Politics of space funding

ever hear of future shock? it was predicted and most are suffering
from this. yes most have their heads in the sand. after all most
are living hand to mouth. the middle class is no more for the most
part. people are living hand to mouth, frightend of this present
administration that uses this to it's advantage. the dollar worth 3
cents now what people with this economy would want to pay for
something they will never injoy the benifit of? our tax monies go to
pay the federal reserve only for printing monies they no longer print
as we are digitised. to print a bill of any denomination cost 3
cents. it is clear this pres. who is related to the royal family has
allowed the world bank who owns the federal reserve to depleat this
country of what little independance it had. the stock market though
it might look good represents other countries and a few here who
could afford to invest. get real! virgin airways will have to do
the investing as with La. desaster, we did not and wont pay for the
land to be recovered. we/the goernment will wait for others to
depleat their funds. the only technology the people commoners will
see is the chip inplants in our cloths products and bodies. to busy
trying to find food that is not processed clean air and water. this
space is for the elite to run to after many have died in the process
tweeking out the dangers for what Hitler would consider the supior
race. as in any new frontier. the ones left behind will serve the
8% of the elite who are the global hoppers. unless????????? but as
i read in this post and agree,,,polarized fearful and complacent.

- In spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com, "janet_baker76"
wrote:
>
> Hetrevillion wrote,
>
> "I don't think there is a way to conveniently have the average
U.S.A.
> citizen show any concern for the future of 'humanity'. As long as
> John Q. Public and wife Jane, with their 1.4 kids and 2.2 pets are
> satisfied with their life as is, they don't give a flip for the rest
> of the world or country or state or city or neighborhood."
>
> Yes, this is the problem almost as challenging as the technological
> problems. I mentioned before, Jared Diamond's book gives some
> details about similar economic/environmental situations on earth
> where tribes in identical environmental conditions and sometimes in
> the same geographical area made different decisions. Tribes started
> out as hunter-gatherers. In some areas, due to tweaks in the
> environment, the conditions existed that gave rise to a kind of
> collective decision to either move to or not move to food
production-
> -agriculture, animal domestication. But not everybody chose to make
> the change.
>
> One would think that the decision would be automatic, a no-brainer
> for whatever group of people, but Diamond says two things that give
> the discussion bearing on our times: an analysis of living sites
> seems to say that hunger-gathers consumed more calories than those
> peoples who moved to food production, and also enjoyed more leisure
> time. The other thing is some tribes outright rejected food
> production even when the local conditions supported it and their
own
> neighbors practiced it, making it easy to "import" food production,
> even entire packages as happened throughout the world. And some
> tribes resist it to this day.
>
> They choose their, well, has to be 2.0 children, and their cave.
> They evidently reject "working for the future" or working for the
> good of mankind. Other tribes chose to make the change, in the
> process enjoying less freedom than the hunter-gatherers, but having-
-
> enjoying--specialists who drove the society to further advances.
> These people followed a path of LESS for themselves in order that
> the whole society would have more--if there was a chance to reason
> it out. And if there wasn't a reasoning of it out, what was there?
> Surely they must have talked about things--they do to this day.
> There are Indian tribes in Mexico that to this day resist changing
> their ways of life. Of course, now the government supports them, I
> think. They beg a lot in the cities. (It is often the most
> vulnerable members of this population, by the way, that ends up in
> the states, in the fields, at age fourteen.)
>
> It's really a tempting subject of investigation, given that we seem
> to be at a similar juncture. We could stay static, or even contract
> ("Cutting off our desires" to survive) but enjoy what we enjoy-we
> think we can, anyway. And perhaps somehow we could, if we tweaked
> our power production somehow, cleaned up a little. I think it is
> worthy of discussion, anyway, at times, as a necessary adjunct to
> the tech discussion. (If we don't make it to space, can we survive,
> is the question being put forward.)
>
> What I keep thinking about is, what were the guys who
> moved "forward" thinking? What motivated them? (What did they
> understand and when did they understand it? And what do we
> understand, and when will we understand it?)
