It’s the End of the Shuttle Program

And WE Are Responsible For Our Scientific Future

I’ve seen a lot of bemoaning the fate of NASA the past few days in various places online, now that the end of the Shuttle Program is nigh. It’s natural, I suppose, to be sentimental about the passing of a very visible part of NASA’s many projects. The shuttles are proud reminders of what CAN be done if we stick our minds to the idea and work of getting humans to space. But, as many of us who have grown up watching this program mature, the seeds of the end of the shuttle program were planted decades ago, with the idea that while that program grew and bore fruit, NASA would be funded enough to start working on replacement programs (like the space plane and others).We all knew that this was one step of many that it would take to explore space and the near-Earth environment — and to reap the scientific rewards that always benefit any such endeavor. And, many of us know today that the next steps are going to involve not just NASA, but the private sector working WITH the space agency, and even some overseas partners.  But, it still takes funding for each leg of the tripod that holds up space science and other science research.

Well, that funding hasn’t exactly materialized. NASA’s budget is under attack from the anti-science crowd in Congress (particularly among the extremists of the right).  In fact, much of the funding for science programs in our country (NOAA and others, as well as science education) is under attack from what I can only observe is an ignorant bunch intent on gutting science in favor of lower taxes for wealthy people and bailouts for Wall Street bankers who may or may not pay those back. Some of that attack is politically motivated, under the rubric of “We don’t like what the science data are telling us about global warming (or some other science), so we’re going to vote to defund weather satellites and NASA and all them other things that give us inconvenient truths.”

That’s really short-sighted and ignorant, but the folks who vote and think like this are proud of their ignorance. The rest of us are ashamed of it.  Those of us who know that investments in R&D and basic science research all know that these things pay the country back in increased employment and higher standards of  living for many citizens.

Voting down science research and choking the rest of its funding is a very risky strategy that will only serve to put the U.S. further back in some very important areas of science. And, it may serve to endanger U.S. citizens.  The vote to defund NOAA weather satellites came just as Joplin, MO was ravaged by tornadoes. Without the satellites we have, MORE people in Joplin and surrounding areas would have died or been injured due to lack of warnings provided by our aging fleet of weather satellites. It takes a spectacular kind of science-hater and cynic to vote against something that saves lives. I hope that the congressional Republicans who voted against the satellites are in Joplin to explain their vote to the folks who suffered so much. I’d just about pay cash money to be there and watch as they try to tell the people who lost their loved ones just why predicting bad weather is something they don’t think is important, but funding tax cuts is.  A tax cut benefits a few wealthy folks who probably just bank the money. A weather satellite benefits millions of people who depend on it for accurate forecasts so they can protect their lives and property. Sure seems sensible to me.

In the international arena, the votes to defund science research are hurting our standing in international-cooperation science projects. Already, some U.S. scientists have had to pull out of some vitally interesting and important projects due to lack of funding, after the U.S. promised to be a part of them. The defunding, again led by Congressional extremists, amounts to a sort of bait-and-switch action that will further erode our prestige in the world.  And, I suspect that when the hue and cry FINALLY raises in the U.S. over our scientists being shut out of discoveries they worked on in the early stages, only to be yanked out of them when the going got tough, the people who voted to rescind their funding will be nowhere to be found. Or, more likely will be sitting on their verandahs sipping gin and appreciating the good money they got from lobbying against science research.

That’s what I think on my cynical days. Other days, I sigh and think that we’ve got to find people to represent us who have an ounce of sense when it comes to science and reality.  I say this because, ultimately it comes down to who WE send to Washington, D.C. to represent us. And, if WE don’t care to find and send people with brains and an understanding of science and how it works, then WE are ultimately responsible for the cuts to NASA and other vitally important science and technical programs (and science education). It isn’t one president or another that has gutted our space program and funding for increased weather satellites and so forth. It’s the people WE elected to represent us, and by extension — US.  Therefore, in a very real sense, it’s WE the PEOPLE who have failed our science and technological dreams, hopes and aspirations. And our children.

And so, WE have brought ourselves to this point in history where one important and special part of our space program is ramping down.  We should be sentimental about it, and praise the people who built, flew, and maintained these shuttles for longer than the program was originally thought to last. But, we should also look to the future, to newer vehicles and better chances to explore our environment.  It’s OUR job as voters to bring that about. If we don’t, then we get the space program we deserve.

In the meantime, I want to thank the shuttle teams and astronauts. They represent the best and brightest among us, a shining example of what Americans CAN do when we want to do it.