Why is space so unpopular!!!

One thing to remember is that the Apollo/ Gemini/ Mercury programs are as real to young people today as World War II is to those in their 50s.  They can't relate to the excitement because their exposure to space has been a constant battle for funding and direction to get people under 250 miles in Earth orbit.  If you look at the potential that was Apollo and how it was brutally killed at its prime it is more than a pity.  I have dreamed of the space program since I was small and am constantly dissappointed to know that I will not live to live in space, to travel to the moon, or to see the results of the first manned extensive exploration of Mars.  It's interesting to see a poster Alcoa Aluminum put out that showed first manned Mars landing in 1974.  I still feel like 2001 was owed to me.  So at this point, I follow the progam and collect models and collectibles from the real space exploration program.  If you think about the fact that NASA is struggling to get funding for a manned space program which is the equivalent of a month's war spending, we can clearly see the direction ahead.  Our only hope is commercial space.

In the mean time, we need some of the older models restored.  One of the best, I believe, is still the Mercury Atlas with its launch gantry.

America needs space to grow! 

Hi All! I have read through all the posts in this thread and I must say, this is quite an interesting bunch of people! I, too, grew up in the Space Age and remember when Apollo landed on the Moon in July of 1969. I remember Apollo 13, 17, ASTP, the first shuttle launch etc.....

I am also an astronomer and someone who works and studies in the aerospace fields.  Like many, my interest in my chosen career path was piqued as a young child with the Mercury and Gemini programs, etc.  Aside from the modelling world - of which I built almost every space model available up until my life took me away from model building 28 years ago - the question of what happened with space exploration is a vast and deep one. There is no single answer, no magic answer as to why our collective interest in it died off to the point of almost non-existence. 

For one thing, back then we had real Heroes.  Today, we have none.  Kids today don't idolize people like we did when we were younger.  They are more interested in instant graitification than spending time doing anything and - especially - learning something.  Model building was more than just slapping glue, paint and decals on plastic.  You could not help but to learn about history as a model builder.  The more you built, the more you learned. It was a multi-faceted hobby as it taught history, it taught patience, it taugh skill with your hands and it provided fuel for your imagination.  Kids today are not interested in this.  They want their X-boxes and rapid fire two-second soundbyte world.  The world us middle aged (and older) people knew is gone - at least as we once knew it anyway.

It's funny, though, how things in Life happen. As I said, I have not built a model in 28 years.  It's not that I didn't want to, it's just that Life had other plans for me and there was no time left for such activities.  But, three years ago I met a woman who has since become my wife.  What is incredibly interesting to me is that she is 9 years younger than I am (I'm 45) - and had absolutely no clue what the Apollo program was!  She had vaguely heard of it but didn't know anything about it.  She had never heard of Gemini or Mercury and really had not much background on the Space Shuttle either.

However, she had an interest in all of it - joined the local astronomy club and even went to graduate school in space studies.  From my perspective it has been an interesting trip, as I can relate most of this stuff first hand to her.  I was there.  I remember it.  I was a part of that history and a part of that dream that people from her age bracket have no clue existed! It is so very strange the differences, in this respect, that a mere 9 years made!

However, to make a rather long story short, as she got more involved and interested in this subject area, I began looking at all my old modelling supplies.  We ended up buying several models from Ebay - Apollo CSM, Lunar Module, Vostok, Apollo-Soyuz Test Project and, more recently, some of the very origins of the Space Race itself - the German V-1 and V-2 (or A-4, depending on how you look at it) rockets.  My wife now knows what these are, what they looked like, where they came from and what they caused in the future which is now our history.

While most of us old time modellers know how one thing always leads to another, my wife is discovering more history than she ever knew existed.  Right now she's learning about the old Nike missile systems that used to guard some of our major cities.  We've been able to locate and construct the old Revell Nike-Hercules kit and the old Renwal Nike-Ajax kit. 

