No, it's factual correct. It's you who are being pedantic with this kind of criticism. What did you not understand in the explanation of the former poster? It stands for automatic, NOT autonomous. Just like the autopilot of an airplane, it doesn't replace the driver, it just make some limited aspects automatic and easier.
If John Q. Public assumes autopilot means 'self-driving', John Q. Public is wrong and ignorant.
If John Q. Public assumes autopilot means 'self-driving', even after the Tesla-seller has explained it to him what it does and doesn't do, John Q. Public is wrong, ignorant and wilfully obtuse.
If John Q. Public assumes autopilot means 'self-driving', even when it explicitly is said in the manual it isn't, then he's wrong, ignorant, wilfully obtuse and lazy.
If John Q. Public assumes autopilot means 'self-driving', even when it explicitly is said it isn't every goddamn time you start up autopilot, then he's wrong, ignorant, wilfully obtuse, lazy and stupid.
And if he then ignores warnings seven times in a row, he's wrong, ignorant, wilfully obtuse, lazy, stupid and irresponsible.
All in all, thus, the fault lays entirely with John Q. Public, not Tesla. Thinking such a person will avoid acting as he did if you call it 'auto assist' or even 'instant death' is just ludicrous. Tesla-owners know FULL WELL it's not a self-driving car, and that they need to hold their hands on the wheel. So all your complaining about how misled they are and how more responsible they would be and avoid accidents if only it was named differently, is just (pedantic) bullshit.
Untrue. If the car, with all it's advantages and disadvantages at the end of the day causes LESS accidents then normal cars would do, it's still a good thing to implement it, however you turn it.
It's not about the vehicle being perfectly safe, it's about it being safer then regular vehicles. If it is, then all what you say here is null and void.
Oh, and btw, it says: "The driver used the vehicle's self-driving system for 37.5 minutes of the 41 minutes of his trip, according to NTSB. During the time the self-driving system was activated, he had his hands on the wheel for a total of only about half a minute"
So it drove longer than 30 minutes on autopilot without crashing, which means it is an autopliot, even using your own argument and reasoning.
Which means that the fault lays with the drivers, since they apparently didn't take the time to know their car.
Even worse, it takes - as some others have pointed out already - a pretty stupid guy to NOT understand even the basics of the Tesla autopilot while 1)It's traditionally explained by the seller when buying the car what the autopilot does and doesn't do, 2)It's described in the manual of the car, 3)it's clearly indicated and mentioned EVERY god damn time you start up autopilot.
So, you have a situation where the driver is being told over and over again it's not a self-driving car system, you always have to keep your hands on the wheel, and you must respond to the warnings... and the guy does nothing of the sort, and then it's Tesla's fault for choosing the word 'wrong'. Let's get real here.
The truth of the matter is - and you know this as well as I - that the driver knew full well that he had to keep his hands on the wheel, that it wasn't a self-driving car, and that he had to respond to the warnings. Yeah - responding to warnings: a real brain-wrecker, need a university diploma and years of training for that! He didn't know how to put his hands on the steering wheel, I suppose?
No, my friend. I get a bit fed up with all the comments as if Tesla drivers don't know about it, and just innocently, ignorantly think the semantics of the word are more important than anything else, and thus 'they couldn't know'. that's bull. They know alright. they ALL know they need to keep their hand on the wheel. They ALL know it's not a self-driving system.
So it's not a matter of lack of knowledge, nor of a complicated system that needs years of harsh training: they just need to do what they always need to do: keeping their eyes open and their hands on the wheel. He KNOWS that. And yet, if the guy then doesn't do that out of stupidity and a search for comfort and laziness, coupled with irresponsibility..., it's Tesla's fault, and not the drivers'?
I don't think so.
The truth is, even if Tesla called it 'auto assistance' or 'keep your hands on the wheel -system', it won't make any difference, since the guys being irresponsible and stupid now by ignoring all what they already know, will be irresponsible and stupid as well, even if if you called it the 'death-wish button'. As said, the comments pretending that a lack of knowledge of the system is the problem for the behavior of the drivers is nonsensical and untrue: they know full well what they have to do - the system even explicitly and repeatedly tells them- , but they ignore it nevertheless. No word-change will change anything to that. the fault here lays not with the system, nor a lack of knowledge, nor the word used for the system. That's all a thinly veiled smokescreen for the trolls around here.
The fault lays squarely with the driver, who knows what he's supposed to do and don't do, but chooses to ignore it.
There is nothing in the definition of 'autopilot' (you can check the dictionary) that encompasses any length of time. I refute your second part, thus, where it's deemed to be 'widely regarded' as such, and even if it were, it's clear that it's an arbitrary and faulty way at looking at things, just like thinking homeopathic medicine actually works - as it's widely regarded by the populace as well.
Also, it wouldn't make sense to have the amount of time be the defining characteristic. What if a plain can only fly 29 minutes before it crashes: it hasn't got an autopilot anymore? Even when it's the same? What about 25 minutes? 15 minutes? And what about the circumstances, the environment? Put a plane low above the ground in a city with skyscrapers on 'autopilot', and it sure as hell won't survive for 30 minutes. On the other hand, put the same Tesla on the same 'autopilot' in the middle of a dried up salt-lake, and it can go for 30 minutes without problem, without crashing.
An 'autopilot' just means a device or system that provides some automatic control, nothing more, nothing less. The *level* of automatic steering and control is, as of yet, ALWAYS limited in some form or to some degree, and depends on the environment as much as anything else. This level is also always described and made clear to the pilot/driver, which is why pilots are not going to fly low in a city on autopilot, nor land, nor ignore warnings, nor go above what the system is capable off - nor are drivers of a car go beyond what their level of autopilot can muster.
It's as simple as that. Whether they don't crash for 10 minutes or 20 or 30 has no bearing on this, and does not define an autopilot-feature.
That's nonsensical. At what arbitrary 'length of time' does something become an autopilot, then? 1 hour? 2 hours? 30 minutes? Depending on that, based on your own definition, one CAN say Tesla has an auto-pilot, and one CAN even say even on airplanes there is no autopilot.
No, the REAL issue here, was whether Tesla should call its system 'autopilot' seen the fact a driver who didn't respond at all at the warnings and apparently wasn't paying any attention and did nothing, crashed.
Well, use THAT analogy, then. An airline pilot doesn't respond at all anymore and ignores all warnings. How will the airplane, with it's 'autopilot' fare? No better than the Tesla car. you know it, and I know it. That it may take a while longer for the airplane to crash changes nothing. If the Tesla car had taken double as long to crash, you'd still be complaining and whining.
Nonsense. A normal adult with an inkling of intelligence knows what 'autopilot' means in the context of driving a Tesla, just like a pilot knows what it means for his vehicle.
It's described in the manual, it's clearly mentioned when they buy it, and it freakin warns about it every time one uses the system.
