Debate Tournament Finals - Anathelia vs. HK

[retro]

Anathelia vs. HK

Space Exploration

The United States recently ended its Space Shuttle program and cancelled its replacement Constellation program. This was largely due to budget constraints and the rising costs of maintaining the existing shuttle fleet and developing Constellation. Should mankind continue to fund space exploration endeavors? Or would that money be better used to combat disease, famine, and other social concerns around the planet? Proponents point towards the massive technological advancements made by man as a direct result of the space program. These include satellites, improvements on air travel, world communication carried via satellite, GPS, and a host of other advancements. On the other hand, opponents point to the fact that we should be focusing on helping our fellow man instead of expending huge amounts of money in order to explore space, especially when our exploration is currently limited to orbit of our own planet. While space travel is a noble pursuit, there are far more important things that need to be addressed.

Should man continue to fund space exploration programs? Or are there more important issues around the world that should be our focus.

There will be four rounds, the first three will be limited to 400 words each, and the fourth round will allow 450 words. There will be no editing of your post allowed, unless it is approved by me, and only before your opponent has their chance to respond. You will have 24 hours from the conclusion of each post in order to post your response.

Please take note of the following changes for the finals:

Four rounds
400 word limit for the first three rounds
450 word limit for the final round

I would request that nobody, other than the participants, post in this thread until the conclusion of the debate.

I flipped a coin to determine who would lead off the debate.

Ana, you're up first...

 

[anathelia]

If there's going to be no jostling around of funding, then I can understand why the space program needed to be cut. As much as it's a big thing around here to see space shuttles launch, and a lot of valuable information can be learned by going out into space, there are a lot of other issues we need to deal with. Like that $13 trillion debt we've racked up at this point.

However, I've been of the opinion for a long time that our governmental budget needs a big adjustment. Funds aren't being siphoned to where they need to be, and too much money is being given to places that don't need it. If we could change government spending, then there would be no need to cut the space program.

My belief is that, if things are going to continue the way they are right now, then the program needed to be cut. But, I believe that we can propose a solution to the spending problems that would allow the space program to continue.

 

[HK]

I don’t believe the space program should have been cut.

The space program is iconic for many who remember images like the first man on the moon, but underneath the historic events there was real scientific progress, which is still ongoing. The launch of the Apollo missions meant the advance of many area such as telecommunications and computers, not to mention the various satellites that orbit the earth, enabling us to learn more about our own planet than ever before.

Also very notable is how much we have learnt about the other planets in our solar system thanks to probe missions. The furthest planet we have reached so far is Jupiter using the Galileo probe, and the New Horizons probe is currently on it’s way to Pluto, with an expected arrival date of 2015. Cutting the space program while missions like this are still ongoing means that all the time, energy and resources put into sending these probes out there will have been wasted.

Public perception of the NASA budget is actually flawed – surveys have shown that most people estimate it to be around 20% of the entire federal budget, which is in fact far higher than the real amount. NASA in fact only obtains 0.5% to 1% of the federal budget on average, with their highest peak being 4% while they were planning the Apollo missions.

So NASA is not as responsible for the incredible debt of USA as the public believes.

 

[anathelia]

I agree that NASA is not responsible for the ridiculous amounts of debt that the US has accumulated. My argument is that there are places our money could be better spent than exploring the "final frontier". We need to find ways to bring our national debt down before we continue to shovel billions of dollars into an agency such as NASA.

While I can certainly see the merits in the discoveries and technological advances that have been brought about as a result of the space program, I can also see why it feels trivial to continue to spend money exploring space when we can't even figure out how to handle life here on the planet we already "own", so to speak.

Our country is horribly mismanaging it's money at this point in time. We spent $664 billion dollars last year in the Department of Defense. I realize that a certain amount of that has to be paid to keep our country safe and to have military personnel trained and ready in case of emergency, but how much of that money was siphoned into a war we don't need to be fighting? Until our country can figure out a way to stop spending money so unnecessarily, I do not believe it is wise to reinstate the NASA program.

 

[HK]

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/ce/Fy2010_spending_by_category.jpg

The link is to the federal budget breakdown for 2010. NASA is the tiny blue sliver marked 0.53%.

I've included this because while I do agree that the federal budget needs to be re-managed and reassessed, I don't think NASA is the area that most needs reassessing to the point of cutting entirely. In fact judging by how much closer NASA is to the bottom of that pie-shaped food chain, it gives me the impression that an action like cutting back the space program is less of a well-judged idea and more of a token gesture so that the government can show that they're doing something.

This also fits in with the fact that as I mentioned before, the public has a very distorted view of what percentage of the budget NASA actually commands, and probably an even less educated view on the scientific advancements that were made possible by the space program. All the public sees is that we haven't put a man on the moon in over 40 years. So cutting back the NASA budget is a move that actually costs the government far less than cutting costs on one of their other, bigger areas of spenditure, and has the bonus of the public believing that they are sacrificing more than they are.

People are unlikely to complain because you don't relate the NASA budget to your own lifestyle in the same way that you would Social Security, or Medicare. Despite the fact that the progress made possible by the space program is evident in all our lives in the technology that we use, it's very unlikely that people will see their budget as beneficial to the public, and so cutting it raises hardly any protest.

The only pros to cutting the space program appear to be to save an amount of money that is a pittance compared to other areas of spending, whereas the cons, such as the loss of potential areas of technological advancement and the chance to learn more the galaxy around us, are far greater.

