Bill Nye 'the Science Guy' Urges Letters To Obama To Restore NASA Budget Cuts 259
MarkWhittington writes "Bill Nye, once known as 'The Science Guy' for his 1990s PBS educational television show, has cut a YouTube video in his current capacity of CEO of the Planetary Society urging people to write to President Obama to restore cuts to planetary science. The budget cuts were enacted by the president last February, causing consternation in the scientific community. Nye writes, 'If that proposal continues the steep decline in funding to NASA's planetary program it will gravely endanger the unique capabilities and outstanding people that have delivered U.S. leadership in space. We will lose a capability that took decades to develop and may never be replaced.'"
Romney too. (Score:5, Insightful)
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Write them both, either could be president in January, and maybe they'll bring up NASA funding around job creation during the election.
I wish people would take your (great) advice and just do it, instead of discussing the flaws and merits of their pet politician.
Wake up, guys. As Bill Nye said, write even if you don't like him (Obama or Romney). Afterwards we can discuss it. But don't waste time NOW.
Re:Romney too. (Score:5, Informative)
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However, Romney has no credibility on budgets... he claimed that he left MA with a $20 Billion "Rainy Day Fund" when actually that was $20 Million in a debate just before the NH Primary that was televised by CNN.
If this is the game you want to play, then we can go all day.
Re:Romney too. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Romney too. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Romney too. (Score:4, Informative)
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2. You are attempting to nitpick away from the point of my original post - that the parent post tried - and failed - to attack Ob
Re:Romney too. (Score:5, Insightful)
As compared to President Obama and a democratic majority in the Senate who create no budgets and spend $1 Trillion in deficits each year, yet can't manage to fund planetary science. Who has credibility then?
Except budgets are started in the House per Federal law, which has been packed with Teaparty & Teaparty wannabes the last 2 years. Also, the Senate has enough Repubs & Teapartiers to fillibuster a call to vote for lunch and the 'Democratic majority' doesn't have the votes to get them to shut the fuck up. Nice strawman. Try again.
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Well, they might actually try working with them instead of trying to get them to "shut the fuck up".
Democrats seem to be all about compromise as long as it's the Republicans doing the compromising.
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The republicans will not be "worked with" while there is a black man in the white house. They made this abundantly clear in 2009 and have been towing the party line.
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Tthe Race Card...now why didn't I see that coming?
Re:Romney too. (Score:5, Insightful)
So...Republicans did NOT work with the Democrat Bill Clinton to pass the (now gutted by Executive Order) Welfare Reform which helped launch several years of balanced budgets (at least as balanced as they get in D.C.)
No, you are playing the race card, plain and simple. Congratulations, you won the race to the bottom.
Re:Romney too. (Score:5, Insightful)
So...Republicans did NOT work with the Democrat Bill Clinton to pass the (now gutted by Executive Order) Welfare Reform
To be quite fair, the Republicans forced Clinton into a balanced budget by shutting down the government and threatening to shut it down again. The Democrats have been saying that Clinton was responsible for the balanced budget for so long now, that even people such as yourself that contradict that belief still give him some credit.
It all started with a document called Contract With America, and while we may no longer like Newt because of his womanizing and corruption, he still got real beneficial stuff done while Speaker of the House. Very smart man, with certainly questionable ethics. Nobody is perfect, but we benefited.
All-in-all tho, the most credit for the balanced budget should go to the tech bubble, not to Newt, the Republicans, and certainly not to Clinton.
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I agree. But you have to feed these people the truth slooowly or they on it
Re:Romney too. (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, they might actually try working with them instead of trying to get them to "shut the fuck up".
Democrats seem to be all about compromise as long as it's the Republicans doing the compromising.
Your statement is so completely opposed to reality that I have to wonder what color the sky is on your planet.