THERE IS NO WAY a Tesla driver doesn't know full well what to expect of the autopilot system thus. A 'reasonable person' thus, should expect what is clearly said and indicated what 'autopilot' means for a tesla car (just as pilots know what it means for their airplanes).
Expecting that it does something else as is repeatedly said what it does, is unreasonable. Just because you ignore all of it and prefer to think it means more and something else, based on the semantics of the word, even though you actually know it doesn't, is the epitome of NOT being rational and reasonable.
I refer again to one of the links I gave. There you can see that even among Muslims in the USA there is a considerably HIGHER - significantly so, in scientific terms - percentage that think it's ok to, for instance, stone women to death which are 'unfaithful'.
The only reason, thus, why the USA doesn't have as many problems (yet) is because of..numbers. It's as simply as that. Germany, last year, got 1 million (!) refugees - in one year, thus. In comparison to it's populace, that would be equivalent of the USA taking in 4 million a year. Everyone with a grain of intelligence will understand that, if the USA did the same, EXACTLY the same problems would occur. (And btw, once they got the nationality, you can't force them to settle anywhere, since as a citizen, they're free to go where they want, so your idea of 'spreading' doesn't help. In fact, after 20-30 years, there is no spreading to be done anymore, because they're in all cities with their own neighbourhoods).
Can you imagine how well the USA would fare, if they took in 4 million people per year for 20 years in a row, where 40% of them think the sharia should be above the constitution, and 12% think it's ok to stone women to death?
I say Islam is bad, because it IS bad - if you follow what is actually described there and you believe the stuff is actually the 'word of god' you have to follow. Other religions may be considered bad too, but those are NOT, or far, far, far less, being interpreted literally anymore, nor are the adepts of those religious so devout anymore, as it is with Islam.
In fact, the problem is NOT being fanatic, at least not on its own. Take the most fanatical Jainist, and that will lead to someone avoiding to trample on insects and who wouldn't even try to hurt bacteria. A fanatical Jainist would be a complete and utter pacifist. So being 'fantical' about your religion, when that religion is inherently peaceful, makes person that is fanatically peaceful. There is no problem with that. So how comes it is with Islam (and, granted, some other religions)? Because there IS bad in there, and it DOES say things that are antithetic to modern thoughts, and the more literally you take this, the more bad it becomes. So it's not just fanaticism that is the problem, it's the sourcematerial as well.
But anyway, the point is, the USA has no problems, not because the Muslims they have are so welcomed by the populace that they don't have any of the antithetical values and wishes anymore ( - as evidenced by the poll, they still have, and still with a far larger percentage than the rest of the populace), but primarily because they have far less than the EU. The percentage of Muslims in the USA make out 0,9% of the populace... in Germany, however, it is more than FIVE TIMES as high. Plus, the USA has far more landmass, so you *can* spread them better, in most EU countries, there is nothing to spread anymore: they're in every city, within there neighbourhoods. Many of which have become no-go zones for the police, btw.
It's all about numbers, thus. The more you have them, the more problems you get, because the more people you get with undemocratic ideas - EVEN if, as correctly noted, not ALL of Muslims share those views. My point is, that that doesn't matter: whether all adher to it or not, it doesn't change the fact that TOO MANY do, and that your society/civilisation is going to buckle under it, if one keeps accepting people where 40% wants to abolish your laws.
And the left has tried for 40 years to claim 'spreading' and 'education' will deal with it, and make them all integrate. Alas, wishful thinking: integration goes extremely slow and is very poor, with Mulims, simply by the fact they don't really want to integrate - especially the 40% that finds their laws should govern the land. In fact, polls have also shown, that even among second and third generation immigrants, it's even worse then with their parents that came in the 60'ies. A recent poll with those youth in immigration-neig
"So given that, I don't really see a reason for singling out Muslims in western society. "
I've given you the reason in my former posts. Whether one wants it or not, in comparison, today, FAR more acts of terrorism are done in the name of their religion by Muslims than by Christians. But, as said, what's even worse is that FAR more Muslims uphold and concur with ideas that are antithetic with democratic, Western values based on the enlightenment. Those are not all terrorists; they just hold extreme views (extreme in regard to our values). If you looked at the links I provided you, you can note that some of those views - which are incompatible with how *we* think about things and go against our basic values - have either a majority, or a very large minority being supportive of it.
If you would take a random sample size and compare Muslims with non-Muslims in regard to women's rights, homosexuality, etc., you would see a HUGE discrepancy in Western countries between the two groups. clearly, the correlation is not by accident, but has a *causal* relation: it's because they are Muslims, such a large part thinks that sharia should be the only law being applied, that women are less worth than men, that homosexuality is abhorred, that they think fre speech does not allow to insult the prophet Mohammed (PUH!), etc.
you wouldn't find these numbers and percentages with atheists, not even with Christians, nor Buddhists, etc. the reason for that is what you said: most people, even claiming to be Christians, aren't all that religious anymore, and Christianity has had a reformation and lost a lot of its sharp teeth anyway.
The Islam has not - or to a far, far lesser extend. Muslims are also to a far higher percentage still devote in the classical sense. You only have to look at the mosques for that: almost always filled, while the churches in Europe are dwindling and largely empty. So, both in religiousness as in the strict applicability of their holy book, Muslims are far more ferocious, percentage-wise, than any other religion these days. That's why you see raving and angry-shouting Muslims trying to get a museum shut down, or making threats - by legal and illegal means - if that museum was posting art that offends their prophet. Do the same with Christians, and the most you get is some bishop saying it's not very proper. That's also why you see people being shot for making a cartoon of Mohamed *by Muslims* - tell me, when was the last time a group of people were shot dead out of religious motives because they offended, say, Jesus?
It's this sort of blindness that annoys me the most. Yes, there has been brutality in the past by all monotheistic religions. Yes, you have nutcases here in the West too, who commit terrorist attacks or who want to impose their religious laws on others. Yes, you have homo-haters in the indigenous populace also. Yes, you have people thinking women are inferior to men as well. But *comparatively* you have FAR more of them within the Muslim community than in every other religious or non-religious community. This is a fact; see the links I gave you, and compare those numbers with the average you get asking the same questions of natives in Europe. The scale and level is considerably higher than with the local communities, and even with any other group who is or has settled themselves in Europe, and their integration is one of the lowest.
Your halal-example shows the same sort of naivety, imho. Ok, so you like halal meat more. Good for you. Now, say I want to eat non-halal food. Do you know it has become increasingly difficult, with the exception of pork, to find *any* non-halal meat anymore in my country? Even when it's not explicitly mentioned, it's still made in a halal way, because that's more convenient for slaughterhouses, even if they technically break the law with it (since they are obliged by law to sedate animals before killing them). Alas, we made the mistake of allowing an exception for religious reasons, and now it's done with all and every animal/meat, wheth
I would claim it rather being the Qu'ran and Islam, instead of the bible and Christianity. That said, buddhism has even less violence done in its name than either of those. Jainism even far less, if not outright 'none'. But regardless, that sort of discussion is endless and leads to nowhere. I would agree that all religions have blood on their hands, and while one might dispute who has 'the most blood', it changes nothing to all the rest I pointed out.
