[TranceMan]

>Besides space exploration being fucking awesome

I don't see how space exploration is feeding the starving. It would be fucking awesome if we solved that. It maybe a strawman - couldn't these millions be spent on Earth? Instead we have commercial TV asking us to donate to solve problems on Earth.

[the8472]

1. diminishing returns. you don't allocate all your resources to fixing the most pressing problem right now. doubling the budget would only yield some fractional improvements. That doesn't mean that today's allocations are optimal (by which measure?), but neither would be scuttling various research programs to shift the money to humanitarian aid and agriculture. If you want to divert budget from somewhere you probably need to find the most bloated allocation that already is far into diminishing returns territory

2. long-term vs. short-term planning. we do basic research to improve something in the long term. you don't want all your resources allocated to fixing short-term problems because then you'll have a problem in the future since nobody laid the groundwork to solve the future's problems. space exploration is basic research that pays off in moderate ways today (new materials science, satellites) and hopefully in larger ways in the future, e.g. asteroid mining, planetary defense against asteroids or establishing permanent self-sufficient settlements somewhere else in the solar system.

3. you can't just blame the government for allocating resources in a way that does not seem "moral", you also have to look at the people who prefer to allocate money to such things like commercial TV as you mention yourself instead of solving more basic problems. People's utility functions and their optimization choices are complicated. There's a locality bias (self > monkeysphere > in-group > out-group) and the question how they weight and aggregate over multiple variables (geometric or arithmetic mean, medians, minimum, weights...) so as cynical as it may sound, a new smartphone or a flag on the moon is more important by some factor than feeding a million africans. People may say otherwise when asked directly, but their actual decisions when not having to make that tradeoff directly means they'll choose to use their money that way.

[TeMPOraL]

Yes, it would be. Being awesome for some (like myself) is obviously not an argument in itself; I added it as a bit of humour :).

Regarding your very good question - it has been asked before. I'll direct you to the classic:

In 1970, a Zambia-based nun named Sister Mary Jucunda wrote to Dr. Ernst Stuhlinger, then-associate director of science at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, in response to his ongoing research into a piloted mission to Mars. Specifically, she asked how he could suggest spending billions of dollars on such a project at a time when so many children were starving on Earth.

Stuhlinger soon sent the following letter of explanation to Sister Jucunda, along with a copy of "Earthrise," the iconic photograph of Earth taken in 1968 by astronaut William Anders, from the Moon (also embedded in the transcript). His thoughtful reply was later published by NASA, and titled, "Why Explore Space?"

The response is to be read here: http://www.lettersofnote.com/2012/08/why-explore-space.html.

[TranceMan]

Thanks, I have read that. It seems to have a premise that we can only feed all the people on Earth from space. Is farming really dead?

When will this promise be delivered? It's been 40 years and I can imagine Billions spent. Are people still starving?.

[the8472]

> Is farming really dead?

No, there's plenty of research to make agriculture (industrial and subsistence farming) more efficient. But it's not trivial getting it into the hands and heads of people since you can only do that locally.

> It seems to have a premise that we can only feed all the people on Earth from space.

No. Nasa and noaa are contributing some parts to a larger machinery. It is not the sole purpose of space missions, but it is a synergetic effect. You need weather forecasts to optimize farming, satellites help with that. GPS helps with international trade which in small part also covers shipping of fertilizer or pesticides to countries.

[LeifCarrotson]

More than billions, it's been approximately 1 trillion dollars in the past 50 years according to the table at [1]. Do note, however, that in a single year the US spends more than double that amount on keeping people fed, housed, and healthy through programs like Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, Unemployment, and Labor. Also remember that this is just American spending - other nations also have space programs and social programs.

But what can you possibly mean by "when will this promise be delivered?"

Yes, some humans are still starving, cold, thirsty, or hurt. Some are fighting - some for good reasons, like protecting/providing basic rights and needs for themselves and others, but many are fighting for stupid reasons. Humans still become sick and injured, and we still die.

