[saganus]

This might sound stupid (and it might be), but wouldn't space exploration go a long way in helping advanced economies having something to do and growth to?

If advanced economies were to increase science and space tech research, they would practically have a limitless "market" from where to obtain wealth and productivity, no?

It's a serious question. Wouldn't this help stagnated economies start the engines again? I mean, if nowadays a lot of people are trying to catch the next startup lottery, betting on things that would seem a bit superficial compared to, say, building a moon base or even a mars one, why wouldn't these same people that control vast amounts of wealth, put it to work on something that will most likely return something of value, and probably something more than just a startup lottery winner would (in the long term)?.

What am I not seeing/considering here? is human greed that badly focused/directed that they won't see this opportunity? I know rocket science is literally... rocket science, so very very hard. But it seems like companies in this area are moving forward by leaps and bounds with comparatively little money (vs say the amount of money being traded in forex every day, or similar).

What is the nature of this blind spot?

[mike_hearn]

There is nothing to do in space. Mining asteroids is the only economically useful thing that might qualify, but that's still way not worth it compared to just digging things out of the ground here on earth. When people bet on startups, they're betting that the startup will create enormous value by doing something very useful. Not just supporting a jobs program.