All monotheistic religions believe in a nonsensical book that is rife with contradictions, but that said, the most dangerous religion nowadays, is clearly Islam.
I also note that you did not address the main point I made, namely that a large percentage of Muslims want the sharia and have ideas that are not compatible with Western concepts (such as respect for free speech, EVEN if it's directly insulting the prophet Mohemedd (PUH!)), and that the sharia is at odds with our Western democratic values. Hence, as it currently stands, it is antithetic and therefore a danger to Western democratic values and its society as a whole, which is based on those values of the Enlightenment.
I can understand what you're getting at, but subjectively speaking, I wouldn't have wasted (as what I perceive it) so much time to a pedantic troll. Yes, it may, or may not lead to some moderate enlightenment for others to read, but even then I doubt it's worth the effort (or you should have addressed it more generally, and not in a one-by-one step as a rsponse to the troll, if your goal is edacutaion of the reading populace). IMHO, of course.
In fact, I thought 'it begs the question' also meant 'it raises the question'. I've always seen, it used like that, en though I'm not a native English-speaker, I'm quite fluent - even if I say so myself.;-)
But I'm not sure this whole things has convinced me to change my opinion or usage of the term. Ok, granted, I've learned the technical correct side of it. I'll take note of it. But it doesn't change much de facto, because, however one turns it, the usage is SO common these days in regard to the meaning 'it raises the question', that it seems to me - and apparent the majority of people - to have surpassed the original meaning and intent.
As with all things, language is a 'living' thing. Myriads of words before and after us and our lifetime, will change, warp, drift and get other meanings. Even a lot of words today don't mean exactly the same what they meant 200 years ago, but no-one today is still complaining about that, isn't there? A language that doesn't change anymore, is dead.
After all is said and done, the meaning of a word is derived from it's usage, period. It can be annoying during a time, for instance, when people misuse 'literally' when they, in fact, mean the opposite; 'allegorically' - but even there, if the usage becomes really common and the norm, I guess I'll accept it. Don't get me wrong: I think the semantics and the real meaning of words - as defined by the dictionaries - is of paramount importance, if you want to communicate sensible with someone else.
I'm just saying, sometimes, the meaning of a word changes, and that change even gets into a dictionary as well.
I'm afraid you have an overly optimistic view of Islamic conquest. Let me give you a link to help you open your eyes a bit: http://www1.cbn.com/churchandm...
One sees there a plethora of massacres, genocides and mass killings done by Muslims. Where they alone in that? No, Christians did their share (Buddhists far less, if one is honest), however, far LESS than Muslim conquest has done.And mostly, in regard to the crusades and other fights against Muslims, it was *in response* to the conquest of Christian grounds and land. Meaning, if the Muslims hadn't INVADED and CONQUERED Christian lands and countries, they wouldn't have had such a reaction neither. I couldn't find any specifics on the conquest of Spain to demonstrate unambigiously that the killings done by Muslims there is 'less' than those of Christians, but in any case it seems rather overly naive to think Muslims didn't kill off civilians and innocents at all, when they clearly had no problem doing it everywhere else.
But, regardless, I'm willing to gleen over all that, since it's in the far history, and during those times violence was rampant everywhere. It's of little use trying to convince whomever was 'the bloodiest' hundreds of years ago. Of far more concern is, how Muslims react NOW, in current times. And in this respect, it does not bode well.
As one can see, a majority of Muslims in Muslim-countries, and even a significant large proportion of Muslims in Western countries have ideas and beliefs that are antithetic with the mores, rules, and values of Western democracies. We're not talking about terrorists here, we're talking about *radical views* hold *by* Muslims, which is much broader then straight out terrorism, but still - even more so, I would claim - a danger to the continuation of Western democracies with their values derived from the Enlightenment.
It is THAT which is *really* worrying, though less visible and less openly violent than beheadings of ISIS. Unless there is a drastic reformation of Islam, such as has happened to Christianity, I claim the following: Islam is unreconcilable with, and a danger to, Western, democratic values based on the enlightenment, and, if we do not (re)act against this, it will - in the long term - mean the end of our era. It's clear as daylight, you can not have or maintain our Western system if Muslims continue to flood in (or breed and propagate faster and more in the Western countries than the original populace) while remaining as insensitive to integration and incorporation of our values as they are today (and ever have been).
Note that I'm not talking about race. Race is not the problem. I'm also no racist. Raise Blacks, Berbers, whatever, up from infancy in ones' own culture, and they ARE and BEHAVE like one of us. I'm saying it's the culture and mentality that is the problem. 40% of British Muslims want the Sharia to be the supreme law, trumping any other laws. 40%!! That's HUGE. That's like, a thousand times more and higher than when you would ask an original, born-and-raised Brit. I find it peculiar that the danger of this is not more than apparent to the left. If you take in a million refugees, as German did, and 40% of them wants to introduce sharia-law, one has to be blind and stupid not to see how this will create tensions and huge societal problems for your own civilisation and society. Yet, the West turns a blind eye. It's incomprehensible. It's like cultural suicide, and we're doing it to ourselves, like a bunch of lemmings.
Even the 'moderate Muslim' should be worried, in fact. At least those who wanted to escape from sharia law and the oppression of their home countries. If this keeps up, I foresee the end of our current Western model by the end of the 21ste century, if not sooner. This is not Islamophobia, it's just an observation and logically deduced analysis.
I largely agree with you, with the caveat the actions done are also done *in the name* of that religion, to be considered 'religious'. Otherwise, one could call the first and second war in Iraq a 'holy War' perpetrated by Christianity onto Muslims. But those wars weren't religious wars. And even though, statistically speaking, I think it's true most of the soldiers of the West were Christians, that wouldn't make it a 'religious/Christian' war.
In contrast, however, it's true that doing something 'in name of (ones') God', clearly validates the nominator that it's religious in nature, EVEN - as you say - some others of the same or similar faith may disagree, and claim it's not about their religion. This is especially true in the case of Islam, since they have no central authority (Like the Pope in Rome For Catholic Christianity) who determines what is the 'right interpretation'.
There is NO right interpretation in Islam, and no-one with absolute authority to claim so. This in turn means, that ALL interpretations can be considered correct - even though warring factions will never agree what interpretation is the correct one, and think 'theirs' is correct - ad infinitum.
The truth is, all interpretations have equal worth within Islam, from an objective stance. Even ISIS is not 'wrong' based on their interpretation; we merely find their interpretation (certainly as Westerners) despicable and vile. And, it must be said, also by a lot of other Muslims. But they're not *wrong* when claiming the Koran says the kill unbelievers. It's in there, all right. And, in their view, they're only adhering to what the Prophet asked - and they're right there too. Because, as with any 'Holy' book, it's full of contradictions, and thus you can choose and cherry-pick whatever you want. But it's ALL there, so one can't say (moderate) Muslims saying that the Koran says Allah is merciful are wrong. BUT, and here is what is controversial for the multicultural left; neither are radical Muslims saying the Koran says killing the unbelievers (and many other things that are murderous and vile, like with enslaving women as warbooty).