 

[anathelia]

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/ce/Fy2010_spending_by_category.jpg

The link is to the federal budget breakdown for 2010. NASA is the tiny blue sliver marked 0.53%.

I've included this because while I do agree that the federal budget needs to be re-managed and reassessed, I don't think NASA is the area that most needs reassessing to the point of cutting entirely. In fact judging by how much closer NASA is to the bottom of that pie-shaped food chain, it gives me the impression that an action like cutting back the space program is less of a well-judged idea and more of a token gesture so that the government can show that they're doing something.

This also fits in with the fact that as I mentioned before, the public has a very distorted view of what percentage of the budget NASA actually commands, and probably an even less educated view on the scientific advancements that were made possible by the space program. All the public sees is that we haven't put a man on the moon in over 40 years. So cutting back the NASA budget is a move that actually costs the government far less than cutting costs on one of their other, bigger areas of spenditure, and has the bonus of the public believing that they are sacrificing more than they are.

People are unlikely to complain because you don't relate the NASA budget to your own lifestyle in the same way that you would Social Security, or Medicare. Despite the fact that the progress made possible by the space program is evident in all our lives in the technology that we use, it's very unlikely that people will see their budget as beneficial to the public, and so cutting it raises hardly any protest.

The only pros to cutting the space program appear to be to save an amount of money that is a pittance compared to other areas of spending, whereas the cons, such as the loss of potential areas of technological advancement and the chance to learn more the galaxy around us, are far greater.

The issue isn't IF the program should be cut or not, because it already has. My argument is that, regardless of how minute the amount of money the government is spending on the space program, it is not a responsible idea to continue to fund, and essentially reinstate the program right now. Not until our government has reassessed it's spending habits.

I completely agree that the space program has made some impressive technological advances (I mean, come on, who doesn't love Tang?? ) however, exploring space is not our number one priority right now. We don't need to be learning more about the rest of our galaxy when we can't even handle the problems, as I've stated, on our own little piece of the Universe.

So, as I stated before, the government should not be continuing to fund the space program right now. At a later date, absolutely, but not now.

 

[HK]

I can see how it's easy to say that the space program doesn't need to be a priority right now, because there are easily so many areas that appear to need the money more. But I still think cutting it was a mistake, because this decision could have repercussions in the future.

Once something has been discontinued, it then becomes more of a challenge to put it back to work than to just keep it running in the first place. Presumably hundreds of staff have been relocated or let go entirely, and NASA's resources are going to take a long time to redistribute, store or destroy. The cost of this, plus the then eventual set up needed once it's decided the program can be reinstated, has got to be more than the cost of simply letting the program continue to run. By shutting it down, they've created more cost for themselves, not less. The only way this makes sense is if they've already predicted my next point...

....that government isn't always as interested in what will further our progress and teach us more about the universe around us as they should be if it's not a vote winner if public feeling is against reinstating the space program for several years from now, it could be a long time before any government decides to get it moving again. Why would they spend time and money on something that won't win them any support, and might even be perceived as throwing money away? And in the meantime, we're losing the opportunities the space program provides.

There was no need to lose the space program, and it should be reinstated before too much time is wasted. Otherwise, it's entirely possible that there is no intention for the program to be set to work again anytime soon, and who knows what scientific and technological achievements might be delayed because of this?

 

[anathelia]

While it may be difficult to reinstate the space program at a later date, I hardly see it as impossible. They've already put a stop to funding for the program. The damage is already being done in people being let go.

There may have been a lot of technological advances in the past, but there comes a point where you can't milk anymore out of a program, and I think we are quickly approaching that point. The money we've been funneling into sending manned and unmanned crafts into space should be spent on things such as cancer research and bringing our troops home and all the defense related issues that are costing us so much money.

I still argue that the benefits to reinstating the space program aren't really there right now. We need to focus on some other more pressing issues before we go back to exploring the final frontier.

 

[HK]

It's true, it wouldn't be impossible to reinstate the program. Ideally it never would have been shut down in the first place but as I said - it might not be difficult to put it back in place but the more time that goes by, the harder it will become, not just for financial reasons.

There will always be 'pressing issues' that need attending to. One day it's cancer, then it's war, then it's global warming. There will always be something close to home on earth that affects us on a very direct, human level, that needs money funneling into it to try and solve or cure it. That doesn't mean we should just cut out all the less publicly favourable areas of research. The space program isn't even close to at the end of it's usefulness - we know so little about the universe around us compared to what we could potentially know if allowed to continue exploring.

I understand your logic, and I think a lot of people would rather see money going to something like cancer research than a program that they don't see doing anything of any value. But just because the results don't make for dramatic headlines doesn't mean they aren't useful. Cutting the space program was a mistake, and the longer we put off reinstating it, the more ground we lose. The space program could teach us so much about our own planet by learning about those around us, and beyond.

We can focus on our own, close to home problems, but the wonders of the universe could help us learn far more about long-term possibilities for our planet, which is just as important.

 

[retro]

aaaaaand this debate is now closed.

Thank you both for your arguments, I thought they were both well said and thought provoking.

Everyone, you can vote for who you believe should be the winner, with a brief reasoning behind your vote until Tuesday evening at 8pm Pacific time.

Again, thank you to both of our participants, and it's a shame that only one of you can win.