Posted on 01/25/2004 3:28:42 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
ALBANY -- Most Capital Region residents believe life exists on other planets, but their view of outer space is otherwise pretty much down to earth.
Almost all doubt they will travel in space, and less than one-third believe the current generation of children will routinely lift off into orbit
More than half say the inspiration for President Bush's recent plan to build a lunar space station and land astronauts on Mars is no more lofty than a bid for re-election, according to a Times Union/Channel 13 poll by Siena Polling Institute.
This lukewarm support for space travel isn't a sudden phenomenon, though. Well before the grounding of the Apollo moon program in 1972 and the Challenger shuttle disaster of 1986, Americans questioned whether the "giant leap for mankind" is worth the astronomical price tag. Decades after Americans first heard about moon rocks and Tang, their feelings about space exploration remain largely unchanged.
In May 1961, the month President John F. Kennedy launched his crusade to send a man to the moon, 65 percent of Americans surveyed in a Gallup poll approved of the mission. But when the estimated $40 billion cost was mentioned, support dropped drastically to just 33 percent.
In December, a month before Bush announced his plan to renew manned missions to the moon and send astronauts to Mars, 53 percent supported another human lunar landing. But when asked whether they supported spending billions of dollars on the program, only 31 percent answered yes.
In the Capital Region, the poll showed 63 percent want the United States to continue to send humans into space, but only 40 percent approved of Bush's plan. More than half the respondents said the money could be better spent.
"The bottom line is very similar," said Frank Newport, editor in chief of the Gallup Poll. "The public likes the concept of manned space exploration. They did in the 1960s and they do now. They're just worried about the cost."
Bush's proposal would create a permanent space station on the moon as early as 2015 and use the station as a hub for sending astronauts to Mars and beyond. The President said the first five years of the program would be funded by reallocating $11 billion from NASA's budget and asking Congress for another $1 billion. But the price tag to complete the program, estimated in the hundreds of billions of dollars, turns off voters in the Capital Region and the rest of the country.
"We can't live on Mars, and we live on Earth," said Albany resident Chris Harris, a 30-year-old graduate student of Africana studies at the University at Albany. "Space exploration is a good idea, but we should continue sending unmanned missions. They're more cost-effective."
Across the country and in the Capital Region, Democrats have been more skeptical of Bush's plan than Republicans. Locally, only 34 percent of Democrats support the proposal, compared with 47 percent of Republicans. Republicans also are generally more supportive of sending humans into space, with 67 percent saying it should continue, compared with 59 percent of Democrats.
Poll respondents in both parties voiced varying degrees of doubt about Bush's motives. About two-thirds of Democrats said the space program is politically motivated; less than a third of Republicans agreed. Republicans were three times as likely as Democrats to say the President was looking to advance the cause of science.
But what might be seen as an American propensity for skepticism about politicians and their motives isn't the only reason Bush faces less than unbridled enthusiasm.
Some scientists said the dissent over the space program is a bit of a public relations problem -- Americans don't understand the extent that space exploration has benefited life on Earth.
"The most common things people don't realize are the battery-operated tools we use came from the space program," NASA spokesman Michael Braukus said. "They were made for astronauts repairing satellites."
NASA technology has aided in the invention of a variety of items, ranging from lifesaving technology such as CT scans, MRIs and pacemakers to innovations like high-tech sneakers, insulation and gas-leak detectors. But few Americans make the connection.
"There are so many people that don't get it. I guess almost no one gets it," said Vanderbilt University's Rick Chappell, director of the Dyer Observatory and a research professor of physics.
Overall, 27 percent of Capital Region residents believe the nation has seen a great deal of benefit from the space program, and 43 percent believe the United States has seen some benefit. Twenty-seven percent said the country has seen little or no benefit.
Chappell was so inspired by Kennedy's 1961 speech setting the goals for American space travel that the Vanderbilt freshman became a physics major and went on to get his doctorate in space physics. Finally, he became an astronaut. He has been through NASA training but has not yet gone on a mission into space, as NASA cut back its program to send scientists with NASA crews.
Beyond the technological benefits of space travel, Chappell said Friday that Kennedy's initiative had an intangible effect: inspiration.
"When we do something like this as a nation, it creates a grand challenge," he said. "It gives the kids something to think about being a part of. And I know it works -- it worked for me and it worked for my colleagues."
During the Apollo program, Chappell continued, 75 percent of new technology was coming out of the United States. Today, it's less than 20 percent.