So it does the Islam good or bad? Neither and both, but looking at the recent developments of the last ten years, it's clear without a doubt that it's pretty dangerous, especially to democratic Western societies. That's because, apart from the terrorist attacks, a *significant* and large part of the Muslim-community still have ideas that are antithetic to Western, democratic values, even if they don't use outright violence like the 1-2% of extreme radicals of their religious community.
Right after the massacres the Muslims did starting with the prophet Mohammed (PUH!) and continuing with the Muslim caliph, Abu Bakr, who launched Islam into almost 1,500 years of continual imperialist, colonialist, bloody conquest and subjugation of others through invasion and war, a role Islam continues to this very day.
But back to Spain. How come the Muslims where there in the first place? Spain has always been Christian, at least since 349 D.
Ah, that's right! Because they INVADED Spain in the first place. Who would have thought!?
As a non-native English speaker, I always thought the latter WAS what the sentence meant. Isn't begging a way of asking for something (as a beggar)? Asking for a question, thus, would logically be more close to 'raising a question', rather than 'assuming the conclusion' to the question. I would have thought. So I can't really find it a disturbing usage.
In contrast, however, I find it mildly annoying that a lot of people (on youtube, for instance) use 'literally', when they mean the exact OPPOSITE of it. They mean it 'allegorically' yet use 'literally'.
Maybe that's because the 'new' meaning isn't as ingrained as yet, or maybe because there is a very close equivalent in my own language which still means what it normally means, but regardless: sometimes, misuse of words CAN be annoying, and this misuse of 'literally' I find more grating than something that begs the question.
Now, this is subjective, of course. But. The above AC however, clearly was being pedantic and wanted to troll.
I'm more inclined to agree with Tyson: while the rover(s) were great news and certainly generated exitment, if a manned landing had been done at the same time, *no-one* of the large public would have even noticed. That is to say: manned missions will *always* generate more excitement than robotic missions.
But, don't get me wrong, I'm all for going to Mars too, and I think purely as a PR stunt (though gathering enthusiasm of/from the public is worthwhile) it's not worth its money, unless you open it up to the private sector and get the economical factor playing. But I just wanted to say that the public, politics, economics, etc. and, indeed, science, all play a part in any decision NASA takes.
It's never going to be one sole thing. Some people - scientists included - will think one thing is a pity, while others think another things is wasted money. For instance, as one can see, some scientists are against manned spacetravel, because it cuts in the available budget and thus it means less science for them. Purely from the premise and viewpoint that NASA is there for them to get scientific data, I can understand their complaints. But I think they're mistaken, when taking a more global approach. I think taking steps to actually colonize other planets and become a multi-planetary species is important too. But everyone has his opinion on it, I guess. Politicians see NASA as a means to have and keep jobs and employment in their region, for instance. That's not a worthwhile or useful goal in my book, but I guess politicians see it differently. Etc.
Anyway, I wish they wrote into the constitution that NASA gets a minimum of 1% of the GNP.:-) That way, things would become less cut-throat, and NASA would be assured of stable finances, allowing to plan long-term.
I'm not a real proponent to waste much time and money on a moonbase, certainly not if it's to be intended as complete moon-infrastructure to make and refuel rockets for Mars. I could mayhaps see some use if it's a kept as a testbed for a colony to Mars. But I don't think it's really necessary.
However, I was making a general point. NASA, and it's goals, have never been, and will never be, solely and purely about science and scientific return. It could be as simple as PR; making the public at large interested in spacetravel again, for instance (public = politics). That succeeds better with manned flights than unmanned, and rather with moonlandings then with a station in LEO.
Of course, Mars would achive that too, but not in the same timeframe and with the same cost. It's still more cheaper and less far off to have a moonbase, then a Mars-base.
And, let's face it, it's been such a huge-ass time... if they were going to land on the moon again, I would take leave from my work and watch it live if I had too.;-) 'Done before' (40 years ago) or not.
Though, personally, if it's that or a Mars-landing during my life-time, I'd rather have the latter.
True. However, as said, NASA *never* had as sole and ultimate goal only science and scientific return. So it really is strange to take the premise as if it was and is. I understand that (most) scientists would *want* that, because that's their bred and butter, and what they like most, but that doesn't make it correct. The public support - and thus political support - is far easier and better gained by manned spaceflight, than robotic flight, for instance. Colonization is, ultimately, a manned endeavor - colonizing with robotic landings doesn't make the human race multi-planetary.
That's not to say the science isn't interesting: it certainly is. But it was never NASA's sole purpose to begin with. It would be like scientists saying: if they would put all the money they waste on wars and the military, into science, we could achieve far more!
Certainly. No doubt. But that's not the point nor the goal of the military.
Let's take this one step further. I'd rather they spend all that money on me, so I could have a luxurious life without any financial worries.
There.
It all depends on ones' priorities. NASA's priorities is not ONLY scientific return. NASA conducts its work in four principal organizations, called mission directorates:
Aeronautics: manages research focused on meeting global demand for air mobility in ways that are more environmentally friendly and sustainable, while also embracing revolutionary technology from outside aviation. Human Exploration and Operations: focuses on International Space Station operations, development of commercial spaceflight capabilities and human exploration beyond low-Earth orbit. Science: explores the Earth, solar system and universe beyond; charts the best route of discovery; and reaps the benefits of Earth and space exploration for society. Space Technology: rapidly develops, innovates, demonstrates, and infuses revolutionary, high-payoff technologies that enable NASA's future missions while providing economic benefit to the nation.
Note that scientific return is not the only goal for NASA, nor was it ever meant to be. You're starting from a wrong premise, thus. It's the fault of those scientists that they think NASA only exists to serve their purposes. It doesn't.
" it can be easier to get payloads to Mars from Venus than from Earth "
Let's not go there. You just made an excellent rebuttal to UnknowingFool why it doesn't make sense to make a base on the moon to then send rockets to Mars, and now you're arguing the same...
By the time Venus would (if, ever) be 'colonized' by myriads of cloudcities large and complex enough to make a floating infrastructure possible to send rockets cheaper to Mars, it would take less long and would be far cheaper by that time to have colonized Mars directly.
Unless you're talking about a really, really far away future, where there is trade between planets... but by that time, Earth may have a space-elevator anyhow.
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No, it's factual correct. It's you who are being pedantic with this kind of criticism. What did you not understand in the explanation of the former poster? It stands for automatic, NOT autonomous. Just like the autopilot of an airplane, it doesn't replace the driver, it just make some limited aspects automatic and easier.
