Letter: Some things simply more important than Mars rover
July 27, 2012 at 7:00 pm in Worthington Daily Globe
The latest NASA project, the Mars rover Curiosity, cost us taxpayers more than $2.5 billion to create, not to mention the cost to blast it to Mars. Continue Reading
I am so sorry to hear about your child’s plight. I have a myeloproliferative syndrome, another survivable chronic disease, so I understand some of what you have gone through.
However, I feel you’re off target regarding space exploration, which has already helped your son with his illness. The Apollo mission demanded the technology to miniaturize computers and electronics, since every pound of payload for that mission required 100 pounds of fuel. The miniaturization of computers and electronics led to the integrated circuit chips that have made computers so much faster and less expensive. The improvement in computers led to much of the improvements in medical technology over the past 50 years. Certainly your son benefits from the chemical tests, and so many of us benefit from diagnostic imaging – remember exploratory surgery? A horror of the past gone due to space technology.
And if your son is cured, it will most likely be through genetic engineering, which is a very computer-intensive technology. We wouldn’t be as far ahead in that without space research.
And let’s also consider that space is important to our entire species. One planet is too fragile, no matter how well we take care of it there can (and will, over time) be celestial disasters beyond our control that can wipe out life on Earth. We must leave our home planet eventually, or become extinct.
Want to rail against foolish expense? Pick on the wars we’ve had of late.
Thanks
Bruce
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To make this short. Please read and support the space program. The following if factual. If needed I can find much more. The trip to mars may have a cure.
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMCSE361AF_Improving_0.html
http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/07/14/space.spinoff.medicine/index.html#cnnSTCText
LONDON, England (CNN) — In these cash-strapped times, you might well wonder why governments around the world continue to pour millions of dollars in to their respective space programs.
Space exploration has produced a host of medical benefits including the ingestible thermometer pill.
Space exploration has produced a host of medical benefits including the ingestible thermometer pill.
But one of the very important by-products of space exploration has been the adaptation and invention of medical equipment and technologies which are making individual lives better and in many cases saving them.
Most people are familiar with temper foam — perhaps the most famous of NASA’s many medical spinoffs — which started life protecting astronauts’ posteriors in the 1960s and is now used in a host of products from mattresses to athletic shoes.
It is surprising to note how many aspects of space exploration have played a part in helping scientists improve the health of nations.
Who would have thought that analysing fluid flow around a Space Shuttle engine would help create a tiny heart pump?
Or that a water purification device for astronauts could help patients suffering from kidney disease. And that the humble hospital thermometer would be transformed by measuring infrared radiation in the stars and planets?
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War does the same as space exploration. It too has caused many deaths and saved many lives with the technology advancements.
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You speak as if space exploration and cancer / diabetes research are mutually exclusive, which is just false. They can and very much do co-exist. Beyond that, they can (and do) actually have a symbiotic relationship. Us going to Mars will, in the long run, actually help the march towards curing things like cancer. Thats the thing with exploration though, you don’t know what you are looking for until you find it.
For example, LCVG (liquid cooling and ventilation garment) suits were developed by NASA as a way to regulate the body temperatures of their astronauts in the vacuum of space. That same suit and technology now serve our nation’s firefighters to protect them from the heat of flames. It is also used in the treatment of burning limb syndrome, multiple sclerosis, spinal injuries, among many others. Do you think that when NASA was developing this, they had any idea they would be making technology that could help MS patients? No. Again, this is the beauty of technology and exploration.
And that was just 1 of hundreds of examples of space technology that was later adapted for other, Earthly applications. I understand that you are probably very angry with life / your god / the planet for the ailment that you son has contracted and this is the way you are showing that frustration. However, I just thought you would like to know that you are directing your anger and frustration at an agency / idea that just very well could someday be the reason we cure your son’s Type 1 diabetes.
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