🚀 go-pugleaf

This discussion is degenerating into a religious war over the relative merits
of manned versus unmanned spaceflight.  This is something which has been part
of NASA and the American space effort since the beginning, and the hard 
questions will not be resolved in any case in favor of unmanned flight anyway.
The reasons of course have to do with the average person's perception of what
THEY want to get out of space exploration.  Remember, the average person has
no idea of what the word *science* actually consists of.  To Joe
Citizen, his space-tax dollars are supposed to be used so that he/she, or
his children, can live the reality of the Star Trek/Star Wars fantasy.  This
emphatically does NOT include robot probes to Io or investigations of the
Oort cloud.  It DOES include heroic X-nauts "flying" through space in vehicles
that look like airplanes, fighting the Evil Empire and looking for little green
men.  This would explain the highly emotional reactions to the Apollo landing
and the first shuttle flight, as well as the ho-hum reception given the
pictures from the Jovian system and the rings of Saturn.  Perhaps van Allen's
concept of a manless space program would "get more science done", but in the
abscence of the Brave Explorer with the Right Stuff, the taxpayers who foot
the bills just plain ain't interested, so the whole discussion is academic
and bears no relevance to the real world.  Personally, I would like nothing
better than a first-class window seat on the shuttle, safe or not, and my
vote is emphatically for continuation of MANNED exploration.  After all is
said and done, space flight is EXCITING, so why let robots have all the fun?

-- 
Disclaimer: All opinions expressed herein are mine alone.  I wear an 
	asbestos suit to work, so flame away.  Pitt doesn't care *what*
	I do, so long as I appear to be working behind this terminal.
Jim Benz, University of Pittsburgh, UCIR