The simple fact is that the Republicans in Congress have voted as a unified bloc, over and over, ever since Obama took office, while the Democrats have not. That's about as objective a measure of (un)willingness to compromise as you can find. The Democrats have compromised over and over again in a futile attempt to get the Republicans to agree to something--anything!--to help fix the mess the Republicans created, and which the Republicans are clearly determined to maintain. The Republican definition of compromise is "do everything I tell you, and I might hold off on calling you an America-hating socialist terrorist-lover for a day or so."
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One might say they same thing of the Senate. So I expect you would hold the exact same opinion of them? Didn't think so.
Or, another way to look at t is that the Republican legislation actually makes enough sense that some Democrats feel they can tell Nancy to shove it and vote for it.
The bottom line is that the House is actually doing their job and legislation is being voted on. The Senate may as well just leave and be done with it.
Re:Romney too. (Score:5, Informative)
The simple fact is that the Republicans in Congress have voted as a unified bloc, over and over, ever since Obama took office, while the Democrats have not.
The actual voting record says that BOTH parties have behaved as a unified block on the exact same issues.
These are the very last 10 House votes, no cherry picking of any kind.. I just picked the last 10.
Roll Call 603 [house.gov] Republicans 214-13, Democrats 19-162
Roll Call 602 [house.gov] Republicans 0-227, Democrats 173-6
Roll Call 601 [house.gov] Republicans 215-10, Democrats 11-171
Roll Call 600 [house.gov] Republicans 218-11, Democrats 10-172
Roll Call 599 [house.gov] Republicans 7-222, Democrats 161-21
Roll Call 598 [house.gov] Republicans 3-225, Democrats 157-25
Roll Call 597 [house.gov] Republicans 224-4, Democrats 23-159
Roll Call 596 [house.gov] Republicans 2-227, Democrats 162-20
Roll Call 595 [house.gov] Republicans 0-228, Democrats 164-18
Roll Call 594 [house.gov] Republicans 222-6, Democrats 20-162
These are the actual numbers, not just some pundit bullshit. Notice that the largest deviation from "uniform block" on the Democrat side was only 1 out of 7.28. Sure, the Republicans are a bit more partisan, but the Democrat voting record hardly paints the picture that you are trying to paint.
It almost seems like you just believe whatever Democrat pundits will tell you. I check up on claims like these because I know for a fact that the media will not, while you just repeat whatever bullshit your party tells you to repeat. What does that tell you about the difference between people like me and people like you, and will this demonstration that should be wholly embarrassing for you effect your future critical thinking when listening to Democrat pundits? Will you just repeat a lie next time when you arent sure what the facts actually are? I wonder.
Re:Romney too. (Score:5, Informative)
Aaaand now you've demonstrated the complete Republican departure from reality. Did you actually look at the numbers you posted? It is absolutely clear from that list that far more Democrats are willing to vote against the majority of their fellow party members than Republicans are. Let's look at the numbers in terms of percentage of members breaking from the party line:
603: Republicans 6% / Democrats 10%
602: Republicans 0% / Democrats 3%
601: Republicans 4% / Democrats 6%
600: Republicans 5% / Democrats 5%
599: Republicans 3% / Democrats 12%
598: Republicans 1% / Democrats 14%
597: Republicans 2% / Democrats 13%
596: Republicans 1% / Democrats 11%
595: Republicans 0% / Democrats 10%
594: Republicans 3% / Democrats 11%
On average, again just going from your own numbers, Democrats are willing to vote against their party line 10% of the time, Republicans 2%, a fivefold difference, and more than enough to make the difference in a close vote. If even 8% of Republicans were as willing to compromise as their Democratic colleagues are, the country wouldn't be in the mess it's in right now.
