On a serious note though, this is a big step given how advanced this rover is compared to their previous models. Hope they do make some fascinating discoveries.
Imagine if the defense budget ($700B in 2011 alone) for the last 3-4 decades had been spent on NASA, how much more beneficial it would have been for mankind's future.
Space mining, cheap commercial space flights, asteroid detection grid, manned missions to planets in our solar system or even alternate fuel sources, could have been a reality now.
But instead all we've gained is the ability to blow up shacks in 3rd world countries, with remote control planes . Progress, huh?
$700 billion is required for maintaining a modern empire even though Americas ememies are usualy third world countries with AK47's or very low cold war technologies.
Yep, America chose empire building as more important than the glory of space advancment. Then again, u cant be succesful as America has if u dont have an empire.
Rome was not built by intellectuals but by Warlords. Greeks did not surface as a great power without the military briliance of alaxander the great. Ghengis khan would have been unheard of if he did not conqer half the world. The English language will be unimportant if the British empire did not colonise the world.
Building Empires has its vital importance as it will always be that way but even they too have an expiration date.
The problem with exploring space is that even if we(Americans) throw all our money into exploring space we'd still not have enough money to explore like we'd need to. The only way I could see us truly exploring space would be and only be by WORLD DOMINATION. The world would have to collectively throw money in to this, and looking at the news now, I just don't see it happening anytime soon....
Since when did America become an 'Empire' that was comparable to former Roman or British colonial domains? A couple of dots in the Pacific ocean & Puerto Rico aren't exactly Australia, South Africa, India, Canada, Hong Kong, Singapore, New Zealand, Ireland & the Caribbean. Hell the US hasn't even conclusively won a war since WW2.
Most of the aforementioned $700B has been spent protecting America against threats that they created themselves. Providing billions of dollars worth military aid to the Taliban in the'80's and arming Israel with nuclear weapons, weren't exactly the most intelligent decisions.
America's military expenditure has brought them nothing but misery & all that money could have gone much worthier causes.
The problem is the American Government of full of liars when it comes to this type of stuff. If they found anything amazing or out of this world they would cover it up and pretend like they havent found anything. Trying to find life outside our planet is the only thing keeping NASA relevent, once a discovery is made they risk funding going down even more.
Knowing humans they will bomb each other is space! Have you not seen star wars or star trek? It's a prediction! When they leave earth their ego is coming with them!
NASA has about 0.5 percent of the federal budget. Which sounds pathetic, but then the US is the world's biggest economy and is therefore huge. Like $17 billion dollar huge. Thats more than half of the world's countries GDP.
There are some major problems on this planet, however it is a pretty much cast iron accepted fact that if humanity is going to survive the next millenia or even couple of hundred years it will have to travel to other worlds and colonise them. Earth is in a precarious position, and I don't mean piffling little things such as environment issues- huge things like extinction level events.
Now of course you could argue this is not an immediately pressing problem in comparison to others, but the long term benefits from technologies and research that disseminate from space programmes promises immeasurably greater benefits than throwing $17 billion at one charitable cause a year. Just ask Bill Gates, who has thrown more than that, and the impact is still limited and aid distibution hugely problematic.
In order to help those in poverty and those with problems, we probably need an advancement of technology and science. If we can crack one key scientific area this century (for one example nuclear fusion power) that is the sort of thing that will help dig us out this hole we are in right now. This is what the likes of NASA contribute to, these significant scientific problems.
Erm.....No one saw technology good enough to have powered flight a mere 110 years ago, or even send a man to the moon a mere 60 years ago. Both were still considered impossible and unrealistic, out of reach, only a few decades before they actually happened...
It isn't science fiction to believe it will be possible to colonise for example the Moon or Mars within the next few centuries. Chances are we will have a man on Mars inside 30 years. If that happens, having people live on the Moon for example for years at a time would seem even more realistic.
This isn't science fiction, this is reality. If you told someone living in 1900 we would have human footprints on the moon within 70 years they would have said what you just said then.
What disappoints me isn't the low NASA budget though, but US neglectance to fund science in general. CERN could have been built in USA if it wasn't for congress! Now, instead of the President making a speech about the Higgs Bosson and having the country be inspired by science, we get Tweets from Switzerland.
Okay, you clearly have your issues, but to put it bluntly: I don't suggest that the world revolves around the US, I just state what I believe would be in US interest.
Your little intervention would be no less misplaced had it been a reply to a suggestion to improve the socioeconomic situation in the states.
Besides, I kidd the Swiss. I'd just like for the USA to have a scientific frontier that could inspire us to learn about the wealth engine that is science.
NASA landed a vehicle the size of my Mini Cooper on a 12 x 4 mile piece of Martian land and that robot was already transmitting photos back minutes after landing. And this only cost each American taxpayer a grand total of $7.00.