If John Q. Public assumes autopilot means 'self-driving', John Q. Public is wrong and ignorant.
If John Q. Public assumes autopilot means 'self-driving', even after the Tesla-seller has explained it to him what it does and doesn't do, John Q. Public is wrong, ignorant and wilfully obtuse.
If John Q. Public assumes autopilot means 'self-driving', even when it explicitly is said in the manual it isn't, then he's wrong, ignorant, wilfully obtuse and lazy.
If John Q. Public assumes autopilot means 'self-driving', even when it explicitly is said it isn't every goddamn time you start up autopilot, then he's wrong, ignorant, wilfully obtuse, lazy and stupid.
And if he then ignores warnings seven times in a row, he's wrong, ignorant, wilfully obtuse, lazy, stupid and irresponsible.
All in all, thus, the fault lays entirely with John Q. Public, not Tesla. Thinking such a person will avoid acting as he did if you call it 'auto assist' or even 'instant death' is just ludicrous. Tesla-owners know FULL WELL it's not a self-driving car, and that they need to hold their hands on the wheel. So all your complaining about how misled they are and how more responsible they would be and avoid accidents if only it was named differently, is just (pedantic) bullshit.
Doing a full stop in the middle of a highway is about the WORST thing you can do, if safety is your concern.
Untrue. If the car, with all it's advantages and disadvantages at the end of the day causes LESS accidents then normal cars would do, it's still a good thing to implement it, however you turn it.
It's not about the vehicle being perfectly safe, it's about it being safer then regular vehicles. If it is, then all what you say here is null and void.
Oh, and btw, it says: "The driver used the vehicle's self-driving system for 37.5 minutes of the 41 minutes of his trip, according to NTSB. During the time the self-driving system was activated, he had his hands on the wheel for a total of only about half a minute"
So it drove longer than 30 minutes on autopilot without crashing, which means it is an autopliot, even using your own argument and reasoning.
Which means that the fault lays with the drivers, since they apparently didn't take the time to know their car.
Even worse, it takes - as some others have pointed out already - a pretty stupid guy to NOT understand even the basics of the Tesla autopilot while 1)It's traditionally explained by the seller when buying the car what the autopilot does and doesn't do, 2)It's described in the manual of the car, 3)it's clearly indicated and mentioned EVERY god damn time you start up autopilot.
So, you have a situation where the driver is being told over and over again it's not a self-driving car system, you always have to keep your hands on the wheel, and you must respond to the warnings... and the guy does nothing of the sort, and then it's Tesla's fault for choosing the word 'wrong'. Let's get real here.
The truth of the matter is - and you know this as well as I - that the driver knew full well that he had to keep his hands on the wheel, that it wasn't a self-driving car, and that he had to respond to the warnings. Yeah - responding to warnings: a real brain-wrecker, need a university diploma and years of training for that! He didn't know how to put his hands on the steering wheel, I suppose?
No, my friend. I get a bit fed up with all the comments as if Tesla drivers don't know about it, and just innocently, ignorantly think the semantics of the word are more important than anything else, and thus 'they couldn't know'. that's bull. They know alright. they ALL know they need to keep their hand on the wheel. They ALL know it's not a self-driving system.
So it's not a matter of lack of knowledge, nor of a complicated system that needs years of harsh training: they just need to do what they always need to do: keeping their eyes open and their hands on the wheel. He KNOWS that. And yet, if the guy then doesn't do that out of stupidity and a search for comfort and laziness, coupled with irresponsibility..., it's Tesla's fault, and not the drivers'?
I don't think so.
The truth is, even if Tesla called it 'auto assistance' or 'keep your hands on the wheel -system', it won't make any difference, since the guys being irresponsible and stupid now by ignoring all what they already know, will be irresponsible and stupid as well, even if if you called it the 'death-wish button'. As said, the comments pretending that a lack of knowledge of the system is the problem for the behavior of the drivers is nonsensical and untrue: they know full well what they have to do - the system even explicitly and repeatedly tells them- , but they ignore it nevertheless. No word-change will change anything to that. the fault here lays not with the system, nor a lack of knowledge, nor the word used for the system. That's all a thinly veiled smokescreen for the trolls around here.
The fault lays squarely with the driver, who knows what he's supposed to do and don't do, but chooses to ignore it.
There is nothing in the definition of 'autopilot' (you can check the dictionary) that encompasses any length of time. I refute your second part, thus, where it's deemed to be 'widely regarded' as such, and even if it were, it's clear that it's an arbitrary and faulty way at looking at things, just like thinking homeopathic medicine actually works - as it's widely regarded by the populace as well.
Also, it wouldn't make sense to have the amount of time be the defining characteristic. What if a plain can only fly 29 minutes before it crashes: it hasn't got an autopilot anymore? Even when it's the same? What about 25 minutes? 15 minutes? And what about the circumstances, the environment? Put a plane low above the ground in a city with skyscrapers on 'autopilot', and it sure as hell won't survive for 30 minutes. On the other hand, put the same Tesla on the same 'autopilot' in the middle of a dried up salt-lake, and it can go for 30 minutes without problem, without crashing.
An 'autopilot' just means a device or system that provides some automatic control, nothing more, nothing less. The *level* of automatic steering and control is, as of yet, ALWAYS limited in some form or to some degree, and depends on the environment as much as anything else. This level is also always described and made clear to the pilot/driver, which is why pilots are not going to fly low in a city on autopilot, nor land, nor ignore warnings, nor go above what the system is capable off - nor are drivers of a car go beyond what their level of autopilot can muster.
It's as simple as that. Whether they don't crash for 10 minutes or 20 or 30 has no bearing on this, and does not define an autopilot-feature.
That's nonsensical. At what arbitrary 'length of time' does something become an autopilot, then? 1 hour? 2 hours? 30 minutes? Depending on that, based on your own definition, one CAN say Tesla has an auto-pilot, and one CAN even say even on airplanes there is no autopilot.
No, the REAL issue here, was whether Tesla should call its system 'autopilot' seen the fact a driver who didn't respond at all at the warnings and apparently wasn't paying any attention and did nothing, crashed.
Well, use THAT analogy, then. An airline pilot doesn't respond at all anymore and ignores all warnings. How will the airplane, with it's 'autopilot' fare? No better than the Tesla car. you know it, and I know it. That it may take a while longer for the airplane to crash changes nothing. If the Tesla car had taken double as long to crash, you'd still be complaining and whining.
Nonsense. A normal adult with an inkling of intelligence knows what 'autopilot' means in the context of driving a Tesla, just like a pilot knows what it means for his vehicle.
It's described in the manual, it's clearly mentioned when they buy it, and it freakin warns about it every time one uses the system.
THERE IS NO WAY a Tesla driver doesn't know full well what to expect of the autopilot system thus. A 'reasonable person' thus, should expect what is clearly said and indicated what 'autopilot' means for a tesla car (just as pilots know what it means for their airplanes).