Oh yeah, here's the R code in case you want to accuse me of playing games:
# index
rollcall = 603:594
# 1 indicates members voting with party majority, 2 indicates members voting against
r1 = c(215, 227, 215, 218, 222, 225, 224, 227, 228, 222)
r2 = c(13, 0, 10, 11, 7, 3, 4, 2, 0, 6)
d1 = c(162, 173, 171, 172, 161, 157, 159, 162, 164, 162)
d2 = c(19, 6, 11, 10, 21, 25, 23, 20, 18, 20)
# capital letters indicate ratios of members voting against party majority to total part members voting, expressed as percentages
R = 100 * r2 / (r1 + r2)
D = 100 * d2 / (d1 + d2)
# package it up
report = data.frame(rollcall, R, D)
print(round(report))
# mean percentages
print(round(colMeans(report[c("R", "D")])))
That should be enough to get you started for running some significance tests if you like.
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Every time the Democrats even try to work with the Republicans, it either ends in a stalemate or the Republican plan gets passed in barely altered form. You can't compromise with someone who would rather sink the ship than compromise.
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At least the House is functioning and legislation is getting passed. The Dems don't get much say now because they are in the MINORITY. Just like when the Dems were running the show and the Republicans were shut out.
The Senate is a failed institution. Harry won't even release bills to committees.
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Sadly, even when in the majority, the Dems didn't properly understand that the Republicans would never compromise. They tried anyway for some reason and their failure is why they got voted out.
Re:Romney too. (Score:5, Interesting)
More accurately, the American governmental structure has failed in this age of computer generated gerrymandering and microtargeted "news" networks and sites. The voters hear only what reinforces their exiting biases and elect representatives to resist the "evil" of the other side, not compromise. The House can pass fully partisan bills with no cooperation from the minority party so it appears to function, but since the legislation passed in the House can't be passed in the Senate then the House's efforts are only for show. If the House passed more bi-partisan bills, then they may have a chance in the Senate. The Senate has its problems from arcane rules, most glaringly that a minority (and sometimes a single Senator) can block any progress at all. This is all exacerbated by the "winner take all" type of elections the US has where a winner of an election by 50.1% can govern like he got a mandate -- the poster child for this was the first term of GW Bush, who won election with fewer total votes than the loser but governed like he had got 80% of the vote -- his VP famously said, "Elections have consequences". There is no incentive for any lawmaker to compromise any more. The federal system is totally broken. Interestingly, California may have found a way out of this disaster with their new primary system which rewards centrists, we'll see...
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They tried that with Regan. We all know what happened then.
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Yep, and since 2010 the Republicans have been passing budgets in the house. The Democrat controlled house never passed a budget for the Democrat controlled house to pass. The Democrats just keep spending money without bothering to pass a budget first and refuse to vote on the house passed budgets. It's easier for them to spend when they don't have any guidelines for it.
If the Democrats can overspend by a trillion dollars every year, then they could include NASA in that budgetless spending if they wanted
Re:Romney too. (Score:5, Insightful)
You know, I'll harken you back to your own side's statement at the recent VP debate. Ryan waxed eloquently on how there was a difference between a person who only had criticism and somebody who had a solution, presenting himself as a solution provider.
Yet like him, you have only offered criticism and attacks, empty ones that you probably don't even support. Seriously, Obama compromised with Republicans on the prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, and you still attack him on it?
Show some integrity.
Not that any of your other attacks are necessarily valid, but that one is especially void.
BTW, I prefer not letting a religion dictate to me what the laws are going to be. If you want to call making a decision on the laws based on objective principles and not the whims of a cranky old man in Rome to be a war on religion, that's on you.
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Seriously, Obama compromised with Republicans on the prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, and you still attack him on it?
I guess that depends on whether you think compromise is better than honoring your word. Politicians compromise all the time by taking money for votes and other bits of corruption. Don't you respect them more for that?
Further, the world doesn't exist merely to give me what I want. So I expect that I'll be able to get some things and not others. I don't let other people decide what things I should get and not get. So how does keeping the Guantanamo Bay prison open, even if that is something I'd want, compe
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destruction of freedom via Obamacare?
Personally I don't think the Federal Government should have the authority to mandate health insurance. In fact, they arguably have more authority to raise a tax and provide it. Not that I'm for that either. But destroying our freedom? It doesn't destroy freedom anymore than taxing and creating an interstate system destroys freedom.
