Fresh from his brutal but well deserved fisking by Lileks, old Amitai is at it again. This time, he wants NASA to forget about this space stuff and explore the oceans.
Leaving aside his historical ignorance (it was Copernicus, not Kepler who posited that the earth went around the sun), really, what part of National Aeronautics and Space Administration do these morons who want to repurpose the agency not understand?
We have an agency that studies the oceans — it’s called the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. We also have an agency that deals with energy issues. It’s called the Department of Energy. Can you say “Department of Energy,” boys and girls?
If we don’t want to have a federal space program, then disband the agency, and shift its funds to the things we do want to do. If there are NASA employees who know how to and want to study the ocean and energy, they can transfer to the places where those things are done. But enough with these stupid attempts to make NASA something that it is not.
I’m with whoever said “I never go in the ocean. Fish fuck in it.”
Actually, that was W. C. Fields, answering the question why he never drank water.
Actually, it’s an interesting phenomenon, since it exposes part of the axiomatic assumptions of the collectivists and, well, we normal people.
Normal people assume that you invent a government agency and tax funding for it because there’s some specific need you see. Goodness, we need to monitor hurricanes! Let’s set up an agency, fund it, appoint some folks who are experts in hurricanes to run it. If global warming eliminates hurricanes in the Atlantic, we can close the agency and lower taxes.
That’s not the way a collectivist thinks. To him, the point is government. The method is some appearance of doing something useful. In this case, the point is to have a large government agency (NASA) with lots of money to spend. But what should it do? Hmm. I guess it could be involved in space exploration, but that seems so 20th century. How about — explore the ocean? Yeah! That’s cool 21st century stuff.
Of course, your collectivist will set up the agency with the purpose written into the name if possible, if he happens to be there in the beginning. But if not, if he happens late on the scene, he sees no strangeness in casting about for ways to repurpose government agencies that he thinks are not doing useful things. The idea of eliminating bits of government that are not doing useful things doesn’t occur to him.
It reminds me of that Star Trek the Next Generation episode where Picard was talking about one of his brothers. (Or cousin. Some relative.) Anyway, this relative of his was involved in some sort of scientific research on Earth to “lift the ocean floor” so they could explore it better. I remember thinking at the time: what do they need to lift up a piece of the ocean floor for? Can’t they just go down and look at it? I mean, we can do that now, with bathyspheres. Surely in the Star Trek future they could easily go down to the bottom of the ocean.
I really think sometimes that people don’t think of what they are saying.
“I really think sometimes that people don’t think of what they are saying.”
One look at Huffpoo comments will make you change some to most.
Of course the notion is that the agency that got us to the Moon should be able to pull off their preferred miracle, as well.
But, in addition to the fact that we’ve not done it *lately,* believe it or not, some things really ARE harder than going to the Moon…
The argument that “we should explore the oceans instead of space” is puzzling because we are exploring the oceans. Not only NOAA but the Navy, private corporations, universities, research institutes, dive clubs, even private individuals are engaged in that pursuit.
Does Etzioni even realize that? At one point, he seems to imply that no one has explored the oceans since Jacques Cousteau. At another point, though, he acknowledges that the Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institution is doing so.
Apparently, he means that we should be exploring the ocean in some manner other than what we are doing at present, but he fails to explain what that manner might be. He says “we must learn to construct submersibles that can handle extreme pressure,” which is nonsense — we learned to construct such vehicles decades ago.
He also betrays complete ignorance of marine science when he refers to reefs — shallow-water structures by definition — as “deep water communities.”
So, apparently, he thinks we need to develop submersibles, which already exist, to study deep-water reefs, which don’t exist???
Jeez, Ed, my post title was a shorter version of your comment… 😉
An analogous situation that sticks in my craw is when the Government repurposes private companies. Take auto companies; there is a hue and a cry to force auto companies to develop “better electric cars”. Why auto companies? Leaving aside the idea that I have never known anyone who wanted an electric car; the problem with electric cars isn’t the cars, it’s the batteries. Why not ride fast and hard all over battery companies?
“But enough with these stupid attempts to make NASA something that it is not.”
Apparently, for the last 35 years not even NASA has known what NASA is for.
This is very well written article as well as sharing.I just want to say Mr. Etzioni should refrain from putting up the false dichotomy that there are means for only one explorative program.Thanks.