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The Top Three Reasons for Humans in Space

Posted by samzenpus on from the so-we-can-fight-the-aliens dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Why humans in space? The Space Review has the top three reasons: 3. To work. 2. To live. 1. To survive. 'To work' means doing stuff in space: research, explore, visit, etc. 'To live' means to have humans/life beyond Earth in colonies/settlements. 'To survive' means that putting humans/life beyond Earth is a very Good Thing in case a very Bad Thing happens to humans/life on Earth."

3 of 732 comments (clear)

  1. Re:NASA's Missing the Mark by Sven-Erik · · Score: 5, Informative

    That is the job for NOAA (National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration).

    --
    - "Every demand is a prison, and wisdom is only free when it asks nothing." Sir Betrand Russell
  2. Space.com's top 10 by djinn2020 · · Score: 5, Informative
    The Expanded reasons from space.com

    1. To Secure a Future for Humanity (when we deplete the ozone/nuke ourselves out)
    2. To Build a New Frontier (welcome the space cowboys and their space cattle drives)
    3. To Find New Energy Sources (hydrogen wells)
    4. To Build an Industrial settlement On the Moon (more likely than not it will be a military establishment; MoonWars 2034)
    5. Better Quality Images of the Universe -- and More of Them (no air to look through means fewer distortians; I refer to hubble and all of its glory)
    6. The SETI Effort (same problem of distortion of current signals, but on earth it is due to ambient radio wave interferance from all the devices we run here)
    7. Mining (rare elements here on earth will abound on different planets/moons; some elements' abundance in asteroids could reduce prices here on earth exponentially)
    8. Learning the History of Our Universe On the Moon (lunar geology, a hands-on test of our theories and observations about the varying ages of planets and moons)
    9. Environmental Benefits (perhaps, more than likely we will discover more environmental problems such as breathing sharp lunar dust and introducing extra-terrestrial life into earh's ecosystem)
    10. Meeting the Challenge (if we can, we will; I'm sure about that)
    --
    Mens et Manus
  3. Re:Regarding the article: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    That is not correct. The issue was never one of whether Galileo was correct, but it was the treatment of Galileo and others. A nice write-up of it is here.