My reasons can be placed in three categories.
National Inspiration
It’s been a long time since the people I this country had a positive, non-war related national goal to strive for. A visible goal that will inspire people to achieve. How many kids grew up dreaming of being involved in the space program and turned that dream into action by getting educated and working in high technology fields. The more dreamers of that kind we have in this country, the better off we are.
What motivates kids now to get an education it high tech fields? Money? Nothing wrong with that, but most people want more. People want to be a part of something BIG. To be part of a group that accomplishes something incredible.
Tell me it wasn’t inspiring when Americans watched Neil Armstrong step on the moon for the first time. That single image probably inspired more kids to achieve great things that any other single event in our history. (Other than the wars, perhaps but that’s not the way we want to motivate them.) Our problem is that once we made it to the moon, we collectively waited for the next goal, and it never came. Our leaders attitudes seemed to be “We made it. We won the race. We’re done. Let’s get back to normal now.”
I firmly feel that humans need to push ourselves, as a race, to explore. To find new things and new frontiers. Yes, it sounds like a cheesy Star Trek line. But just because it’s been adopted by a TV series doesn’t negate its truth. What pushed Columbus across the Atlantic? Well, wind of course. But what motivated him to put a sail to the wind? Need? Greed? Yes I know he was looking for a water route to the Indies, but I’m talking about a need to explore and discover. So once he found “The New World” why did people keep going back? That same need. Sending robots to do the exploring is not the same thing. Kids don’t dream of becoming a robot when they grow up, they dream of being an ASTRONAUT. It’s the dreams they need to inspire and motivate them. Controlling a robot from a room in NASA is not the same.
Technological advances
No one is suggesting that none of the aforementioned products/technologies wouldn’t exist without them first being developed for the space program or that these things could only be developed through it. But you must concede that many certainly were developed much faster than they would have been, and in a few of the examples, perhaps polymers or some computer technology, they might not exist at all.
“Necessity is the mother of invention.”
Without the space program, a lot of these things would never have been needed, and therefore the alternate uses for them that other people came up with would not have come about. We simply don’t know what would be developed and then modified for commercial use, even life saving uses, by a truly motivated space exploration program.
Long Term Goals Private companies are run, necessarily, on a short-term basis. If an idea wont pay off in a relatively short time, it wont get done. There is no short-term payoff to space exploration. The long-term benefits are incalculable. We simply cannot see that far. I’m talking generations here. If you think the human race must push for the stars eventually, when will that be? Should we wait for the national debt to be paid off? Do we wait till there’s no more hungry people in the world? There will always be SOME reason not to do it. Always somewhere else to better spend that money. The amounts of money we’re talking about are miniscule compared to what we waste in one welfare program every year. When WILL it be the right time? When WILL we have not other pressing needs on Earth?
Competition
Nothing brings out the best in people that good old fashion competition. People want to be on the winning team. How will we feel as a nation when RED CHINA establishes a base on the moon? Collectively we’ll look at the moon and think, “Those miserable Stone Age punks are on the moon and we’re not?” In short, we will feel like we’ve LOST. Lost to a country that hasn’t managed to get indoor pluming to most of it’s population yet but managed to find the motivation to go to the Moon, and MAINTAIN a presence there. What will that do to our moral? Don’t think national moral exists? Think back to the Carter years. Then remember the change when Reagan came along. I remember it quite well. We were proud to be Americans again.
We need something big and difficult to strive for. This could do the trick.
Oops.
After reading my post again, that would be FOUR.
PAY OFF THE NATIONAL DEBT this decade. We could put up billboards all over the country that count down, kind of like the Illinois Lottery does when the jackpot is going up. That would be a great sight EVERY FRICKIN morning while I drive to work. This country is on a path to BONING our children. Mine are 10 and 9.