The Cleveland Ohio "The Plain Dealer" has a good article recently outlining the body blows to science dealt out by NASA over the past few months. It’s a scary list, one I have seen many times, and I’m glad — such as I can be — that it’s getting air time.
The article really starts off hard, talking about the cuts, and not painting a flattering picture of what’s going on at NASA. Right on the first page is a quotation from NASA’s press secretary, and it’s… well, read it:
The space agency insists its support for science remains strong. “With the growth in science over the last 15 years to almost 33 percent of NASA’s budget, we feel good about the robustness of the program going forward,” press secretary Dean Acosta said.
"Robustness"? NuSTAR cut (two weeks from its final proposal review), Dawn cut, then reinstated, Constellation-X gutted, LISA gutted, Astrobiology facing 75% cuts in two years, the wildly successful Explorer program in jeopardy, two Mars probes cut… the list goes on. If Mr. Acosta feels good about this, then I really, really hope nothing happens that makes him feel bad.
I’d love to get the context for that quotation, just to be fair. But it’s hard to imagine just what context it was in. Maybe it was from two years ago.
I’ll reiterate, as I’ve done before, that NASA is in a very hard place with the budget. I wouldn’t want to be in the position of having my budget cut and deciding what to keep and what to lose. But let’s face facts: science programs are being eviscerated, and scientists are extremely antsy about their careers (I know of one who may leave the field entirely, or may go to another country to find a stable job).
I wonder how all those scientists would feel, reading that quotation above? As a scientist myself, and one who was involved with NuSTAR, I know how I feel. I’m pretty upset.
However, later today I’ll post about what one person is trying to do about this– and he’s in a position to have some influence over Congress.
June 7th, 2006 at 1:44 am
It seems slightly bizarre that an organisation like NASA has science taking only a third of its budget. As a kid growing up, NASA seemed to be made of science.
June 7th, 2006 at 2:50 am
You caught my attention with “The … Plain Dealer had a good article”. I’m from Cleveland and I’m here to tell you that’s not normal — not that there isn’t decent writing in the PD, but it’s normally from wire reports. But then I realized, wire reports naturally don’t cover much local news, and a piece about science cuts at NASA is a big local story in Cleveland, what with the Lewis Research Center — apparently renamed the Glenn Research Center when I wasn’t looking — being right there and everything.
June 7th, 2006 at 6:24 am
NASA will start advancing science again when the current distractions end. Those distractions are:
- a God vs Rational Thinking government; and
- the Chinese vow to put a man on the moon.
This board talks about the GvRT government enough, so I’d like to throw into the ring the idea that Americans, when properly motivated, are capable of so much, but are otherwise kind of lazy and happy to let things slide.
The USA put a man on the moon in 1969 because the American people were motivated to beat the Russians there.
Now, I think, the American people are motivated to beat China there, doubly so due to the decrepitness of space shuttle causing a bit of a national embarassment.
So my take on it is that the combination of God-Squad government plus what amounts to a mission from said God to get back to the moon will hamper budgeting for science for a while until the God-Squad is shuffled out AND the USA can declare that it has beaten China in the (new) space race.
June 7th, 2006 at 6:53 am
Interestingly enough, the U.S. beat China to the Moon 37 years ago.
I have to agree however that Americans en-mass are a lazy bunch, intellectually. They’ll go to great lengths to do almost anything but think hard. They tend to be like my pair of German Shepherds: they want someone else to do the high level stuff. There’s a quote by Einstein from one of his early visits the the U.S.: “Americans are colossally bored.”
Perhaps this is ultimately why Americans stopped walking on the Moon almost as soon as they started.
June 7th, 2006 at 7:58 am
It’s a direct result of the President mandating return to moon and exploration, but not providing the increased funding to allow programs to continue and the new programs to develop. NASA is stuck with obligations and expectations and desires to complete the ISS on one hand and the need for funding to make the milestones on the new projects on the other.
And don’t tell me NASA wouldn’t get a black eye in the public’s mind if they abandoned space station so they could cut Shuttle now (or after 1 more Hubble mission) and shift that funding over. ISS would be one more line of “Colossal NASA Mistakes” right up there with the Hubble fuzzy mirror and letting Skylab fall.
I know there are some who will argue that ISS is already a “Colossal NASA Mistake”, but how much worse would it be to spend all the money, effort, time, and then not even complete it, but let is burn up? At least Skylab was used before it was abandoned.