The black and white photos are for quick confirmation that the rover is safely on the ground. The HD pictures won't be here for a day or so due to the bandwidth and the distance the data has to travel.
hahaha butt hurt commenter, commenting on a 2 day old post to get back at someone who he thinks he cares about "agree"s, LAUGHED at and made my day just a little better, thanks man :)
1) We didn't just find Mars, we've known about it for hundreds of years.
2) Like I said above, the total budget of NASA is less than 1% of the entire U.S budget, that kind of money wouldn't make the slightest bit of difference here on Earth. Why should we halt progress just because of some problems? We have always had problems, that's not going to stop just because we stop spending money going to Mars. That's a very small minded view.
3) We will visit Mars one day, that's a guarantee.
Guaranteed based on the fact that people have wanted it to happen for many years now. Mars is a very intriguing planet and NASA obviously think it's worth the time and effort. The Moon was the first step, Mars is the obvious choice for the next.
I love this stuff. Indeed a great achievement for the US, NASA, and human kind. If this was a test, they would've scored 100%, anything less Curiosity would've been crashed into Mars. I only wished they had a video camera to record each step during Curiosity's entrance and landing on Mars. That would've been amazing! It was mentioned in an interview that it costed $7.00 per US resident.
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On a serious note though, this is a big step given how advanced this rover is compared to their previous models. Hope they do make some fascinating discoveries.
I wish more people would be interested in this, invading countries and building bombs is not our destiny, exploring space is.
Space mining, cheap commercial space flights, asteroid detection grid, manned missions to planets in our solar system or even alternate fuel sources, could have been a reality now.
But instead all we've gained is the ability to blow up shacks in 3rd world countries, with remote control planes . Progress, huh?
Yep, America chose empire building as more important than the glory of space advancment. Then again, u cant be succesful as America has if u dont have an empire.
Rome was not built by intellectuals but by Warlords. Greeks did not surface as a great power without the military briliance of alaxander the great. Ghengis khan would have been unheard of if he did not conqer half the world. The English language will be unimportant if the British empire did not colonise the world.
Building Empires has its vital importance as it will always be that way but even they too have an expiration date.
Most of the aforementioned $700B has been spent protecting America against threats that they created themselves. Providing billions of dollars worth military aid to the Taliban in the'80's and arming Israel with nuclear weapons, weren't exactly the most intelligent decisions.
America's military expenditure has brought them nothing but misery & all that money could have gone much worthier causes.
There are some major problems on this planet, however it is a pretty much cast iron accepted fact that if humanity is going to survive the next millenia or even couple of hundred years it will have to travel to other worlds and colonise them. Earth is in a precarious position, and I don't mean piffling little things such as environment issues- huge things like extinction level events.
Now of course you could argue this is not an immediately pressing problem in comparison to others, but the long term benefits from technologies and research that disseminate from space programmes promises immeasurably greater benefits than throwing $17 billion at one charitable cause a year. Just ask Bill Gates, who has thrown more than that, and the impact is still limited and aid distibution hugely problematic.
In order to help those in poverty and those with problems, we probably need an advancement of technology and science. If we can crack one key scientific area this century (for one example nuclear fusion power) that is the sort of thing that will help dig us out this hole we are in right now. This is what the likes of NASA contribute to, these significant scientific problems.
It isn't science fiction to believe it will be possible to colonise for example the Moon or Mars within the next few centuries. Chances are we will have a man on Mars inside 30 years. If that happens, having people live on the Moon for example for years at a time would seem even more realistic.
This isn't science fiction, this is reality. If you told someone living in 1900 we would have human footprints on the moon within 70 years they would have said what you just said then.
What disappoints me isn't the low NASA budget though, but US neglectance to fund science in general. CERN could have been built in USA if it wasn't for congress! Now, instead of the President making a speech about the Higgs Bosson and having the country be inspired by science, we get Tweets from Switzerland.
Your little intervention would be no less misplaced had it been a reply to a suggestion to improve the socioeconomic situation in the states.
Besides, I kidd the Swiss. I'd just like for the USA to have a scientific frontier that could inspire us to learn about the wealth engine that is science.
This is why I love the space program.
But wth is with the black and white photo's.
The machine has 2 hd camera's built into it.
I knew it, everybody was against me, but I knew there be dirt in them thare hills all along.
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Wow, the U.S. should totally claim Mars. Then the Martians can open up casinos on their reserves.
1) We didn't just find Mars, we've known about it for hundreds of years.
2) Like I said above, the total budget of NASA is less than 1% of the entire U.S budget, that kind of money wouldn't make the slightest bit of difference here on Earth. Why should we halt progress just because of some problems? We have always had problems, that's not going to stop just because we stop spending money going to Mars. That's a very small minded view.
3) We will visit Mars one day, that's a guarantee.
U.S debt doesn't mean a thing;
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