Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!texbell!ficc!jeffd From: jeffd@ficc.ferranti.com (jeff daiell) Newsgroups: comp.robotics Subject: Re: Divert NASA budget to robotics Summary: Ban? Message-ID: <1UR41XC@xds8.ferranti.com> Date: 19 Jul 90 11:34:18 GMT References: <2787@dftsrv.gsfc.nasa.gov> <18608@ttidca.TTI.COM> Organization: Ferranti International Controls Corporation Lines: 26 In article , kas@cs.aber.ac.uk (Kevin Sharp) writes: > I'd like to make two points. One for either side of this argument. > > > 2) In comparing the cost of human life with that of a machine it's as > well to remember that there's no problem finding volunteer astronauts. > The calls to ban manned space flight on account of the danger to > individuals amounts to gross protectionism. No one has called for a *ban* on manned space flight, only for an end to NASA manned space flight, at least until it's safer. This would in no way preclude private firms from manned space exploration, were they not also smart enough to send a machine to test the waters before risking a Human. > Such an attitude is > extremely patronizing towards those who are willing to risk their > lives for experience of traveling outside the Earth's atmosphere. Their willingness in no way obliges the taxpayers to pick up the tab for their 'experience'. Jeff -- "...the American dream, in recent years the object of much denigration even within our own borders, turns out to have been the world's dream, as well." -- Louis Rukeyser on events in Eastern Europe