Now, both parties are systematically taking our freedoms away. You can almost always tell because the bills are largely bi-partisan. Things like the NDAA or the Patriot Ac
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But destroying our freedom? It doesn't destroy freedom anymore than taxing and creating an interstate system destroys freedom.
Obamacare created a new means of control and did so in a way that violated the Constitution. For government power, the slippery slope is a real concern. What other things will they try now that they have the precedent of the individual mandate? My take is that they could have rewritten that aspect of Obamacare in a way that didn't violate the Constitution, by making a tax write off for having health care (beyond the already existing write offs on the business side). But that would have cost the government m
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In any case, if I want something, and somebody agrees to let me have it, I will consider it dishonest to criticize them for that compromise.
I don't have that issue. I see the Guantanamo Bay thing as something Obama had to do which gets dressed up as a compromise.
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Obama pulled the country out of a death spiral set in motion by 8 years of the exact same policy standards that Romney supports. If Romney managed to win and restored the failed Bush policies based in trickle down economics, the economy will crash again sometime around 2014, significantly worse than it did in 2008, and the Republicans can tell the masses it was Obama's fault to rally support for a full sweep of the house and senate.
Luckily Romney has no chance to win thanks to his countless lies, willingnes
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Obama pulled the country out of a death spiral set in motion by 8 years of the exact same policy standards that Romney supports.
Then why is the country still death spiraling?
If Romney managed to win and restored the failed Bush policies based in trickle down economics, the economy will crash again sometime around 2014, significantly worse than it did in 2008, and the Republicans can tell the masses it was Obama's fault to rally support for a full sweep of the house and senate.
Oh, how the projection shines forth! We even have Obamacare to make that happen.
Luckily Romney has no chance to win thanks to his countless lies, willingness to say anything, and complete lack of conviction.
How glibly you speak when the other guy is Obama who has those problems in spades.
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> Obama pulled the country out of a death spiral
This must be some definition of "pulled the country out of a death spiral" with which I am not familiar.
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No doubt. It's the one where Bush had us losing jobs, and Obama turned it around and has us gaining jobs.
You know. This one. [fyngyrz.com]
It's the one where Romney would have let GM die; and Obama saved it, along with a huge number of jobs.
It's the one where the (rich) credit card companies were taking advantage of credit card users right and left, particularly lower and middle class, screwing them on interest rates in specific, and the Obama admin saw to it that the means they used to do that were taken from them.
That d
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That graph shows new job creation. When above the 0 line, that's a job gain. It's consistently been holding there all through Obama's term, once it was dug out of the republican mess it was in.
Yes, we'd like it to be higher -- a truly healthy economy would have it at a gain of 400k/month or better, because there's a normal rate of loss that it needs to serve as a counterforce for. We sure as heck don't want it looking like it did under republican policies, though. We *surely* don't want the catastrophe the
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Right right right... I've heard Mitt is going to outlaw Tampons also. It'll be just horrible.
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Delusion, my friend. "This mess", was created by Repubmocrats over the last century. Continuing to vote for Repubmocrats like Obama or Romney and expecting different results is sheer stupid madness. Vote for someone outside the "one party system" if you ever want science funding again.
I swear election time just MAKES The Whos " Won't Get Fooled Again" stand out as prophesy. "Meet the new boss, the same as the old boss" with the exception that "a parting on the left is now a parting on the right" and the DEB
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lol.. and the alternative is to tax the people who can invest in jobs. Your right, the middle class is getting fucked, but they seem to have largely consented to it with promises
Re:Romney too. (Score:4, Insightful)
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Ah yes, the mysterious job givers again. Where are they by the way? Could someone find them and wake them up?
