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Value of the American Manned Space Program
Gary Brickhouse
Colorado State University Global
ENG101: Composition I
Anne O’Bryan
July 18, 2021
Value of the American Manned Space Program
In the world of today, information is valuable as physical assets/capital. For this reason, there is an increasing interest among business management researchers in the concept of know-based resources to gain a competitive edge. Case in point, nucleotide knowledge is pertinent in increasing food production through genetic engineering. Knowledge about weather and climate assists the government in preparing and reduce losses costs by various natural calamities such as hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, and droughts. Coherently, research is critical in the civilization and development of societies. The context brings forth the rationale for the American Manned Space Program. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) spearheads the program to discover new information concerning the earth and the environment surrounding the planet. The collected information is necessary for a wide range of applications in innovation and evasion of dangers posed to the masses. This paper argues that the United States should continue funding and supporting the American Manned Space program since it helps in decreasing the costs and injuries associated with possible collisions with meteorites and mass extinction, increasing the pace of innovations, and improving military technologies and capacity.
The bone of contention in determining funds reimbursed to the American Manned Space Program is whether the government should consider long-term benefits or urgent short-term endeavors in budgeting. In general, there is a substantial change in government spending behaviors. One cause of the changes is the emerging of additional national issues such as heightened immigration, epidemics, and terrorism. Therefore, programs prioritized in the past are highly likely to receive fewer funds than before. One of the programs which experienced decreased funding in NASA. For instance, NASA (n.d.) informs that Congress reduces the NASA budget in 2020 to the extent that the organization stopped some of its space exploration projects, such as the Apollo program. However, the reduction is not recent, considering that in the 1960s, the government appropriated more than five billion dollars to NASA but reduced the amount to less than 4 billion dollars in the 1970s (NASA, n.d.). The posed argument for those advocating for reducing space-related research is that there is no need to explore beyond earth when millions of people are suffering and dying of preventable causes. Nevertheless, the space exploration programs which NASA conducts are critical in protecting human beings against natural catastrophes, global warming effects, and other issues which require urgent responses.
Space exploration helps astronauts detect incoming meteorites, moving people from the region where they may land before such an accident. Asteroids are large extraterrestrial rocks that either move around or remain stagnant in outer space. The moving rocks, therefore, have the possibility of colliding with the earth. Asteroids and meteors are far smaller compared to the size of the planet. Nevertheless, they are destructive to the region of the earth’s surface that they hit. There are a few times that asteroids and meteorites have collided with planet earth in the past. Depending on the force of their movement and size, the asteroids and meteors may cause significant catastrophes. For instance, NASA detected that a 2,700 megaton asteroid might hit Earth in October (Kettley, 2019). Considering that the force of the Hiroshima bomb was between 13 and 18 kilotons, the asteroid would have caused massive destructions that none in the area would survive (Kettley, 2019). However, space exploration helps to detect such danger in time hence preparing the evacuation plan for the people from the region that it will hit. Thus, space exploration helps to save lives threatened by extraterrestrial substances.
Furthermore, space exploration is vital in determining a safe place for refuge in the event that the ongoing global warming causes the sixth mass extinction on planet earth. Undoubtedly, mother earth is becoming more and more unbearable for living organisms due to the general temperature increment. The reducing ice cover in the arctic and the rising sea level act as evidence of the high rate of warming of the atmosphere and oceans. Resultantly, some scientists and paleontologists foresee the occurrence of the sixth mass extinction. For example, Kolbert (2019) asserts that about 22-to-31 percent would become extinct by 2050 if the rate of global warming remains unchanged. However, with the continuation of fossil fuels and other hydrocarbons, the rate of global warming is subject to increment. Therefore, it is essential for space explorers either to find another planet that supports life or create an artificial ecosystem to salvage some people who would progress humanity on earth after the mass extinction. As such, space exploration is vital in preserving the human race.