Even more interesting, though, is that she never knew 12 of the Nike bases existed in the city we live in.  What's surprising is that several of them are still there, abandoned and empty for the past 33 years - but still standing.  We've begun going around and surveying the sites, taking pictures and actually walking through them.  Building the models is a great way to learn - but nothing compares to actually experiencing the real things/places behind the models.

It's been an interesting trip back into the modelling world :)

-Ro

Wow, it's cool to see an old post resurecting.  I wrote this post before I started building armors.  I'm still a space freak and I look forward for my next space projects.  I plan to build some space probes and satellites in styrene using paper model rendering.

Hey, Anybody have seen the new movie "The Astronaut Farmer" ?  How is it?

I saw it this weekend with my family. You will be able to relate to it...he is essentially a space modeller with the passion to take his creation into flight...just as we have done many times in our thoughts with our models.  It is a wonderful movie!

Is there a DVD of the Astronaut farmer available? I would like to see that...

Unfortunately no,

The movie just came out in the theaters, here in the US last week.  Legal copies most likely won't be out to the stores for 4-6 months.  Other "copies" . . . well, I won't go there.

Mike

Most modeling subjects are instruments of conflict and/or competition--- to win a battle, a war, a race, etc.  Once we "won" the space race it ceased to hold the interest of the media (which thrives on both conflict and competition), as well as those many among us who are always looking for the next "contest".  Modeling reflects those basic tendencies.  Unfortunately, none of us will be around when enough time has passed to allow a proper historical perspective on the space program.  In the future, though, I believe our descendents will look back on this period of incredibly audacious exploration and declare it to be the finest thing our species has ever done.

TomB

Persephones_Dream wrote:

Hi All! I have read through all the posts in this thread and I must say, this is quite an interesting bunch of people! I, too, grew up in the Space Age and remember when Apollo landed on the Moon in July of 1969. I remember Apollo 13, 17, ASTP, the first shuttle launch etc..... I

 

Okay..I will date myself here. As a kid, I remember watching Allen Shepard first Mercury flight on B/W TV. Than seeing the next Mercury mission and Gus Grissom struggling in the water as his capsule slipped beneath the waters. The nation was glued to the TV as NASA was progressing towards it's goal of a moon landing. In that period and in a short span of less than 10 years, we have seen the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo programs and the model kits that represented them whereas for the last 20 some years, we had just the Space Shuttle to model. If NASA can start up another lunar project and a Mars mission, you know there will be kits put out depicting the type spacecraft used and I for one am looking forward to seeing it.

Scott

 

I can remember when they would have prime time coverage of the Gemini and Apollo space missons. None of the Mercury and some of the Gemini mission didn't last long enough to show more than a few clips. The later Gemini and the Apollo missions would last for days or weeks so occassionaly there would be live coverage (news specials) on the missions during prime time TV broadcasting. When was the last time they showed a space shuttle mission during prime time. (except for the two disasters) Note: I'm not talking about the top of the hour 1 minute news breaks.

The most exciting times were during Apollo 8, 11, and of course Apollo 13.

Apollo 8 is best known for Frank Borman, Jim Lovell, and William Anders reading Genesis from the Moon on Christmas Eve 1968. If you've never heard this clip click on the link below. The video is better because it shows the Earth as seen out the window of the command module orbiting the Moon as they are reading Genesis. Its one of those things where you had to have been there to experience the emotion when it originally happened.

http://history.nasa.gov/40thann/wav/ap8_xmas_eve.wav

For me this ranks in the top 3 most memorable public events in my life, the other two are Kennedys assasination and Apollo 11.

Walter Cronkite was my favorite commentator to watch because he has a very personal interest in the space program and it showed during his broadcasts.

I still remember at 5:30 PM CST I would tune in to CBS for the lastest mission news (keep in mind we didn't have FOX,CNN, MSNBC) and hear "This is the CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite". He would always end the program with "And that's the way it is:", followed by the date.

