I just asked someone (randomly) what percentage of the US budget is appropriated toward NASA. He replied, 20% (confidently I would add).

Back to that in a moment.

According to Neil deGrasse Tyson, "there is no greater force of nature than NASA in stoking a pipeline of interested students who, one day, want to become scientists and engineers. It's that simple." Neil is an astrophysicist so of course he is biased. Biased for learning.

How much is that inspirational force worth to a nation and to the world? Just think about that for a bit. What would you say? 15%? 10%? 1% ?

In 2009, the NASA budget amounted to 6/10th of one penny for each tax dollar. I believe it's even less now. I support more funding for NASA, not less. A full penny now.

NASA budgets are not invoices, they are investments in projects that can benefit all of humanity.

Mike

That's a myth, kpawsuh.

http://www.snopes.com/business/genius/spacepen.asp

The Russians also have a less than stellar record (get it? STELLAR?!) when it comes to space exploration. Their program was always less effective than NASA, as evidenced by the fact that we won the space race. They sent the first satellite, animal, and human into space by virtue of starting their space program earlier than us, but we quickly eclipsed them. They lost a surprising number of unmanned probes as well, and faded into irrelevance after the moon landing, whereas NASA kept with it and produced a staggering amount of scientific knowledge.

and the rest of the world. Here's a quote from an article from Nov. 2010:

"The idea behind space-based solar was to install solar cells high above the Earth’s atmosphere where the yield is more intense. The energy would be transmitted in the form of diluted, harmless wavelengths to a small satellite dish attached to the roof of every home and business (think satellite TV dish). No more wires or dams or electrical towers strewn across the desert. No more coal-fired plants or nuclear power facilities. No more solar mattresses affixed to our rooftops. No brown outs, power outages or back-up generators. All of them gone, in an instant.

Sounds brilliant.

But what would you say if I told you that NASA has this technology today?

What if I said that NASA has been banging at the door of the U.S. Department of Energy for over a decade and no one will answer. Every time they get a foot in the door they are chastised for “mission creep” and “overreach.” NASA? Those scientists need to stick to pictures of Mars."

NASA has this technology now.

The article goes on to say "No country has a space agency more knowledgeable, powerful or successful than NASA and the time has come for the United States to leverage this untapped asset. Forget investing in more nuclear power plants or trying to manufacture solar panels and wind generators more cheaply than China. When you can’t compete nose to nose there’s only one thing left to do: change the playing field. And in this case, America owns the field." http://cleantechnica.com/2010/11/01/can-nasa-save-struggling-america/

This is possibly one of the most exciting and important issues facing the world. We have the capability of energy independence at our finger tips - the entire world can benefit and the benefits are immeasurable. The lives that would be saved and improved are staggering and we are just sitting on this technology.

See PP, you just dont really get it. Only you would care if it were a true story or not. In truth, do we need a space pen? No, we can use a pencil. Did we really need tang? No. Astronaut Ice Cream? Nope. But it all has cost millions. But we have to support NASA because they are going to save us when we destroy our planet by moving us all into little pods on Mars! Ever research how much environmentally destroying pollution is caused by NASA? Would that tech and brain power and $$$ be better used to solve the environmental challenges? We have no clue about almost all life on our planet. Sea turtles. We know the migration patterns of the females, but have no clue as to that of the males. I could go on and on. We find new species almost everytime we look. We literally know more about Mars than the life in our deep ocean trenches. Could NASA figure out how to get us off oil if they wanted? Sure. Probably already have. Do we really need to continue the phallic measuring by who can do the most in space? The reality is, escaping a doomed Earth and living in a pod on Mars is a fantasy. Maybe someday, but not any time soon. Lets maybe try to fix the problems here instead of scrapping this planet and planning for a move.

@kpawsuh: Tang also existed before the space race. It was used because it was convenient; it wasn't invented for astronauts. Astronaut ice cream was (freeze-drying, actually), but that is arguably an important technology. Freeze-drying is a fairly common form of food preservation these days.

Furthermore, it's disingenuous to say that NASA should focus their efforts on biology. We have other organizations for that. They have done a lot for environmental research, too. Much of the information we have on climate change has come from NASA, for example. The hole in the ozone layer? NASA found that as well, and continues to monitor it.

It seems there's a disconnect between what people think NASA does (hint: it's not an organization devoted to the colonization of Mars, or an organization devoted to spending millions of dollars on Tang and space pens) and what it actually does (good science, and lots of it).

And finally, what do you do for a living? Are you a scientist working on these issues you seem to think every other scientist should focus on? If not, you have no room to talk. All science is valuable, terrestrial or not. To a layman like yourself, maybe NASA seems useless, because you don't care to look at what it actually does. To just about any physicist or astronomer, many biologists and chemists, and even some social scientists, NASA is incredibly important to their work.

Spiff, yes you and I seem to be on the same sheet of music. If they have already created that, than have the CIA take out who ever is standing in the way of implementation.

PP, Yes I am. Next point? I have 20 yrs in fisheries, in Alaska, the gulf, the caribbean... Anything else? We can develop freeze drying and all that great stuff, for terrestrila use. We don't need to shoot rockets into space to do that. At this point, and really for almost all of its past history, NASA's main directive was to prove which country has the biggest, um, shall we say "rocket". It does science as well, but I argue that in the realm of relevance, we should be focused on Earth first. Important stuff to learn how seeds grow without gravity... Maybe shift the funding to ocean acidification, tech like Spiff is describing, cures for cancer etc. NASA has a niche to fill, but I dont think we should be neglecting everything else so we can see if a cockroach can live in space. DoD should get equally chopped.

"NASA ordered 34 mechanical pencils from Houston's Tycam Engineering Manufacturing, Inc., in 1965. They paid $4,382.50 or $128.89 per pencil. When these prices became public, there was an outcry and NASA scrambled to find something cheaper for the astronauts to use."

A really interesting read!

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=fact-or-fiction-nasa-spen

"According to an Associated Press report from February 1968, NASA ordered 400 of Fisher's antigravity ballpoint pens for the Apollo program. A year later, the Soviet Union ordered 100 pens and 1,000 ink cartridges to use on their Soyuz space missions, said the United Press International. The AP later noted that both NASA and the Soviet space agency received the same 40 percent discount for buying their pens in bulk. They both paid $2.39 per pen instead of $3.98. "