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Meanwhile, Ryan's tax plan isn't fit to wipe my ass with. The "6 studies"
The saying is that 10 economists will give you 11 firm opinions regarding any given economic analysis or plan. So putting quotes around studies and declaring it wrong might make you feel smug but it's far from a definitive response.
or... (Score:2)
You could wait until January.
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There is no budget...give me a break.
Whatever passes in the house will be round filed by Harry and he'll just write a continuing resolution.
The Senate has ceased to act as a deliberative legislative body and is just a place for rich Senators to hang out.
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There is no budget...give me a break.
Whatever passes in the house will be round filed by Harry and he'll just write a continuing resolution.
The Senate has ceased to act as a deliberative legislative body and is just a place for rich Senators to hang out.
Agreed. Except I'd say "old rich senators". And it'll remain that way until we get sufficient new blood in there.
Read the Constitution... (Score:5, Insightful)
The House is the body responsible for spending authorizations. If you want an increase in NASA's budget, write to your local congressman/woman first. The nice thing about the House is that with 435 members, it's theoretically possible that you might get some sort of response if there is enough constituent interest on the issue.
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You should check out the FAQ about this: http://www.planetary.org/blogs/casey-dreier/20121011-write-the-president-for-planetary-exploration.html#faq
The point is that Congress is not working on a budget right now, and won't be until 2013. They put some money back into this area within NASA, but since they never passed the budget, NASA has to assume that the President's proposed budget is all they have to work with.
The Office of Management and Budget is the agency that allocates money and long-term spending w
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No they aren't. OMB is part of the executive branch. The executive branch is constrained by Congress, they cannot spend money on anything they want nor can they shuffle money around willy-nilly. Yes, the President submits a proposal to Congress and that proposal is developed at the OMB. But if Congress doesn't adopt that proposal then the President's budget is meaningless.
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Mod this man (or woman) up.
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We're spending trillions on legally mandatory spending (aka "entitlement" programs), Defense and bailouts, all the while borrowing many hundreds of billions from China/Japan/etc.
Eliminate some (or a lot) of that mandatory spending, and *then* increase NASA spending.
Why not raise taxes? "Eventually you run out of other people's money."
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How much do all those Obama Phones cost?
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Simple. Because unless you include a check, they won't read your letter.
Didn't you guys get the memo? (Score:2)
It has been decided that we will be staying here. We will pray to our Gods for nice weather and the forbearance of asteroids.
Nickname predates PBS (Score:4, Interesting)
He was "Bill Nye the Science Guy" back when he was a role player on "Almost Live!", which was a Seattle-area comic sketch show in the 80s and 90s.
Most of the time he was just a stock player, but occasionally he'd do a science-comedy mashup [youtube.com]; and for each year's New Year's special episode he'd rig up some Rube Goldberg sciency contraption that'd be used to count down to the new year.
Although I think I liked him best as Speed Walker [youtube.com], who fought crime while adhering to the conventions of the International Speed Walking Association.
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Correct - he's not a scientist, he has played one on TV.
(And I miss "Almost Live!'.)
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While, true, he is best known as an entertainer of sorts, he's an engineer that's worked in a number of fields (I won't bother posting links to various bios; you can google for those.)
I grew up watching Almost Live! Loved that show. I loved the Billy Quan segments... "Be Like Billy!" It was a sort of extreme spoof of fake looking staged martial arts fighting movies taken to the extreme.
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"Remember, kids - be like Billy! Behave yourself!"
Today's Air force is yeterday's NASA (Score:2)
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Wait, what? (Score:5, Informative)
Bill Nye 'the Science Guy' Urges Letters To Obama To Restore NASA Budget Cuts
"Restoring cuts" sounds like NASA getting less money.
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NASA broke even and even made money (Score:5, Insightful)
Ultimatley this shouldn't be Obama's choice (Score:2)
Which departments are funded and how much funding they get is up to congress and not the president.
The president is not king or emperor and people need to stop treating the position this way. It is very dangerous because if we do this for too long the president will become emperor.