With all this, I always wonder why there was never a good Skylab model.  Skylab was so far ahead of the curve that when Congress let it deorbit because they would not pay for a propulsion module to boost it, they didn't realize that they margininalized the shuttle.  The shuttle was built to go to Skylab and whatever follow-on station would replace it or compliment it.  Skylab was huge with amenities such as coolers for ice cream (yes, experiments as well).  Problem was that the size of the shuttle was dictated by the needs of the military for their satellites.  Orgininally, the second shuttle launch site was to be only for military missions.  Unfortunately, due to total mismanagement of the construction, the pad was unusable and scrapped.

Anyway, my real question is, has anyone ever come across a GOOD Skylab model? 

Astronaut Buck wrote:

With all this, I always wonder why there was never a good Skylab model.  Skylab was so far ahead of the curve that when Congress let it deorbit because they would not pay for a propulsion module to boost it, they didn't realize that they margininalized the shuttle.  The shuttle was built to go to Skylab and whatever follow-on station would replace it or compliment it.  Skylab was huge with amenities such as coolers for ice cream (yes, experiments as well).  Problem was that the size of the shuttle was dictated by the needs of the military for their satellites.  Orgininally, the second shuttle launch site was to be only for military missions.  Unfortunately, due to total mismanagement of the construction, the pad was unusable and scrapped. Anyway, my real question is, has anyone ever come across a GOOD Skylab model?

 I think Skylab was a victim of the post Moon Landing excitment. We landed on the Moon, we beat the Russians...  IMHO that the onlything that Apollo was about - beating the Russians - Think back - I could see it. Big Wig holding the purse strings says "We landed all these guys on the moon and now you want all this $$ for just going around the earth in a tube... " Too bad. <sigh>

There is no kit of Skylab available, to my knowledge, right now. Mike M from the SIM books (http://www.spaceinminiature.com/models/skylab.html ) did a very nice 1:96 scratbuilt one. Plus I'm sure there are many scratchbuilt ones - You just need an Apollo sturn V kit.  But IIRC Real Space Models has one on their future kits pages (I'm not too sure about New Ware Models). I'm personally wqiting for one of these guys to come up with a kit of Skylab. I know I would butcher a scratchbuilt version.

Thank you for the information...question is, if I were to build from scratch, should I go 1/48 or 1/12 scale? ;)

I think the problem is cynicism. The dreams mankind had in the fifties and sixties of a bright new future among the stars have all turned to ash and blind rhetoric. The more we learn about space and the universe, the more apparent it becomes that Man will likely never escape this ball of rock we call home.

Added to that horrible accidents like Challenger and Columbia, and it's no wonder why kids no longer want to be astronauts. We've grown out of it.

The reason space is unpopular is that no war has yet been fought in it, and no real aggresive weapons have been deployed to it.     This is why space modeling is about as popular as, say, modeling of Queen Mary cruise ship.

 

 

  It too expensive and dangerous to put humans into a radiation filled, -450 degree vacuum with really no benefit other than saying that we did it. It is difficult to find astronauts (due to the screening process) so ultimately very highly intelligent,intensively trained people are chosen,go into a low orbit and are killed when their vehicles disintegrate due to human error. Apollo 13 shows us what to could happen to a deep-space vehicle that runs into a life-or-death problem and how there would be no hope if they were tens of millions of miles away. We have no idea what to expect in deep space and would not be able to prepare for every possible problem..sooo    I agree with those people who advocate using robots instead of humans to explore deep space. Once we are capable of building special deep space vehicles-robotic platforms that can build their own robots and launch them-we can send a few dozen,maybe hundreds,of these things in different directions and explore the planets that astronomers have been finding recently and will find in the future. Of course,this is far into the future and would involve nanotechnology,advanced robotics and artificial intelligence but these are merely small hurdles to that goal in my opinion. We can figure all of this stuff out and we will unless there is a catastrophe before then. I know that as humans we would really like to send people into deep space but it is so dangerous that we would probably kill every crew that tried it or even worse they may have a psychological breakdown knowing that they are so far away and are stuck in a sealed metal box. If robots are lost,however,we just sigh and build another..Besides that,the technologies involved would employ tens of thousands of skilled people..     rant over 

Dude, the post is talking about space models not space.

