NASA budget

Yeah, I have a thought...well, a fact really.   We need more wars to increase bold space exploration incentives.  But we neednt worry, that will happen, we just need to be a little patient perhaps.  I cant believe the world is as peaceful as it is, right now...its like seeing surprising low sunspot activity during the 11 year activity cycle peak.  It is mankind's nature to fight for land, resources and beating their chest to demonstrate their power .  Mankind is selfish...as is the whole animal kingdom.  That's our nature, we neednt worry that eventually we will be exploring other worlds (should we survive our own stupidity of course) because it is almost guaranteed that we will have the incentive to do so.  Its just different times, call for different incentives.  NASA may have a low budget now...but one day it will have a massive budget again, different generation world leaders will think differently and allocate budgets differently according to the driving incentives of the time.  Its all about waiting.  I dont know why Tyson is so worried...perhaps he just wants to see something actioned during his own lifetime...fair enough, so do I...but then again, I'm not that particularly keen on wars...

But you know what, we have learnt so much about the cosmos from all the robotic space missions and telescopes built so far.  We have learnt far more than we could have ever possibly imagined just a couple of decades ago.  In truth, we are so damn greedy!  Gosh, the knowledge we have now, compared to just ten years ago, whoa.  But I do want us to learn more, fast, explore more worlds, fast..everything I want to happen, fast, in my lifetime...but I cant want all that and not put my hand up and admit that I am one greedy bugger 🙂

Tej

I totally disagree with you but this is not the place to debate the issue.  Will do next time I see you.

I might disagree with myself once I've heard your point of view! I often change my opinions when I am enlightened with different angles.  I still yet to attend a pub meetings after my summer job has finished 🙂

There is plenty of evidence to demonstrate that wars have a tendency to accelerate technological development... not just providing new and more horrific ways of killing people... but also in the advancement of medicine and other beneficial technologies.

Would we have landed on the Moon without the Cold War?

I'd like to think that, one day, humanity will have advanced to a point where wars no longer happen... but I suspect it will take some form of external threat to unite humanity.

Or a visionary like Elon Musk and SpaceX, working on cheap access to space and aiming for Mars! Can the private sector do it better than over-regulated  government agencies? We will have to wait and see.

Can the private sector do it better than over-regulated  government agencies

That may be the one possibility. Our attitude towards risk has got to the point where the cost of any major project like this becomes almost prohibitive, and it becomes very difficult to fund via governments as a result.