The majority of power must always reside in the legislature. They make the laws, they set policy, they debate the issues, they cut the deals. The president just runs the show after he's been given the rules.
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You might read the US Constitution, and read up on the principle of separation of powers. Not only do you not understand how the current system works, you don't seem to understand that what you propose requires significant amendments to the Constitution.
Why not wait? (Score:3)
Wait until you see who wins the election. Then write that person. No need to write the loser as he is packing his bags.
NASA has almost never been funded very much. (Score:5, Insightful)
Except for the couple of years immediately after the president insisted we needed to go to the moon, where NASA consumed more than 4% of the national budget (but still wasn't very much), it has almost never accounted for a significant part of the budget in any way. For the entire life of the agency, the average budget (in 2007's dollars) has been something like $17,000,000,000/yr.
Hell, since 9/11, we have spent TWICE as much conducting war in the middle east as NASA has spent in its entire fifty-five year live time, in which it developed rocket technology. Developed shuttle technology. Helped improve countless other technologies (including those for the military). Helped generate entire new private industries. Shot a man into space. Shot around the moon. Landed men on the moon several times. Built space-suit-jets for men in space. Conducted space walks. Built a space car. Built and deployed a telescope to see to the beginning of time. Built and manned a space station. Built one (wait, two?) little RC cars that we landed on the surface of Mars. Then built an SUV that we landed on Mars. Not to mention the satellites above our heads. The satellites far out in space, exploring the universe for decades, now. . .
All of that is in *today's* dollars.
So, let's not fool ourselves into believing NASA has ever had a "ton of funding". But, just think what we could accomplish if we blew up a few less brown people or facilitated a few fewer corporate (Haliburtin, KDR, etc) contracts in Afghanistan or Iraq with government resources and just funneled that little bit of money to NASA. Maybe push 5% of that "searchin' for WMDs" money over to NASA. Who knows what fucking amazing shit we could do?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Private industry yadda yadda. That'd be fine, if we apply that consistently. But if we're going to be debating what's worth funding, how the fuck is pursuing one of the most primitive needs of mankind not near the top of the list?
Instead, we have to bank the whole of our space exploration on the guy who ships books and kindles to your doorstep, the guy behind Doom and Rage, and the guy behind PayPal. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but . . .
More shakeycam! (Score:2)
Preach it! (Score:2)
restore cuts? ... or restore funding? (Score:3)
I'm very confused as to why it is desirable to restore cuts.
Or even possible.
If cuts exist, how can they be restored?
Perhaps he wants to increase cuts?
Or perhaps everyone at /. failed English as well as Logic.
I'm pretty sure that most of you want FUNDING restored, not CUTS.
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Dude, I think you forgot your tinfoil hat this morning.
Re:Mr. Obama prefers Big Bird (Score:4, Insightful)
Because Big Bird only needs Millions in support.... NASA's projects require BILLIONS over multiple years.
Big Bird helps little kids... NASA helps rich defense contractors.... They usually vote Republican.
Re:Mr. Obama prefers Big Bird (Score:4, Informative)
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Name a single thing that have in your home, in your pocket, on your desk, or in your car that came directly from whatever the fuck the MIC has been spending $4 Trilion on over the last few years. You can't. Precisely because none of us are getting anything useful out of it. Period.
Funny thing with the logic... if you don't see something happening, it simply does not mean it can not happen!
(a subtle way of Godwining the thread) my car brand started because of a group of people with megalomaniac aggressive mindset wanted it... No, it's not a Humvee... it goes 74.8 MPG [wikipedia.org] and you wouldn't like the people [wikipedia.org] that pushed it into existence.
My point: yes, funding NASA have better chances of progress than waging wars... however, the results of belligerency may not be all bad (e.g. why larger hu
Re:Bill Nye (Score:5, Informative)
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Prove your Deity exists and end all argument.
Do it now. The burden of proof is on those who contend that a thing is fact.