Expecting that it does something else as is repeatedly said what it does, is unreasonable. Just because you ignore all of it and prefer to think it means more and something else, based on the semantics of the word, even though you actually know it doesn't, is the epitome of NOT being rational and reasonable.
I have some truly peculiar habits, therefor I am a genius.
Again, I think this is naive.
I refer again to one of the links I gave. There you can see that even among Muslims in the USA there is a considerably HIGHER - significantly so, in scientific terms - percentage that think it's ok to, for instance, stone women to death which are 'unfaithful'.
The only reason, thus, why the USA doesn't have as many problems (yet) is because of..numbers. It's as simply as that. Germany, last year, got 1 million (!) refugees - in one year, thus. In comparison to it's populace, that would be equivalent of the USA taking in 4 million a year. Everyone with a grain of intelligence will understand that, if the USA did the same, EXACTLY the same problems would occur. (And btw, once they got the nationality, you can't force them to settle anywhere, since as a citizen, they're free to go where they want, so your idea of 'spreading' doesn't help. In fact, after 20-30 years, there is no spreading to be done anymore, because they're in all cities with their own neighbourhoods).
Can you imagine how well the USA would fare, if they took in 4 million people per year for 20 years in a row, where 40% of them think the sharia should be above the constitution, and 12% think it's ok to stone women to death?
I say Islam is bad, because it IS bad - if you follow what is actually described there and you believe the stuff is actually the 'word of god' you have to follow. Other religions may be considered bad too, but those are NOT, or far, far, far less, being interpreted literally anymore, nor are the adepts of those religious so devout anymore, as it is with Islam.
In fact, the problem is NOT being fanatic, at least not on its own. Take the most fanatical Jainist, and that will lead to someone avoiding to trample on insects and who wouldn't even try to hurt bacteria. A fanatical Jainist would be a complete and utter pacifist. So being 'fantical' about your religion, when that religion is inherently peaceful, makes person that is fanatically peaceful. There is no problem with that. So how comes it is with Islam (and, granted, some other religions)? Because there IS bad in there, and it DOES say things that are antithetic to modern thoughts, and the more literally you take this, the more bad it becomes. So it's not just fanaticism that is the problem, it's the sourcematerial as well.
But anyway, the point is, the USA has no problems, not because the Muslims they have are so welcomed by the populace that they don't have any of the antithetical values and wishes anymore ( - as evidenced by the poll, they still have, and still with a far larger percentage than the rest of the populace), but primarily because they have far less than the EU. The percentage of Muslims in the USA make out 0,9% of the populace... in Germany, however, it is more than FIVE TIMES as high. Plus, the USA has far more landmass, so you *can* spread them better, in most EU countries, there is nothing to spread anymore: they're in every city, within there neighbourhoods. Many of which have become no-go zones for the police, btw.
It's all about numbers, thus. The more you have them, the more problems you get, because the more people you get with undemocratic ideas - EVEN if, as correctly noted, not ALL of Muslims share those views. My point is, that that doesn't matter: whether all adher to it or not, it doesn't change the fact that TOO MANY do, and that your society/civilisation is going to buckle under it, if one keeps accepting people where 40% wants to abolish your laws.
And the left has tried for 40 years to claim 'spreading' and 'education' will deal with it, and make them all integrate. Alas, wishful thinking: integration goes extremely slow and is very poor, with Mulims, simply by the fact they don't really want to integrate - especially the 40% that finds their laws should govern the land. In fact, polls have also shown, that even among second and third generation immigrants, it's even worse then with their parents that came in the 60'ies. A recent poll with those youth in immigration-neig
"So given that, I don't really see a reason for singling out Muslims in western society. "
I've given you the reason in my former posts. Whether one wants it or not, in comparison, today, FAR more acts of terrorism are done in the name of their religion by Muslims than by Christians. But, as said, what's even worse is that FAR more Muslims uphold and concur with ideas that are antithetic with democratic, Western values based on the enlightenment. Those are not all terrorists; they just hold extreme views (extreme in regard to our values). If you looked at the links I provided you, you can note that some of those views - which are incompatible with how *we* think about things and go against our basic values - have either a majority, or a very large minority being supportive of it.
If you would take a random sample size and compare Muslims with non-Muslims in regard to women's rights, homosexuality, etc., you would see a HUGE discrepancy in Western countries between the two groups. clearly, the correlation is not by accident, but has a *causal* relation: it's because they are Muslims, such a large part thinks that sharia should be the only law being applied, that women are less worth than men, that homosexuality is abhorred, that they think fre speech does not allow to insult the prophet Mohammed (PUH!), etc.
you wouldn't find these numbers and percentages with atheists, not even with Christians, nor Buddhists, etc. the reason for that is what you said: most people, even claiming to be Christians, aren't all that religious anymore, and Christianity has had a reformation and lost a lot of its sharp teeth anyway.
The Islam has not - or to a far, far lesser extend. Muslims are also to a far higher percentage still devote in the classical sense. You only have to look at the mosques for that: almost always filled, while the churches in Europe are dwindling and largely empty. So, both in religiousness as in the strict applicability of their holy book, Muslims are far more ferocious, percentage-wise, than any other religion these days. That's why you see raving and angry-shouting Muslims trying to get a museum shut down, or making threats - by legal and illegal means - if that museum was posting art that offends their prophet. Do the same with Christians, and the most you get is some bishop saying it's not very proper. That's also why you see people being shot for making a cartoon of Mohamed *by Muslims* - tell me, when was the last time a group of people were shot dead out of religious motives because they offended, say, Jesus?
It's this sort of blindness that annoys me the most. Yes, there has been brutality in the past by all monotheistic religions. Yes, you have nutcases here in the West too, who commit terrorist attacks or who want to impose their religious laws on others. Yes, you have homo-haters in the indigenous populace also. Yes, you have people thinking women are inferior to men as well. But *comparatively* you have FAR more of them within the Muslim community than in every other religious or non-religious community. This is a fact; see the links I gave you, and compare those numbers with the average you get asking the same questions of natives in Europe. The scale and level is considerably higher than with the local communities, and even with any other group who is or has settled themselves in Europe, and their integration is one of the lowest.
Your halal-example shows the same sort of naivety, imho. Ok, so you like halal meat more. Good for you. Now, say I want to eat non-halal food. Do you know it has become increasingly difficult, with the exception of pork, to find *any* non-halal meat anymore in my country? Even when it's not explicitly mentioned, it's still made in a halal way, because that's more convenient for slaughterhouses, even if they technically break the law with it (since they are obliged by law to sedate animals before killing them). Alas, we made the mistake of allowing an exception for religious reasons, and now it's done with all and every animal/meat, wheth
I would claim it rather being the Qu'ran and Islam, instead of the bible and Christianity. That said, buddhism has even less violence done in its name than either of those. Jainism even far less, if not outright 'none'. But regardless, that sort of discussion is endless and leads to nowhere. I would agree that all religions have blood on their hands, and while one might dispute who has 'the most blood', it changes nothing to all the rest I pointed out.
