"We learn almost nothing new with every new mission. We keep repeating the same processes and experiments over and over again. The US and the Russians learned how to build structures in space a long time ago. Any new construction is rehearsed ahead of time on computers and in water tanks.'
How long have humans sailed the seas?
How long have we even had powered flight? about 100 years, let alone space travel?
The shuttle has not even flown 200 times.
The amount of people that have been in space would not fill a high school auditorium.
We are but a child stepping out on the porch the first and seeing the outside world.
We are learning everytime. Even if it is our own shortcomings or ability to maintain our resolve to press on.
These things we do today, they are not for us, they are for those yet unborn. As the endeavours of those before us put us where we are today. We OWE them to do our part too.
It is our time now. And we must use the tools at hand.
Besides it is inevitable. Computers and water tanks are not space. A human hand must do, and feel, and experience the reality. And computers cannot create human presence.
This is no different from any frontier. Each one has brought new challenges. You ask how easy these missions are of any astronaut. You ask them if they learned anything. We both know what those answers will be.
A Saturday morning ping....
The shuttle has not even flown 200 times. The amount of people that have been in space would not fill a high school auditorium.
You're absolutely right. And what that means is NASA shouldn't be wasting its resources on a system that is only going to put a couple of dozen people in space every year. And it looks like the replacement program isn't going to do any better. NASA needs to use its resources to build a more reliable and cheaper system that will open space travel to everybody, such as what the private sector is attempting.