That's really not all that much considering the federal budget.
this post was submitted on 29 Sep 2023
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Military spending is over a trillion, right? They could fund this with a rounding error.
Of course it costs an astronomical amount of money! It's a space mission, what else would it cost?
How much do we spend killing innocent people abroad every year? We can bring back some fucking rocks thanks
I'm pretty sure that if we, as a specie, stopped wasting money to kill each other, we could give food, shelter, healthcare and education to each of us.
And there would still be enough money left to found this kind of scientific projetcs.
Absolutely. But there's always the risk that that one entity doesn't switch gears and then they have the strongest military and can fuck everybody up always.
Independent reviewers find NASA Mars Sample Return plans are seriously flawed
My abstract for the linked article
NASA's Perseverance rover has been collecting valuable rock samples from Mars' Jezero Crater to search for signs of ancient life. An independent report found that NASA's plan to return these samples to Earth by the late 2020s at a cost of $4 billion is unworkable, and will actually cost between $8-11 billion. While returning the first samples from Mars is scientifically important, the project's budget has increased as engineers have refined complex mission designs. There are also competing priorities for funding within NASA's $3.2 billion planetary science budget. The report recommends delaying launches originally planned for 2027-2028, and developing an alternative strategy. If launched by 2030, the revised mission could still cost $8-9.6 billion.
NASA will now reassess plans to determine how to accomplish the strategically and scientifically important goal of returning the first Martian rocks to Earth for detailed study.
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Put up a damn Aldrin Cycler already.
Have they considered USPS flat rate shipping?