All monotheistic religions believe in a nonsensical book that is rife with contradictions, but that said, the most dangerous religion nowadays, is clearly Islam.
I also note that you did not address the main point I made, namely that a large percentage of Muslims want the sharia and have ideas that are not compatible with Western concepts (such as respect for free speech, EVEN if it's directly insulting the prophet Mohemedd (PUH!)), and that the sharia is at odds with our Western democratic values. Hence, as it currently stands, it is antithetic and therefore a danger to Western democratic values and its society as a whole, which is based on those values of the Enlightenment.
Well, to each his own, I guess.
I can understand what you're getting at, but subjectively speaking, I wouldn't have wasted (as what I perceive it) so much time to a pedantic troll. Yes, it may, or may not lead to some moderate enlightenment for others to read, but even then I doubt it's worth the effort (or you should have addressed it more generally, and not in a one-by-one step as a rsponse to the troll, if your goal is edacutaion of the reading populace). IMHO, of course.
In fact, I thought 'it begs the question' also meant 'it raises the question'. I've always seen, it used like that, en though I'm not a native English-speaker, I'm quite fluent - even if I say so myself. ;-)
But I'm not sure this whole things has convinced me to change my opinion or usage of the term. Ok, granted, I've learned the technical correct side of it. I'll take note of it. But it doesn't change much de facto, because, however one turns it, the usage is SO common these days in regard to the meaning 'it raises the question', that it seems to me - and apparent the majority of people - to have surpassed the original meaning and intent.
As with all things, language is a 'living' thing. Myriads of words before and after us and our lifetime, will change, warp, drift and get other meanings. Even a lot of words today don't mean exactly the same what they meant 200 years ago, but no-one today is still complaining about that, isn't there? A language that doesn't change anymore, is dead.
After all is said and done, the meaning of a word is derived from it's usage, period. It can be annoying during a time, for instance, when people misuse 'literally' when they, in fact, mean the opposite; 'allegorically' - but even there, if the usage becomes really common and the norm, I guess I'll accept it. Don't get me wrong: I think the semantics and the real meaning of words - as defined by the dictionaries - is of paramount importance, if you want to communicate sensible with someone else.
I'm just saying, sometimes, the meaning of a word changes, and that change even gets into a dictionary as well.
Well, anyway, I'm digressing.
They aren't, trust me.
I'm afraid you have an overly optimistic view of Islamic conquest. Let me give you a link to help you open your eyes a bit: http://www1.cbn.com/churchandm...
One sees there a plethora of massacres, genocides and mass killings done by Muslims. Where they alone in that? No, Christians did their share (Buddhists far less, if one is honest), however, far LESS than Muslim conquest has done.And mostly, in regard to the crusades and other fights against Muslims, it was *in response* to the conquest of Christian grounds and land. Meaning, if the Muslims hadn't INVADED and CONQUERED Christian lands and countries, they wouldn't have had such a reaction neither. I couldn't find any specifics on the conquest of Spain to demonstrate unambigiously that the killings done by Muslims there is 'less' than those of Christians, but in any case it seems rather overly naive to think Muslims didn't kill off civilians and innocents at all, when they clearly had no problem doing it everywhere else.
But, regardless, I'm willing to gleen over all that, since it's in the far history, and during those times violence was rampant everywhere. It's of little use trying to convince whomever was 'the bloodiest' hundreds of years ago. Of far more concern is, how Muslims react NOW, in current times. And in this respect, it does not bode well.
http://www.pewforum.org/2013/0...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
As one can see, a majority of Muslims in Muslim-countries, and even a significant large proportion of Muslims in Western countries have ideas and beliefs that are antithetic with the mores, rules, and values of Western democracies. We're not talking about terrorists here, we're talking about *radical views* hold *by* Muslims, which is much broader then straight out terrorism, but still - even more so, I would claim - a danger to the continuation of Western democracies with their values derived from the Enlightenment.
It is THAT which is *really* worrying, though less visible and less openly violent than beheadings of ISIS. Unless there is a drastic reformation of Islam, such as has happened to Christianity, I claim the following: Islam is unreconcilable with, and a danger to, Western, democratic values based on the enlightenment, and, if we do not (re)act against this, it will - in the long term - mean the end of our era. It's clear as daylight, you can not have or maintain our Western system if Muslims continue to flood in (or breed and propagate faster and more in the Western countries than the original populace) while remaining as insensitive to integration and incorporation of our values as they are today (and ever have been).
Note that I'm not talking about race. Race is not the problem. I'm also no racist. Raise Blacks, Berbers, whatever, up from infancy in ones' own culture, and they ARE and BEHAVE like one of us. I'm saying it's the culture and mentality that is the problem. 40% of British Muslims want the Sharia to be the supreme law, trumping any other laws. 40%!! That's HUGE. That's like, a thousand times more and higher than when you would ask an original, born-and-raised Brit. I find it peculiar that the danger of this is not more than apparent to the left. If you take in a million refugees, as German did, and 40% of them wants to introduce sharia-law, one has to be blind and stupid not to see how this will create tensions and huge societal problems for your own civilisation and society. Yet, the West turns a blind eye. It's incomprehensible. It's like cultural suicide, and we're doing it to ourselves, like a bunch of lemmings.
Even the 'moderate Muslim' should be worried, in fact. At least those who wanted to escape from sharia law and the oppression of their home countries. If this keeps up, I foresee the end of our current Western model by the end of the 21ste century, if not sooner. This is not Islamophobia, it's just an observation and logically deduced analysis.
I largely agree with you, with the caveat the actions done are also done *in the name* of that religion, to be considered 'religious'. Otherwise, one could call the first and second war in Iraq a 'holy War' perpetrated by Christianity onto Muslims. But those wars weren't religious wars. And even though, statistically speaking, I think it's true most of the soldiers of the West were Christians, that wouldn't make it a 'religious/Christian' war.
In contrast, however, it's true that doing something 'in name of (ones') God', clearly validates the nominator that it's religious in nature, EVEN - as you say - some others of the same or similar faith may disagree, and claim it's not about their religion. This is especially true in the case of Islam, since they have no central authority (Like the Pope in Rome For Catholic Christianity) who determines what is the 'right interpretation'.
There is NO right interpretation in Islam, and no-one with absolute authority to claim so. This in turn means, that ALL interpretations can be considered correct - even though warring factions will never agree what interpretation is the correct one, and think 'theirs' is correct - ad infinitum.
The truth is, all interpretations have equal worth within Islam, from an objective stance. Even ISIS is not 'wrong' based on their interpretation; we merely find their interpretation (certainly as Westerners) despicable and vile. And, it must be said, also by a lot of other Muslims. But they're not *wrong* when claiming the Koran says the kill unbelievers. It's in there, all right. And, in their view, they're only adhering to what the Prophet asked - and they're right there too. Because, as with any 'Holy' book, it's full of contradictions, and thus you can choose and cherry-pick whatever you want. But it's ALL there, so one can't say (moderate) Muslims saying that the Koran says Allah is merciful are wrong. BUT, and here is what is controversial for the multicultural left; neither are radical Muslims saying the Koran says killing the unbelievers (and many other things that are murderous and vile, like with enslaving women as warbooty).