Religion is not based on evidence, therefore it's nonsense and its proponents delusional or liars. Prove your Sky Fairie is real and I'll recant then kiss his/her/its Noodly Appendage. Otherwise, fuck off.
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That's not how burden of proof works. You are suggesting that the older idea is presumptively correct in the absence of proof. In reality, religion has had thousands of years to prove anything at all, and failed utterly to do so, whereas science has routinely either proven its claims, discarded them, or built more capable equipment for gathering evidence.
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Anyone who truly understands science is inherently anti-religion. Sciences looks for answers for things that religion would rather you just shut-up and believe (and give money and power).
Re:Not sure I care what Bill Nye thinks (Score:5, Insightful)
You obviously do not know what science is. Science is not religion and does not say anything to religion because religion is full of supernatural claims that Science cannot prove or disprove.
Anyone who truly knows what science is would be indifferent about religion. They simply wouldn't care about it as it does not effect science at all.
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It's not a matter of what science has taught us. It's a matter of methodology. Science is about modeling the observed, proving the model, and proving a better model. Religion boils down to trusting an unobservable and unprovable model to be fact. Attempting to apply scientific rigor to a religion inevitably leads to an outright dismissal. To suggest the concepts are indifferent or not at odds seems only plausible through some sort of cognitive disso
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Actually, they are closer then you think. Religion is about a set of people saying a God told them something and passing it down the ages to others. You cannot do half the science out there, so you are trusting and believing what someone else is telling you.
But you are also wrong. This is because science and religion are separate things. You do not need to apply the scientific method to it or any other thing and religion doesn't require you to ignore the scientific method to anything. So saying someone who
Re:Not sure I care what Bill Nye thinks (Score:4, Insightful)
And of course the absurdity of it all is this fallacious argument you seem to hold that is saying because a group of people organized into a religion believes the teachings and eye witness stories from 2000 to 6000 or more years ago to be fundamentally true that they have to ignore science, math, or anything else in their present day tasks.
No one, let me repeat this, No one, thinks that because of their beliefs that something will automagically happen. Even the people who think God will provide what they need, do not sit around waiting or wishing, they actually attempt to accomplish something using the best tools available to them at the time and pray that it was enough. You bring up NASA and yes, there are people working for NASA, even on the mars rover and the Cassini project that are religious.
You and everyone else who thinks so is living in a delusional world that has no connection to reality. The people who achieve things with science do so because they do not confuse science and religion. If you can look at science and claim it mandates a rejection of religion, you have no clue about science or religion at all and are more likely using science as your religion.
Re:Not sure I care what Bill Nye thinks (Score:5, Insightful)
Examples of "supernatural" (a.k.a. bullshit) claims that science can help answer:
* Does prayer work to cure the sick? Sciences indicates no.
* Was the world formed in six days? Science indicates no.
* Did Noah get every species onto a boat? Science indicates no.
* Are we reincarnated? Sciences indicates no.
These can all be proved negative to my satisfaction.
I didn't say science has anything to say about religion. Science is merely the act of trying to find answers with reason, and proving it with evidence. It's not a religion - it doesn't say a thing.
I said "Anyone who truly understands science is..." not "Science is...".
People who understand science see people being swindled by religion all the time - people are hurt by religion. Think about the babies raped in Africa to "cure HIV" - this is an extreme example of a false belief that is widely shared - basically a disorganised religion. If these people thought scientifically, they wouldn't do that. Same with faith healers, fortune telling, cold reading, greedy evangelists, stoned women etc.
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Your things that science can answer is not very strong. First, does prayer work, yes it does, about as well as a placebo. But that doesn't mean it hasn't worked either. Second, created in 6 days, well, despite the word used to day is also used to era or time span, the fact that it was created means it can appear to be anything the creator wanted. So if science indicates no, that could be specifically a result of the creation. That is why science and religion are separate things. I think you get the drift,
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To stop belief in the irrational, you can teach people new ways of thinking about things. And what is religion but a shared set of irrational beliefs (with some rational ones thrown in to entice people)?