We cannot "solve" these problems today by throwing money at them. We will probably never be able to completely solve them. By analogy, you cannot complete the task of having clean dishes and laundry by buying new place settings and clothes. But consider that these endless chores have become easier and less impactful with the advent of indoor plumbing, washing machines, cotton gins, sewing machines, and synthetic fabrics - not to mention advances in transportation, communication, and other seemingly unrelated fields.

In the same way, the work of keeping people healthy and fed has been improved by the development of agricultural, medical, and other technology. Certainly, feeding the hungry is important, and we should spend a great deal right now to help those in need. But there are other needs, and it would be foolish to not use some of our effort on making future needs less.

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budget_of_NASA

[Beltiras]

Some areas in the world are in a constant state of war and strife. It's not a matter of logistics or food production. The problem is getting warlords to stop their detrimental activities.

[HCIdivision17]

And it's a shame, because there really isn't a reason not to do both. After all, we are spending millions on both.

I really love the story about Norman Borlaug [0], because it shows how these great advances can be from enormous work from unexpected places. His research and testing - over decades - saved so many lives (he earned the title "The Man Who Saved a Billion Lives", and it may not be an exaggeration).

I vaguely recall the econ nobel a few years ago studied how people starved with food rotting in enormous piles just a few dozen miles away. It's utterly heartbreaking, and the worst is that it was largely bad policy that did it. We already overproduce food enough, but we can't get it where it needs to be.

Now, though, imagine that we find a way to mine asteroids for rare earth minerals. Imagine we can have clean power without the horrific pollution as industrial infrastructure ramps up. How could that change the world, leading to logistics networks that could fix distribution issues?

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Borlaug

EDIT: terminology, and I'd like to disclaim about the strife problem: space can't really fix. But food and money can't either.

[zimzam]

Data from satellites is used in a variety of ways to improve crop yields. (And like most infrastructure, improves people's lives in dozens of other unappreciated ways)

The reasons for people starving in 2017 aren't due to food production issues (we grow enough food) but rather distribution issues, which are much thornier to solve.

[TranceMan]

How is this mission trying to solve the distribution issues?

[GLenH]

In the US we spend about half of our national budget on social programs, including Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, grants to build affordable housing, public education grants, the Veterans Administration (which mostly covers health care for veterans), and so on. We also spend a significant amount of money on agricultural subsidies of many kinds.

In contrast, we spend approximately 1% of our budget on all of NASA - including NASA's deep space exploration programs, it's earth sensing programs, and its manned spaceflight programs, in addition to the unsung work it does in aeronautics, which includes helping develop more efficient passenger planes and safer, more efficient air traffic control. Which means that we spend considerably less than 1% of the federal budget on deep space mission technologies like this one.

So I have a question for you in response to your question: if we can't solve world hunger by spending 50% of our national budget, why should I believe that we can solve it by spending 51%?

Can't we take just a little bit of our budget and spend it on something where we can make real technological progress, right now, and see where that leads us?

These kind of arguments have always struck me as similar to thinking that you can pay off your mortgage by cancelling your newspaper subscription. The math just doesn't work, and in the meantime you actively make yourself less educated.

[dvtv75]

NASA isn't tasked with food production or distribution, nor should they be. There are other departments for that.

You're shoving the responsibility for the starving masses on NASA and their relatively small budget - why not the military? How is their mission trying to solve the distribution issues? (It's not.) The Gerald R. Ford class aircraft carrier program cost $36 billion (cf. wikipedia), that's more than NASA's budget. Why spend that money there? There are more than enough ships right now.

If you cut their budget entirely, you would have hundreds of billions to spend. Or education, a group who are also not tasked with food distribution. Or Homeland Security, again not tasked with food distribution.

Why is NASA alone the target of your scorn?

What makes you think that, if NASA were folded right up, all the money would be transferred and the starving masses would be fed? They weren't being fed before NASA was created.

A good portion of the US don't feel that it's their problem to feed the masses, something that could be readily achieved if there was sufficient political will.

[Razengan]

> couldn't these millions be spent on Earth?

Couldn't these millions be taken from military expenditures instead of scientific progress?