Auntie Matter wrote:

It too expensive and dangerous to put humans into a radiation filled, -450 degree vacuum with really no benefit other than saying that we did it. It is difficult to find astronauts (due to the screening process) so ultimately very highly intelligent,intensively trained people are chosen,go into a low orbit and are killed when their vehicles disintegrate due to human error. Apollo 13 shows us what to could happen to a deep-space vehicle that runs into a life-or-death problem and how there would be no hope if they were tens of millions of miles away. We have no idea what to expect in deep space and would not be able to prepare for every possible problem..sooo    I agree with those people who advocate using robots instead of humans to explore deep space. Once we are capable of building special deep space vehicles-robotic platforms that can build their own robots and launch them-we can send a few dozen,maybe hundreds,of these things in different directions and explore the planets that astronomers have been finding recently and will find in the future. Of course,this is far into the future and would involve nanotechnology,advanced robotics and artificial intelligence but these are merely small hurdles to that goal in my opinion. We can figure all of this stuff out and we will unless there is a catastrophe before then. I know that as humans we would really like to send people into deep space but it is so dangerous that we would probably kill every crew that tried it or even worse they may have a psychological breakdown knowing that they are so far away and are stuck in a sealed metal box. If robots are lost,however,we just sigh and build another..Besides that,the technologies involved would employ tens of thousands of skilled people..     rant over

Oh, but we will jump into our cars and drive across town and die in the tens of thousands. The entire space programs casualty list is very short considering some human endeavours. In 2005 there were 6.2 million car accidents, 2.9 million injured and over 42,000 killed. That's one person every 13 minutes. Space is down right safe in comparison.

No other benefit other than to say we've been there?

Miniaturized computers, pacemakers, kevlar, mylar, the ability to track weather (which has saved thousands of lives), orthoscopic surgery, titanium metallurgy, rigid insulation, smoke detectors, MIR and CAT scans, artificial limbs, LEDs, LCDs, IR thermometors, digital mammography,  chromozone analysis, windshear avoidance and collision detection systems for airports, helmut padding for motorcycles and football, golfball technology, lightweight wheelchairs, rechargable batteries, cordless power tools, firefighter breathing apparatus and fire suits, Jaws of Life, lasers, cell phones, satallite TV, I could go on!

The benefits far out weigh any risk.

Dateline 1491 Christopher Columbus has called off his idiotic plan to sail around the world, as it is too dangerous to risk human lives on such a risky trek, not to mention the dearth of willing participants. "No tangible benefits" Queen Isobella stated today "besides, it was such a waste of the government's money".

 Apollo 13, by the way, was a success, and the astronauts and flight crew figured out how to get safely back to Earth.

I could care less about deep space exploration, except for robotic exploration. I'm more interested in near space industry. We could put our dangerous, but necessary, factories on the moon, which we could also mine for it's mineral content. Mars is ripe for the plucking, as well. Point of fact, is that mankind is quite willing to sit on their butts and not learn new technologies, and it is only through war and space research that we have progressed so far.

I certainly agree on this one...

If we haven't faced those risks,we would certainly have not went this far...

If we don't send people simply because of these risks, then, practically we don't want to improve ourselves as humans, because we simply let those fears get the best of us...

"Imagine if Christopher Columbus has come back from the New World, and no one returned from his footsteps"

 - Cpt. James Lovell

Besides, it would be an INSULT to those who sacrificed their lives if people would stop human spaceflight, simply because we're afraid to do so...

Plus, if we stop human space programs, then what would we do when the time comes when we have to leave this planet of ours (and don't limit it to just asteroids and comets)? And please don't say "only if its gonna happen", because it IS going to happen, its just a matter of time

Dude, the post is talking about space models not space   Dude,really? Hmm I thought this was an astronomy website.  silly me

 

Apollo 13 was a success? I thought they died.   No wait..I did see the movie.Uh huh yeah. I did.  See the movie.   Yep.   I saw it. Thats right I remember now.It was a success BRINGING THEM BACK..Duh!  The mission itself was a failure,I would think..wouldnt you  Mr brains?..   If there were 50,000 Space Shuttle launches per day,there would be more accidents to be sure...so the analogy with cars is pointless..you could "care less about deep exploration,except with robots"  

just think..there wouldnt be artificial limbs if we didnt go into space .I am glad we went into space.Because if we didnt,there would be no artificial limbs.Could you imagine that? I cant. or what about helmet padding? The thought is horrible.. Hey all of you golfers!,thank the dead space shuttle crews for golfball technology everytime you sink a birdie..   

