Against exploration? You might as well be a lab rat...

IMO, anyone who is human and has no desire to explore, no curiosity about
things and whose only desire is to live for a living ought not to have
been born.
-Rich

CeeBee:
I want to make and end to war, and hunger, and I want world peace, and
everybody get rich and happy, and oh, I want to be Miss Universe one
day.

Next candidate please.

Next candidate? I'm voting for _you_!

Davoud

--
usenet *at* davidillig dawt com

IMO, anyone who is human and has no desire to explore, no curiosity about
things and whose only desire is to live for a living ought not to have
been born.
-Rich


Fortunately one can be curious about an infinite number of things, desire to
explore an infinite number of topics, ideas, places, experiences.

One can choose....

Some may find space rather futile and limited in its appeal when compared to
things which may be closer at hand, more critical to the survial of the
species.

Jon Isaacs

Jon

IMO, anyone who is human and has no desire to explore, no curiosity about
things and whose only desire is to live for a living ought not to have
been born.
-Rich

I agree. There are new viruses popping up all the time that require
microscopic study to help find a cure. The tiny little pond organisms, like
amoeba and paramecia, are always fascinating to study, especially their
responses when a stimulus is applied.

We can learn about overpopulation, for example, by exploring the wonderful
world of rodents. What is their response when an 8'x8' room is first filled
with 10 rats, then 100? What about 1,000 or 10,000? Lots of tremendous
learning can occur here. We can single out a rat and view its reaction to
its neighbors as we exponentially increase the population. How will it get
along once the population reaches 100,000? Fascinating stuff!

So, yes, exploration and curiosity, if carefully applied, are quite
important.

Ash

(Richard) wrote in message . com...
IMO, anyone who is human and has no desire to explore, no curiosity about
things and whose only desire is to live for a living ought not to have
been born.
-Rich

For [space] exploration to exist, to have funds and infrastructure,
there have to be millions of people whose primary working concern in
life is making wheat, plastic bins, handbags, cars, pens, driving
delivery trucks, cleaning toilets, researching people's taste in soft
drinks, administrating insurance policies.... you get the picture.

That's not to say those folks can't be interested in exploration as
such (and it doesn't have to be space, though at some point long term
it'll have to be!) but that without a massive modern industrial base
there can be nothing practical done about it.

Oh, and some folks in the world are too concerned with feeding
themselves and not dying to get excited about exploring.

not wanting to put a downer on your post, the spirit of which (other
than the not being born bit!) i largely agree with, but just a to but
some balance on it.

(Richard) wrote in message . com...

IMO, anyone who is human and has no desire to explore, no curiosity about
things and whose only desire is to live for a living ought not to have
been born.

Well, "ought not to have been born" is too strong for me, but it is
certainly not a way that *I* would want to be.

For instance, there is this guy who keeps posting to s.a.a. who
is obsessively opposed to exploring Pluto ...

Nonetheless, I don't think he should never have been born.

Do I think he is in the bottom 5% of North American society? Yes on
some measures, no on others. Do I want to get rid of him? No, not
really. The only person who really suffers from his short-sightedness
is he himself.

- Tony Flanders

(gswork) wrote in message . com...
(Richard) wrote in message . com...
IMO, anyone who is human and has no desire to explore, no curiosity about
things and whose only desire is to live for a living ought not to have
been born.
-Rich

For [space] exploration to exist, to have funds and infrastructure,
there have to be millions of people whose primary working concern in
life is making wheat, plastic bins, handbags, cars, pens, driving
delivery trucks, cleaning toilets, researching people's taste in soft
drinks, administrating insurance policies.... you get the picture.

That's not to say those folks can't be interested in exploration as
such (and it doesn't have to be space, though at some point long term
it'll have to be!) but that without a massive modern industrial base
there can be nothing practical done about it.

Oh, and some folks in the world are too concerned with feeding
themselves and not dying to get excited about exploring.

not wanting to put a downer on your post, the spirit of which (other
than the not being born bit!) i largely agree with, but just a to but
some balance on it.

Balance used to mean something. Now it's a word used by self-centred yuppies
to mean organizing their "New Age" oriented lives. Leave the "survival"
to countries that simply don't have the means for anything else, the U.S.
MUST continue to pave the way for the advancement of mankind through pure
scientific research.
-Rich