Originally Posted By: Al
Originally Posted By: Mystic
In my opinion, nothing human beings have done in space, except for perhaps the Moon landings, compares to what unmanned spacecraft have achieved.
100% agree. Value of sending humans in space = zero. Risk high. Cost exponential. Too failsafe engineering required. Acident = heads roll.
China/Russia will take the risks to keep costs low.
I would argue that the value of the moon landings is zero. Again...to much spent for insuring safety. Yea..we won the "Space Race"
Bear in mind..I'm thinking like an Engineer.
(Adjusts flamesuit)
I guess for nationalistic pride I am glad the USA made it to the Moon first with people. But anybody who reflects on it a little bit will realize there were several unmanned missions to the Moon first. Aside from having people on the Moon for historic reasons, I don't really think there was any value to having people there. The machines were able to get the job done, at less cost.
It may be centuries before human beings go as far as the machines have already gone. And for that matter humans could not even go to some of the places the machines have gone.
Having said all of this, I was really excited about the first landing on the Moon with Armstrong and Aldrin and Collins orbiting. We had been visiting my oldest sister who lived in a rented house. My father was disinterested in the space program. I had to encourage him to go so we would get home in time to watch the landing.
After we arrived home I watched the landing live. The picture was poor quality and distorted (in the live view). I think we had a little black and white TV. I was extremely excited watching the landing of the first humans on the Moon.
I can still remember after all of these years. It was a somewhat rainy day.