The program was also necessary for increasing the pace of technological innovations besides winning the Cold War against the Soviet Union. On 4th October 1957, the space race between the Soviet Union and the United States, the two greatest military and economic powers of that time began. Tangential to the ongoing arms race between these two nations, the space race was known as the missile gap (Collins, 1999). The two countries attempted to advance missile and rocket technologies ahead of one another to impose a sense of technological superiority. The competition brought significant advances through American research in various fields besides astronomy. Across the globe, numerous established innovations resulting from the efforts of NASA scientists have direct application in various day-to-day uses of the post-modern and big-data eras. Some of the innovations include light-emitting diodes (LEDs), artificial limbs, and ventricular assist devices. SSERVI (2021) presents various sectors and industries that benefitted from the initiatives; transport, mass communication, computing and computer engineering, agriculture, industrial productive public safety, and climate change. Therefore, there is a sense in which the information gained from space exploration benefited those with extraterrestrial interests and innovators and researchers in numerous other fields such as healthcare and ICT, and food production.
Furthermore, the military force of the United States benefited from the technological studies which the American Manned Space Program conducted. Research in rocket technologies resulted in rapid advancement and growing interest in the field of nuclear technology and warfare. For example, the Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) is one of the first weapons designed to travel through space by applying nuclear concepts. It results from research at NASA’s nuclear plant such as Plum Brook, and considerably one of the most influential twentieth-century weapons. The Submarine Launched Ballistic Missile is another pivotal military technology of the time, which, together with ICMB, changed the approach of strategic warring (Shaw, 1999). It is for this reason that in discussing in the novel dubbed “Science in Flux,” Pomeroy (2007, p.53) informs that NASA had dedicated nuclear power plants such as Plum Brook “to military work: a long-range, nuclear-powered, manned, strategic bomber.” The dedication contributed to America’s military advancement in weaponry, with space exploration being the chief motivation to the course (53). The number of military benefits the American Manned Space Program has created for its citizen is extraordinary. Correspondingly, a lack of government funding for such an involved program in America’s progress should be reconsidered in the country’s best interest.
In conclusion, the government should consider additional funding for space exploration through the American Manned Spaced Program because it helps in the detection of asteroids and finding contingent plans for the human race in the event of mass extinction and improving military capacity. In essence, the program leads to innovations of technologies that qualify as life-saving inventions. Firstly, space explorations help astronauts detect incoming asteroids and meteors, paving the way for the evacuation of people from earth’s regions projected to collide with the heavenly bodies. Secondly, the military force of the United States benefited from the technological studies which the American Manned Space Program conducted. Research in rocket technologies resulted in rapid advancement and growing interest in the field of nuclear technology and warfare. Thirdly, the program was also necessary for increasing the pace of technological innovations besides winning the Cold War against the Soviet Union. As such, the knowledge gained through the American Manned Space Program is not solely for future purposes. The discoveries lead to current applications with the potential of saving vast pools of people. Space explorations cause scientists to invest in technologies that render the human race more aware of their surroundings to the extent of foreseeing and escaping detrimental natural occurrences. To sum up, the space exploration programs which NASA conducts are critical in protecting human beings against natural catastrophes, global warming effects, and other issues which require urgent responses.
References
Collins, M. J. (1999). Space Race: The US-USSR Competition to Reach the Moon. Pomegranate.
Kettley, S. (2019). NASA asteroid danger: A 2,700 Megaton asteroid might hit Earth this October. Express.co.uk. Retrieved 19th July 2021, from https://www.express.co.uk/news/science/1148808/NASA-asteroid-danger-Asteroid-FT3-hit-earth-October-NASA-news.
Kolbert, E. (2014). The sixth extinction: An unnatural history. A&C Black.
NASA. Pruning the Apollo Program. Hq.nasa.gov. Retrieved https://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/SP-4204/ch22-8.html.
Pomeroy, S. A. (2007). Science in Flux: NASA’s Nuclear Program at Plum Brook Station, 1955-2005. AirPower History, 54(4), 52-54.
Shaw, J. E. (1999). The influence of space power upon history 1944-1998. AirPower History, 46(4), 20.
SSERVI. (2021). NASA Tech Spinoffs Show How Much Space is in Our Lives. Solar System Exploration Research Virtual Institute. Retrieved https://sservi.nasa.gov/articles/nasa-tech-spinoffs-show-how-much-space-is-in-our-lives/.
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