, Communicators, Teleporters, and Vulcans, we can't realistically expect to explore the Universe. If any boys from NASA are in the audience, GET CRACKIN!

According to the Star Trek chronogy, we should already be well on our way to Warp Drives. Instead, NASA is throwing money down the drain. It's like the difference between renting a house and buying a house. You can never recover your rent money (throw-away probes), whereas if you buy the house (put the money into fundemental research), you can later reap a profit.

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My Favorite Slashdot Poll of All Time

An Expert on Pluto?

[cperciva]

What, exactly, does it take to be an expert on Pluto? Does knowing everything ever discovered about it count?

In that case we're almost all experts on Pluto, because almost nothing is known about it.