June 7th, 2006 at 9:31 am
The US beat China to the moon 37 years ago… and hasn’t been back for what, 34 years? I think there’s a large number of people who believe the US loses face if Beijing is putting Chinese footprints in the lunar soil over top of American ones.
The thinking goes that if China goes to the moon now, they can say “We have the will, and the capability to go to the moon and are now world leaders in space” whereas if the US doesn’t go to the moon, the best they can say is “Oh yeah, we were there first. nyah.” and that goes against the traditional US grain.
June 7th, 2006 at 9:43 am
The third letter in NASA stands for “Space”, not “Science”. While it pains me to see missions cut, science is not all that can be done in space. In a perfect world, NASA would create an environment that allows easy access to space, so that other science organizations (NSF, universities, etc) could do their investigations. Unfortunately, current NASA plans don’t seem to move us any closer to that perfect world.
June 7th, 2006 at 9:44 am
Considering how much science can be obtained for the 3 billion, shouldn’t we go for it; afterall, China is spending half that on one bridge.
http://english.people.com.cn/200306/08/eng20030608_117842.shtml
June 7th, 2006 at 10:04 am
That’s called the “sunk-cost fallacy”. The fact that we have wasted money on something up to this point can never justify wasting more money on it. The money has already been wasted, wasting more money will merely waste more money, it will not get you back the money that has already been spent, or somehow turn a non-worthwhile action into a worthwhile one. The unrecoverable money you already spent cannot be used in analyzing whether to spend more, that is a logical fallacy.
When deciding whether to spend money in the future (or doing anything in the future), you must only take into account the utility of spending that money (or taking that action), the fact that you may have spent money in the past will not somehow magically make the new expenditure or action bring you greater rewards. If the rewards do not justify the cost you are planning, then they do not justify the cost, that is all there is to it. Previous costs do not change this. This is a fundamental microeconomics principle.
June 7th, 2006 at 2:04 pm
So, has anyone checked out the qualifications of Dean Acosta?
June 7th, 2006 at 2:11 pm
The corollary to the “sunk-cost fallacy” is the “lost-face fallacy,” or continuing to pursue a course of action (the last two disastrous “wars,” for example) just so as not to appear to be a “quitter.” Beginning a race to the moon now just because China might be able to put some folks up there doesn’t seem like a rational reason, I agree. Nearly as bad as trying to “out-sputnik” the Russians 36 or so years ago.
HOWEVER, should there be demonstrated scientific merit in a return to the moon (and not simply spun-off new consumer technology), then perhaps the U.S. should consider it.
But the war in Iraq isn’t getting any cheaper, and the “don’t cut and run” patriots are firmly in command of the current admininstration and the public which chooses to vote, it seems. And the deficit is compounding exponentially. I guess that’s an economic
reason, principled or no, not to expect any funding for much of anything in the way of “frills” in the near and not so near future. Sort of like the way many public secondary schools are funded today – at least in the bottom one-third of the country.
June 7th, 2006 at 9:50 pm
I feel compelled to point out that returning to the Moon before the Chinese has other aspects other than just “saving face”.
In military operations, owning the “high ground” is extremely valuable.
Go and read Robert Heinlein’s “The Moon is a Harsh Mistress” if you don’t understand my point.
June 7th, 2006 at 10:23 pm
Uh, the moon is a bit too high. In the even of a war the moon is simply too far away to be of any strategic importance. It would be like in a war between US and China, one of the two countries taking over Madagascar. Sure you could do it, but it is so far out of the way that it would be a complete waste of time. In a war between the US and Canada, sure Mount Everst would be the highest possible ground, but it wouldn’t do either of them any good to try to take control over it.
June 8th, 2006 at 5:34 pm
I read an article in Seed magazine recently: “As Science goes, so goes the nation” Very sad, and worse is I believe that a future administration is going to kill the return to the Moon. Essentially NASA will be just spinning its wheels and have next to nothing to show for it. I’m relieved DAWN survived though.
June 12th, 2006 at 9:33 pm
TheBlackCat,
As Elias Friedman said, read The Moon is a Harsh Mistress by Robert A. Heinlein. Con sider the kinetic energy of 100 tons of rock moving at 11 kilometers per second!
June 16th, 2006 at 11:43 am
Don’t forget the first “A” in NASA is AERONAUTICS. It will be alot easier for some future administration to kill off NASA entirely once the only mission is manned return to moon (or mars) and NOTHING ELSE.
No more aviation research, icing, engine noise, safety, effiency etc.
I think it might be fairly easy to convince the public that a “moon/mars only” NASA isn’t worth the cost.