While the space race with the Soviet Union created a fear in Americans that motivated them to develop space technology, Chappell said revitalizing America's technology market and stimulating the economy could be the motivation today.
"The race didn't go away," he said. "It just changed in nature."
Religious beliefs influence people's consideration of whether there is intelligent life in outer space, the Times Union poll found.
Less than half of those who consider themselves very religious believe intelligent life exists outside our planet. Fifty-three percent of "somewhat religious" residents think it exists, and 64 percent of nonreligious people think it's out there. Men also were more likely than women to believe in intelligent life on other planets -- 59 percent to 46 percent.
Gabrielle Febbie of Amsterdam doesn't believe in the existence in life on other planets.
"Whatever was created is here," said Febbie, who brought her 3-year-old daughter, Cassandra, to the Henry Hudson Planetarium in Albany on Saturday. Febbie said she doesn't support Bush's program.
No matter what's to be found in outer space, many scientists say today's high-tech rovers can do almost the same research as humans, at a much lower cost in both dollars and human lives.
"There were some very important discoveries made by the manned flights to the moon, but there's no question they would have been done more cheaply and without the loss of lives if they had been done by unmanned probes," said Syracuse University professor Carl Rosenzweig, who teaches physics and astronomy.
Jim Zadoorian, a 38-year-old Schenectady resident, brought his wife and daughter to the Henry Hudson Planetarium on Saturday to see a program on Mars exploration. He said the benefits of space exploration are impossible to quantify but worth the cost.
"It's about optimism," he said. "It's about what the human potential is and going beyond our current confines."
"What happens with astronauts? You get to Mars, you put up the flag and you come back with a few rocks," Osheroff said.
Even a few rocks sound like a great idea to David Strangway, a former U of T president and professor who studied rock samples from all six Apollo moon landings as a principal NASA investigator. Now chief executive of the Canada Foundation for Innovation, Strangway also ran a lunar science program for the U.S. space agency at the height of its earlier lunar exploration.
Strangway said any "to do" list for travel to Mars begins by getting help on the moon, including:
Dust scooped from the lunar surface can be insulation in Mars-bound spacecraft, shielding sensitive equipment or people from radiation damage. A high-energy solar flare is blamed for frying key innards in Japan's Nozemi mission which failed to orbit the Red Planet last month.
Tiny, highly concentrated iron pellets lying in patches on the moon could be used to forge metal there, greatly cutting the bulk that has to be lifted off the Earth where the gravitational pull is six times stronger (or even from Earth orbit, where the pull is still three times stronger than on the moon.)
Microscopic examination of materials in abandoned Apollo lunar modules - in effect archaeology on the moon - should provide more precise information about the constant bombardment by radiation and micrometerorites the size of sand grains that hit at tens of thousands of kilometres an hour. Such measurements are essential to ensuring a long life for moon and Mars explorers, whether robotic or human. Most Martian exploration could be done by orbiting spacecraft and mechanized landers, but Strangway said only the drama of human involvement generates political and public support for the huge costs.
"We didn't land a man on the moon because of the science." he added. Veteran astronaut Marc Garneau, president of the Canadian Space Agency, agreed that "the boldness, the adventure" of sending people to Mars appealed to him personally. But four-fifths of the agency's annual spending has nothing to do with humans in space and many areas of potential Canadian expertise for Mars are robotic, including remotely operated mining equipment.
As well, the agency has just taken another big step toward unmanned exploration in the solar system by getting companies to bid on an all-purpose small satellite "bus" - the outer shell and supporting systems for a spacecraft that would carry 300 kilograms of experiments.
Starting in 2007, made-in-Canada small satellites would be launched every two years and Mars is certainly a potential target.
Even 69-year-old, non-astronaut Strangway still feels the pull of the moon ("there are so many more questions to be answered") as well as the pull of Mars.
Understanding those two heavenly bodies means we would get a much better handle on how our own Earth coalesced from a swirling cloud of hot gases. "I am very fired up about this, even though at my age I won't be part of it," he said.***
If Kennedy and Bush were to follow Bill Clinton's approach to leadership, they each would have put their finger in the air and read the polls. Thank God they look at the landscape and make decision based on the situation.
You have had a tax cut.
I'll take another.
Democreeps would spend any funding cuts at NASA for the Great Society anyway. We may as well get something useful out of it.
Yes, we had massive loss of life on the Apollo missions professor crackpipe.
I've been thinking about putting in a pool.
I've saved over 9K for it already.
I need that last three bucks.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.