What time does the Artemis 1 Orion spacecraft splash down on Dec. 11 to end NASA's moon mission?

[Admin]

NASA's Artemis 1 Orion spacecraft will end a 26-day mission to the moon on Sunday, Dec. 11, and here's what time to watch.

What time does the Artemis 1 Orion spacecraft splash down on Dec. 11 to end NASA's moon mission? : Read more

 

[odubya23]

Please stand by for an incredibly unpopular opinion.

I think that manned spaceflight is a titanic waste of resources that could be better allocated to much more pressing issues our nation and our planet faces. I believe that this new moon rush is a direct response to a perceived concern that the Chinese Space Program might have real interest in exploiting Lunar resources.

Everything we could want to do on the moon could be done for a fraction of the cost and risk to human life with automation.

I will respond to serious rebuttals and ignore flame from Sci-fi enthusiasts and surviving members of the population that remembers watching Apollo live on TV.

Thank you for your kind attention.

 

[billslugg]

It's "crewed" not "manned".

Without crewed spaceflight, there would have been no way to repair and upgrade Hubble the five times we did.

Robots cannot do experimentation or repairs in space as well as humans.

Robots should always be the first wave of exploration in space at each step, LEO, Moon, Mars, etc but eventually humans will have to follow to do the high end work.

 

[odubya23]

It's "crewed" not "manned".

I thank you for the English lesson.

It is remarkable that NASA was able to repair Hubble. As I look at images like "The Pillars of Creation" and "The Hubble Deep Field Exposure", it is easier for me to not look at the more than half million homeless Americans, many of them Veterans, too many of them children.

As we quibble about terminology, we are pleasantly distracted from 4.5 metric tons per person per year that will soon make many regions of our homeworld uninhabitable.

It is extremely difficult for me to see how not diverting funds and efforts to find solutions for terrestrial problems and instead spend an extra few thousand dollars in extra mass for life support equipment is justified.

 

[billslugg]

Space travel by humans is a necessity to conduct the experiments that will be needed to solve the problems of the world.

It is not an 'either/or' question. There is plenty of money available to solve the world's problems because money is not the problem. The problem is human stupidity, greed and corruption. No amount of money fixes them.

Look at the Horn of Africa. They have been there 300,000 years since homo sapiens became a distinct species, watched us go to the Moon and yet they cannot figure out how to establish a stable society or provide clean drinking water for their children.

That's what I think about shoveling money into the world's problem areas.

 

[COLGeek]

Gentlemen, politics and religion are off limits. Lets stick to science, please.

 

[odubya23]

Look at the Horn of Africa. They have been there 300,000 years since homo sapiens became a distinct species, watched us go to the Moon and yet they cannot figure out how to establish a stable society or provide clean drinking water for their children.

That's what I think about shoveling money into the world's problem areas.

That is precisely the attitude that I was hoping to address. Space exploration and development should be for the good of all human kind. Until I can be convinced of that, it's just the new imperialism.
Your callous dismissal of terrestrial problems, especially African ones, a particularly disturbing example, is why such problems persist.

It's depressing, really.

 

[billslugg]

But our space exploration is for the good of all humankind. We freely share our learnings with other countries. The ISS is a consortium of 15 countries, people of 19 nationalities have flown on it.

I don't dismiss the Horn of Africa it is a problem, I dismiss that money diverted from space exploration will solve it.

 

[odubya23]

I will concede your argument.

 

[billslugg]

That's very kind of you. Thanks.