There are "recognised" religions (Islam, Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism etc) and then there are de facto religions such as the cargo cults, hippie communes, and vague spiritualism. You're right, I am applying the same broad brush to all of these - they're all the same phenomenon: faith without questioning.
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Principle of Explosion (Score:3)
Do tell me the difference between considering the unprovable to be false and considering it to be null.
You might call that the difference between skepticism [wikipedia.org] and empiricism. [wikipedia.org] Religion violates the principle of parsimony, is untestable, and provides nothing in the way of explanatory power. You're arguing about whether or not science should treat religion as being wrong, or not even wrong. [wikipedia.org]
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Yep, but that's not science.
A theory becoming a religion isn't science becoming a religion. Science is a process, not a belief.
Ideological belief in a doctrine while ignoring evidence to the contrary is religion, not science.
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Agreed. And what separates the intellectually honest from the converts is the ability to look at evidence that disputes their theories.
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Anyone who truly understands science is inherently anti-religion.
Absolutely false, and incredibly naive. I fully understand science and I am not the slightest bit "anti-religion". I don't believe that a God exist but that does not make me anti-religion. Your mistake is to think of beliefs as being about the truth, rather than about what works. The fact that every single society in the history of human race was based on religion should make a science guy like you at least consider a possibility that
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I guess my choice of language was ambiguous at the best. (I was using "anti-religion" because that's what the parent said.)
By anti-religion I don't mean church-burning, Mormon-punching, Nativity-banning psychopathy. I meant "anti-" in the same way as used in "antifreeze" or "anticlockwise".
I meant that when approached by someone who tells you that "God will heal that sunburn, and if you believe in Him you'll live forever in eternity. Join now for an obligation free meeting." that you'd have the sense to eva
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Anyone who REALLY understands science inherently believes it has nothing to say on the topic of religion and vice versa.
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There are likely many things within the bounds of reality that we simply do not know about yet. If we know nothing of it, we cannot theorize about it and so cannot test our theories. Until that changes, it is real but not in the realm of science.
Quantum physics has always existed, for example, but the ancient Greeks had no way of knowing about it. Had they by some coincidence come up with a quantum theory then, it would have been in the realm of religion.
If we ever learn to detect God and gain the ability t
Re:Not sure I care what Bill Nye thinks (Score:4, Insightful)
Believing that writing to Obama to change things will do any good requires a higher level of ignoring all available evidence than does belief in any given diety.
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I guess the differences are:
1. That there is some sort of plausible process that makes this belief conceivable. (Mail gets read by secretary, passed to the big man himself, he thinks great idea, proposes it to congress, and change happens.)
2. It is testable. If we got a rational person to test it (perhaps getting them to write 1000 unique letters to the President and observing change in laws), they'd probably change their mind.
But you're correct in many cases. I think many people had irrational and poorly c
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NASA was impressive, when it was committed to human exploration. They already lost that legacy. They replaced it with the shuttle, and then started doing an endless stream of space research.
Sometimes you have to shoot the scientists and turn it over to the engineers.
You sure wasn't exactly the engineers that cut the manned human space exploration? After all, it's a sensible idea when it comes to pragmatic solutions.
Besides, the "Lose exactly what?" is a good question. Except that the alternatives are not "manned/unmanned space exploration" but the choices are: the "leadership in space" or the "capability"?
Because... you know?... other solutions may exists for maintaining the capability (e.g. collaboration./contracts with other space agencies, be them national or priva
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There is a need (Score:2)
Thanks to asteroid impacts, comet impacts, super volcanos, solar outbursts, major biological insults, ice ages and other rare, but dependable catastrophic events, there is every need to find other planets to colonize.
Thanks to huge resources that become almost freely available to us once we definitively get out of the earth's gravity well, the financial case is, if long term, still quite clear.
Thanks to the lack of atmosphere and the availability of incomprehensibly long baselines, astronomy alone will bene