i feel the same way -- always feel the poets should be at the helm. just being human isn't romantic. the elevated ideal of human-ness is. that's what poetry does, but so do rockets.

i think certainly manned explorations in space are quite romantic. however, watching discovery land this morning was a white-knuckle, edge-of-your-seat sight, not just for the boys at nasa, but for people watching at home. it seems moot now, but i was furious that they sent the crew up without making ABSOLUTELY sure that they had done everything in their power to keep the astronauts safe. i am in love with the idea of space travel but i don't like the idea of sending people out when there is something potentially disastrous going on with the shuttle.

Absolutely wonderful post, and excellent points. I am now totally on-board with manned space travel. Nothing compares with "being there", and with the shoestring budget they have, these people are the premier explorers of our time.

Thanks for the comments guys.

I think you're right Megan, we should make sure that those explorers are given every oppurtunity to survive their mission. But we're never going to be absolutey sure of their safety. Such is the danger of trying to hurdle human life into a unkownable and hostile vacuum.

absolute safety is always an impossibility. but if there is something nasa sees as a potential danger that they can fix, they need to fix it. any person willing to go into space is very brave, and truly makes them, as koby put it, explorers. i have nothing but respect for those guys...despite any misgivings i have about manned missions, i would give someone's left nut to be able to go and see what they see!

When I saw the title of this post, I thought it was going to be a criticism of that dog who makes drawings, but it was actually much more interesting than that. I always get sad when politicians and the like say funding for space exploration should wait til we solve all our worldly problems. That's like saying we should never make art until we've built a house for everyone to live in. It's our contribution to science and art that separates us from the animals that just live and breed and die. Without it, we might as well have never existed.

Nice thoughts

I'd have gone up the day after the Challenger blew up, the day after Columbia burned up on re entry, and I'd go up tommorow if they saw fit to send me. To experience what the handful of humans, astronaught and cosomonaught alike, have been privileged to, is worth risking any danger.

I remember with great fondness a childhood visit to the Kennedy Space Center. It was a fantastic thing to see as a child. Years later as an adult, I got to see the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. All my life I have been enamored with the discoveries of space sciences. When they sent that satellite out with the Cd playing sounds of the Earth, the Hubble, images of Saturn, Jupiter, Uranus, I was riveted. Space exploration is an exciting yet risky venture. Yes there have been tragedies, and there will likely be more, but the idea of travelling to far off planets, seeing new stars in the heavens, and inventing new technologies is fascinating. While I don't grasp the mathematical and technical aspects of space travel and science, I am nonetheless in awe of it all. Imagine the excitement centuries ago when people first learned of the exploits of Magellan, Cook, Columbus, Hudson and countless others? With the advancement of techonology and information, space travel is that new ocean, continent, or chain of islands. Obviously the governments of the world are unable to cure societies ills, we can thank corruption for that, but at the same time look at these wonderful feats of human achievement. Wow. I predict in my lifetime we will return to the moon, we might land on Mars, and we will be continually amazed at these discoveries as they unfold.