In a message dated 2/22/01 3:59:40 PM Eastern Standard Time,
JMGreen@SISNA.COM writes:
<< BUT to assert that the nation should take on projects the size of the SSC,
or a Moon trip, or the Hubble based on the idea that some scientific
knowledge will eventually spin off into a data reservoir and thereby
technology might eventually be enhanced this seems to me to be over
reaching -- projects of this size should be debated publicly and weighed
against other expensive projects and my favorite, pay down the damn federal
debt.
>>
What you are really arguing for is the end of public support for basic
research. I can't help but wonder how someone who would choose to make a
career of science could hold such an opinion. What percentage of the general
public do you think has the slightest clue about what the SSC would have been
and what it would have been used for? Now that it hasn't been built what
would you say the impact has been on our national debt? The only real impact
been the lost opportunity to gain a greater understanding of the most
fundamental laws of nature.
Are you making the same argument for the Hubble. I find this even more
shocking considering the scientific payoff from that project. In my opinion,
these types of pure research projects involve such a small percentage of the
federal budget their benefits far outweigh their cost. There is plenty of
wasteful federal spending, mostly in defense, money that could be much better
spent on more publicly supported research.