So it does the Islam good or bad? Neither and both, but looking at the recent developments of the last ten years, it's clear without a doubt that it's pretty dangerous, especially to democratic Western societies. That's because, apart from the terrorist attacks, a *significant* and large part of the Muslim-community still have ideas that are antithetic to Western, democratic values, even if they don't use outright violence like the 1-2% of extreme radicals of their religious community.
When?
Right after the massacres the Muslims did starting with the prophet Mohammed (PUH!) and continuing with the Muslim caliph, Abu Bakr, who launched Islam into almost 1,500 years of continual imperialist, colonialist, bloody conquest and subjugation of others through invasion and war, a role Islam continues to this very day.
But back to Spain. How come the Muslims where there in the first place? Spain has always been Christian, at least since 349 D.
Ah, that's right! Because they INVADED Spain in the first place. Who would have thought!?
You clearly didn't.
As a non-native English speaker, I always thought the latter WAS what the sentence meant. Isn't begging a way of asking for something (as a beggar)? Asking for a question, thus, would logically be more close to 'raising a question', rather than 'assuming the conclusion' to the question. I would have thought. So I can't really find it a disturbing usage.
In contrast, however, I find it mildly annoying that a lot of people (on youtube, for instance) use 'literally', when they mean the exact OPPOSITE of it. They mean it 'allegorically' yet use 'literally'.
Maybe that's because the 'new' meaning isn't as ingrained as yet, or maybe because there is a very close equivalent in my own language which still means what it normally means, but regardless: sometimes, misuse of words CAN be annoying, and this misuse of 'literally' I find more grating than something that begs the question.
Now, this is subjective, of course. But. The above AC however, clearly was being pedantic and wanted to troll.
That said, you're feeding the trolls by this.
The more you feed them, to more obnoxious and clingy they'll get. Bad idea.
Ignoring, thus, is the best thing you can do with pedantic, trolling AC's.
I'm more inclined to agree with Tyson: while the rover(s) were great news and certainly generated exitment, if a manned landing had been done at the same time, *no-one* of the large public would have even noticed. That is to say: manned missions will *always* generate more excitement than robotic missions.
But, don't get me wrong, I'm all for going to Mars too, and I think purely as a PR stunt (though gathering enthusiasm of/from the public is worthwhile) it's not worth its money, unless you open it up to the private sector and get the economical factor playing. But I just wanted to say that the public, politics, economics, etc. and, indeed, science, all play a part in any decision NASA takes.
It's never going to be one sole thing. Some people - scientists included - will think one thing is a pity, while others think another things is wasted money. For instance, as one can see, some scientists are against manned spacetravel, because it cuts in the available budget and thus it means less science for them. Purely from the premise and viewpoint that NASA is there for them to get scientific data, I can understand their complaints. But I think they're mistaken, when taking a more global approach. I think taking steps to actually colonize other planets and become a multi-planetary species is important too. But everyone has his opinion on it, I guess. Politicians see NASA as a means to have and keep jobs and employment in their region, for instance. That's not a worthwhile or useful goal in my book, but I guess politicians see it differently. Etc.
Anyway, I wish they wrote into the constitution that NASA gets a minimum of 1% of the GNP. :-) That way, things would become less cut-throat, and NASA would be assured of stable finances, allowing to plan long-term.
I'm not a real proponent to waste much time and money on a moonbase, certainly not if it's to be intended as complete moon-infrastructure to make and refuel rockets for Mars. I could mayhaps see some use if it's a kept as a testbed for a colony to Mars. But I don't think it's really necessary.
However, I was making a general point. NASA, and it's goals, have never been, and will never be, solely and purely about science and scientific return. It could be as simple as PR; making the public at large interested in spacetravel again, for instance (public = politics). That succeeds better with manned flights than unmanned, and rather with moonlandings then with a station in LEO.
Of course, Mars would achive that too, but not in the same timeframe and with the same cost. It's still more cheaper and less far off to have a moonbase, then a Mars-base.
And, let's face it, it's been such a huge-ass time... if they were going to land on the moon again, I would take leave from my work and watch it live if I had too. ;-) 'Done before' (40 years ago) or not.
Though, personally, if it's that or a Mars-landing during my life-time, I'd rather have the latter.
But then again, NASA's stated missions is NOT solely to do about science in the first place.
True. However, as said, NASA *never* had as sole and ultimate goal only science and scientific return. So it really is strange to take the premise as if it was and is. I understand that (most) scientists would *want* that, because that's their bred and butter, and what they like most, but that doesn't make it correct. The public support - and thus political support - is far easier and better gained by manned spaceflight, than robotic flight, for instance. Colonization is, ultimately, a manned endeavor - colonizing with robotic landings doesn't make the human race multi-planetary.
That's not to say the science isn't interesting: it certainly is. But it was never NASA's sole purpose to begin with. It would be like scientists saying: if they would put all the money they waste on wars and the military, into science, we could achieve far more!
Certainly. No doubt. But that's not the point nor the goal of the military.
Let's take this one step further. I'd rather they spend all that money on me, so I could have a luxurious life without any financial worries.
There.
It all depends on ones' priorities. NASA's priorities is not ONLY scientific return. NASA conducts its work in four principal organizations, called mission directorates:
Aeronautics: manages research focused on meeting global demand for air mobility in ways that are more environmentally friendly and sustainable, while also embracing revolutionary technology from outside aviation.
Human Exploration and Operations: focuses on International Space Station operations, development of commercial spaceflight capabilities and human exploration beyond low-Earth orbit.
Science: explores the Earth, solar system and universe beyond; charts the best route of discovery; and reaps the benefits of Earth and space exploration for society.
Space Technology: rapidly develops, innovates, demonstrates, and infuses revolutionary, high-payoff technologies that enable NASA's future missions while providing economic benefit to the nation.
Note that scientific return is not the only goal for NASA, nor was it ever meant to be. You're starting from a wrong premise, thus. It's the fault of those scientists that they think NASA only exists to serve their purposes. It doesn't.
" it can be easier to get payloads to Mars from Venus than from Earth "
Let's not go there. You just made an excellent rebuttal to UnknowingFool why it doesn't make sense to make a base on the moon to then send rockets to Mars, and now you're arguing the same...
By the time Venus would (if, ever) be 'colonized' by myriads of cloudcities large and complex enough to make a floating infrastructure possible to send rockets cheaper to Mars, it would take less long and would be far cheaper by that time to have colonized Mars directly.
Unless you're talking about a really, really far away future, where there is trade between planets... but by that time, Earth may have a space-elevator anyhow.