>
> By the way, I myself prefer the word "exploitation"
> over "exploration" because I think as humans we have to keep alive
> the very important and ancient idea, "I'm allowed to exploit"
> however one defines it, with its warts and its glories, because if
> that idea is allowed to disappear and human beings
> eschew "exploitation" in all of its many manifestations we will
HAVE
> to go back to being hunter-gathers. Not even hunters! Carrion-
> eaters! We exploit the universe. It's like that. We're allowed. God
> gave us dominion, as it says in Genesis. We better do it wisely. He
> says that, too--wise stewardship. (This idea, dominion, is under
> constant attack in the modern media.)
>
> But there are things that government CAN do, and capitalism better
> be prepared to purify itself, as well--and, if you will permit me
to
> say, the social encyclicals of the Church--just google social
> encyclicals-- are a very good antidote to the extremes of both
> imperialism and socialism, and could be studied with at least as
> much care as propulsion systems by those who really want to make
> that Trip.
>
> It's possible that the opportunities in space will work the same
way
> the old frontier did, and if so, that could help. I think it
cleaned
> it up, opened it up, reduced monopolization. (All we have to do is
> just not kill the natives in the process, and there the Church as
in
> Catholic worked better than the church as in protestant, if one
> compares Latin America to North America, just the native population
> at some chosen point after the colonialization, minus the deaths
due
> to infection, which were the same ratio in all areas. These are the
> figures we leftists found, in the civil rights movement in the
> sixties, comparing slavery among both African and native slaves, in
> North and Latin America, and we found that slavery was much more
> humane in Latin America, with the right to work for oneself outside
> of a defined number of hours for the owner, and the right to buy
> one's freedom, plus other rights, the right to marry, for example,
> all defined and defended by the Church, or rather by the saints in
> the Church.Plus the fact that it was much more sanctioned to kill a
> native in Latin America than in the great Indian Wars in the north.
> We studied these things as leftists, not as Catholics.)
>
> I could be wrong about the frontier, High or West either, cleaning
> things up, though. It's the Han Solo version of economics, I'm
> afraid.
>
> I'm thinking that, in our times, reducing people's anxieties about
> these fundamentals--by covering, debating, educating-- might reduce
> our present social lethargic approach to the future. Turn us on
> again, turn us out of our cosy nests. (Unfortunately the mention of
> Church makes some people nervous,like they might have to give up
> masturbating, again. Which they would, by the way.)
>
> Yours,
> Jan
>
> --- In spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com, "hetrevillion"
> wrote:
> >
> > --- In spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com, "janet_baker76"
> > wrote:
> >
> > > in this particular one, John says the
> > > politicians must see space exploitation [John,was that a slip?
> Or do
> > > you really mean 'exploitation' and not 'exploration'?] as
> something
> > > which helps them win their next election, and then things could
> go
> > > forward--I am guessing John means that last phrase, sorry, but
I
> > > mean.
> >
> > I agree with John, exploitation is the correct term to use.
> > Exploration is also important, but the profit potential (not only
> > money, but clean energy, resources and frontier escape release of
> > pressure on society will be immensely important in the future
> > elections---once politicians and 'citizens' recognize the reality
> of
> > the need to go 'Up and Out' or the species will go "DOWN AND OUT".
> >
> > As for the rest of Janet's post about convincing the electorate, I
> > don't think there is a way to conveniently have the average U.S.A.
> > citizen show any concern for the future of 'humanity'. As long as
> John
> > Q. Public and wife Jane, with their 1.4 kids and 2.2 pets are
> > satisfied with their life as is, they don't give a flip for the
> rest
> > of the world or country or state or city or neighborhood.
> >
> > I think a better viewpoint is to allow the pioneers to do their
> thing
> > and develop space without further government help. NASA has shown
> how
> > to go up and out. Now it is time for the commercial world to
> develop
> > the technology to allow US, the 'common' people, to get off this
> > dead-end rock and out into the solar system (and, eventually,
> beyond)
> > and live the life of our nomadic ancestors who were always
looking
> for
> > the 'greener grass' over the next hill. Sure, many will die due
to
> the
> > hazards of the environment. Many died on every expansion of the
> human
> > race from the cradle of our origin till the conquest of Earth.
> People
> > die. It's what we do. How we live our lives in-between cradle and
> > grave is what is important. I want to be a pioneer, although it
is
> too
> > late for me. Maybe some of the readers of this will be pioneers,
or