BiscottiGelato

no matter what those technologies too, if no one educates those people who poo on the street, or p ...
mukmuk2 發表於 2010-10-4 09:27

Didn't read through the whole thing. It's crazy long.

If the argument is that, as long as there's needs in addressing the poor and other social services, then 'luxuries' like space exploration should take the back seat... I don't exactly agree.

1. There's no country in the world where there isn't a population that lives below the poverty line. In that sense, then space exploration should cease to be conducted world-wide?
2. As in all explorations, first to discovery usually gives a much bigger say in ownership. Not to mention the ability for a country, in particular the US, to keep secrets from the world. Imagine discovering Gold deposits, Nuclear fuel deposits, Diamond deposits from outer space, etc. The US can easily keep this from the world and benefit on their own. It's in every countries' interest to get their own version of space to keep some check and balance in terms of the 'ownership' of the space and knowledge surrounding it.
3. It might be much too late for countries to catch up in the 'space race' if it one day becomes absolutly necassary to do so (space based weapons arms race, race for space ownership when valuable resource/habitable land, space colonization, global catastrophe requiring escape to space).

So arguing that budget for things like space exploration should be completely cut until social spending is 'adequate' is very poor budgeting when it comes to safe guarding the interests that pertains to a nation. And when are we such socialist? Shouldn't it be policies and capitalistic forces that drives society out of poverty? The Obama brain wash of hand-outs is so in favor these days? Never knew socialism is the new capitalism... Thought we already concluded that socialism, which tries to counter the forces of natural selection, just never works many many years ago...

More-over, I agree with Hawkings that to ensure human survival, we need to be able to live independant of Earth's biosphere sooner rather than later. There is already not enough political will world wide as it is. Further cutting such spendings will only spell doom for the human race. Doom for the human race for more investment into the poor and needy today... I don't know if that's a very good trade.

sheep

Dare to debate me?
rockypath 發表於 2010-10-4 09:24

回復 96# rockypath

    knock!! knock!! anybody home?
you can't even remember what you have said a moment ago.
How can you debate with me?

fibbi

Develop space technology 好，唔develope啲＄咪又係落去貪官個袋到？

sheep

今日
美國佬唔花咁多錢嚮太空度
點解？
因為佢知道有啲地方要好多錢
例如 醫療改革

rockypath

so you are happy if Canadian launch their probe instead of putting money into health care of educa ...
mukmuk2 發表於 2010-10-4 09:44

Ask me this question again when Canada can no longer rely on US for its economy and defence.

Lik

So arguing that budget for things like space exploration should be completely cut until social spending is 'adequate' is very poor budgeting when it comes to safe guarding the interests that pertains to a nation. And when are we such socialist? Shouldn't it be policies and capitalistic forces that drives society out of poverty? The Obama brain wash of hand-outs is so in favor these days? Never knew socialism is the new capitalism... Thought we already concluded that socialism, which tries to counter the forces of natural selection, just never works many many years ago...
BiscottiGelato 發表於 2010-10-4 09:42

If you look at the list of countires with the highest qualities of life, the ones that consistently make the list are the highly socialists countries such as Norway and Denmark where taxes are high, but citizens enjoy high levels of social services from cradle to grave. Canadians also enjoy a high quality of life because on the whole, our governing policies have a heavy dose of socialism involved as well.

People of HK origin often complain about this because they grew up with HK's capitalist system where taxes are low. What they fail to see is, they are able to take advantage of that system they were the ones among the elites -- to be able to immigrate to Canada means they were the beneficiaries of the capitalist system. So for their own good, of course they are against socialist ideals. This is not that different from monopolies where the monopoly would most certainly be against competition because his profits would suffer. But as we all know, competition is the thing that would lead to much greater goods on the whole, and in the same way, a healthy (but not complete) dose of socialism is good.

Nobody ever said that high tech R&D in whatever field should be avoided until poverty can be completely eradicated. But in China's case, I always argue that since much of the country is still living under such poor standards, the urgency to pursue cutting edge high tech goals is absurd. The money and effort could be put to much better use if they are spent on improving people's lives.

-Lik

Lik

Develop space technology 好，唔develope啲＄咪又係落去貪官個袋到？
fibbi 發表於 2010-10-4 09:50

Not entirely true because projects are the perfect venues for those 貪官 to 撈油水. The bigger the project, the more $$ is involved, and the more opportunities they'll have to stuff $$ into their own coffers.

-Lik