Auntie Matter wrote:

just think..there wouldnt be artificial limbs if we didnt go into space .I am glad we went into space.Because if we didnt,there would be no artificial limbs.Could you imagine that? I cant. or what about helmet padding? The thought is horrible.. Hey all of you golfers!,thank the dead space shuttle crews for golfball technology everytime you sink a birdie..

 

Now you're just being silly. You know perfectly well what I mean by artificial limbs. Previous to the space program, prosthetics were limited to hooks for hand and stumps for feet. Now people can hold their babies and take part in LIFE again. You think helmut padding isn't worth something? There are plenty of motorcyclists and football players who are alive today due to that padding.

What about the rest of the technology? You posting here is directly due to the space program.

I'll give you the golfball technology. But you really need to research the subject before you spout off your ingnorant opinions. 

Auntie Matter wrote:

Apollo 13 was a success? I thought they died.   No wait..I did see the movie.Uh huh yeah. I did.  See the movie.   Yep.   I saw it. Thats right I remember now.It was a success BRINGING THEM BACK..Duh!  The mission itself was a failure,I would think..wouldnt you  Mr brains?..   If there were 50,000 Space Shuttle launches per day,there would be more accidents to be sure...so the analogy with cars is pointless..you could "care less about deep exploration,except with robots"

Mr. Brains? You've got a bunch of keyboard courage, don't you. I've had enough of you.

 

I still love you my brother.. 

Hey Bgrigg, don't let this fool get to you. Most likely a troll out trolling.

It's people like this that keep the world in stagnation.... wimps and whiners that do not have the Courage to move onward, who can't see past there own nose.

As this world gets more polluted and over populated from human contamination, these sheepeople will be the first to rise up and complain- WHY was not something done. They will be the ones pointing fingers at everyone else when they should pointing at themselves.

Humanity will Only survive in the future if we head out into space, plain simple fact.

To many have there head buried in the sand, saying that everything will get better if we just don't think about it and let it pass.

WAKE UP!!!

Back on topic-

The reason why space is Not now popular is because todays youth, instead of staring up at the stars like we did, and still do, wanting to discover what is out there... they have there head buried in some video game or computer. The only thing they want to discover is where the next mutant beast will show itself.

Building these models reminds us that there is more than this little planet, that at one time we had a space program that was worth something, something great... it is a connection to a time of hope and dreams.

Just think how far we would be now if that dream would have continued.

c3po wrote:

Hey Bgrigg, don't let this fool get to you. Most likely a troll out trolling. It's people like this that keep the world in stagnation.... wimps and whiners that do not have the Courage to move onward, who can't see past there own nose. As this world gets more polluted and over populated from human contamination, these sheepeople will be the first to rise up and complain- WHY was not something done. They will be the ones pointing fingers at everyone else when they should pointing at themselves. Humanity will Only survive in the future if we head out into space, plain simple fact. To many have there head buried in the sand, saying that everything will get better if we just don't think about it and let it pass. WAKE UP!!! Back on topic- The reason why space is Not now popular is because todays youth, instead of staring up at the stars like we did, and still do, wanting to discover what is out there... they have there head buried in some video game or computer. The only thing they want to discover is where the next mutant beast will show itself. Building these models reminds us that there is more than this little planet, that at one time we had a space program that was worth something, something great... it is a connection to a time of hope and dreams. Just think how far we would be now if that dream would have continued.

 

Oh yeah!!! Great statement there sir, I coudn't agree more.

Sir, you mentioned today's youth, well I just turned 20 last week, so I'm still considered a part of the youth (ok, I'm a young adult!!! hehe!!! ), and I can't help but observe my peers today, and what they want to do with their lives...

