Mars Rover Curiosity - dija see it?

As I came into work all tired from waking up at 1:10 to watch how NASA handled the Mars Rover Curiosity, I couldn’t believe my ears when I exclaimed ‘Did ya know about’ & ‘isn’t it cool’ co-workers responded with the attitude of ‘no-big-deal’ or ‘So?’.

I remember mentioning in an earlier blog the reasons for space travel in addition to the understanding of the universe around us. Many inventions came out of our travel to the moon. From just Apollo 11 we gained not only Speedos and memory foam, but the CAT scan, Computer microchip, Cordless tools, Ear thermometer, Freeze-dried food, home Insulation, water filter that more effectively kills bacteria, scratch resistant glasses and satellite TV. Additionally we haven’t even been too Mars yet and there are inventions that while specifically for Mars have earth applications as well. Before the Curiosity even arrived last night/this morning it had already helped in its first discovery; what amount of radiation we can expect traveling not just to Mars but in space in general.

Now you could follow this with a ‘So?’ as well, but do you really want to HAVE to take your chances on the earth, forever? And by you I mean you or the generations following you. Many of the disastrous events I wrote of in Sanacion: The Black Hole Mission leave me scared when I hear of things going on now! Solar Storms and portals at the poles letting Gamma Rays sneak past the O3, the Ozone suffering from all the storms of late, nearly half of our oxygen comes from photosynthesis in the oceans but thanks to Anthropogenic CO2 (changes caused by humans) the oceans are having a larger percentage of CO2 disolve in the ocean which then becomes and acid. This in turn affects the sea life which then in turn affects the many types of life either in whole or partly reliant on them and starts a chain reaction – one species extinction causes another and then another and so on until there are no more.

That’s just scratching the surface of why we need to travel in space, because one day we may have to! But now how is it actually hurting you? Less than 1% (.7 actually) of the Federal budget is spent on NASA. Imagine what we could do if they gave NASA what Defense gets! (Which don’t get me wrong I am all for defense, just making a point!)

There were thousands of thrilled tweets when Curiosity landed so I am glad to know you are all not jaded and are really proud of what your country and basically mankind just accomplished!

I know that this a little more opinion than usual, but I was bothered by the nay-sayers; silly-me! And on that note - Way to go NASA!