The thing here in our country is, computer shops ang internet cafes have sprung up like mushrooms almost on a weekly basis, and, well, you've guessed it, these outlets have their PCs installed with at least 5 or 6 of the latest video games that are very popular with today's young people, and guess what, there shops are within sight of elementary schools, high schools and of course, colleges (well, I think your'e getting the sad picture now...)... no wonder many of my classmates here in college almost always have a failing mark, if not D-...

Plus, the mentality of people here is that someone must earn lots and lots of money (by any means possible, and I mean ANY means possible) in order to live a happy and contented life, and it dictates what people should choose which path they want to traverse, like what college degree should they take, for instance, mainly because that's their only option since they need a high earning job that requires that degree to be qualified...

and if there's someone here who has a friend who is a Filipino, you probably know what that college degree is, for those who don't, I'll tell you - its B.S. Nursing - I call it "the National course" translate it to our native tongue, and it reads - "ang pambansang kurso"

 - even our licensed medical doctors enroll for this course just to earn more...

Well, I'm not degrading nurses, they are great people who help the sick and aided doctors in their time of need, but the mentality here is the most annoying part, because the reason most people enroll this course is that many Filipinos think that working abroad is the best way to earn big, and that being a nurse is one of the best ways, if not the BEST way to get there...

so being that, we are sending thousands of nurses abroad, while our hospitals here are actually lacking an adequate number of nurses, sometimes, there's no nurse at all...

wait there's more...

many, if not all young people here sees studying as the most boring thing someone can do with their lives, and that it is only needed as a qualification to land a job... They prefer to be stuck with a PC and chat till their hands get numb of typing and their eyes sore, or if they want to get out, spend some time at the mall and stroll till their legs ache, or go barhopping and party and drink the night away...

and also they consider people who are serious about their lives and their dreams as lunatics, abnormals, and hopeless nerds who they thing will die with their books in their heads...

And I got a fairly good dose of what it feels like to be treated by these people like that...

They think of me and my interest in science, particularly in aviation and space as being hilarious, stupid, crazy, and ready for the dumpsters... (although there are some of them who think very much - otherwise)

ok enought of that!!!

The reason I put this here is to emphasize one thing - that most of the youth here has practically abandoned the thought of dreaming for a better future, to aim higher, to do more that what they thought they can do, and stuff like that...

I think that's what's happening why space is very unpopular, many think that this topic is better confined in classrooms with their boring teachers...

But being that, I am fortunate that I got interested in this, because it gave me something to look forward to - I am not afraid to admit I want to be an astronaut, and right now, I'm working to reach it in any way that I can...

Who knows, maybe someone here can help make us dream again...

BTW, I haven't seen any recent segment topics in FSM that is related to real-space subjects... so...

a friend of mine is designing a 1/144 scale card model of the ISS to follow up his Impressive STS card model collection, and it will grow as the station grows, and right now he's designing the necessary parts up to the current configuration...

I volunteered to be one of the primary builders, and hopefully it would qualify as a how-to article for FSM...

here's his site, where you can get his collection, mostly for free (actually his whole STS fleet plus SRB/ETs are free, except for the payloads), but some will require a small fee to obtain...

http://www.axmpaperspacescalemodels.com

I posted this link before, just reposted it as a refreshment

c3po wrote:

Hey Bgrigg, don't let this fool get to you. Most likely a troll out trolling.

No worries, my statement was more in frustration in wasting my time trying to educate him, instead he ridicules the great leap in abilities the space program brought humanity. I know people who are amputees who can lead very normal lives, and who suffered with the old style prosthetics. I can well imagine their reaction to his sarcasm. I actually read his posts backwards, when I went back a page and read "Mr. Brain" I stopped caring!

One of my first posts in this thread was about my outrage at NASA for allowing the dream to be stifled with the Shuttle. To this day it annoys me that it's considered a space craft when it is incapable of escaping the gravity well. I grow up on Mercury and Apollo, and recall the wonder of the entire event. I cried when Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee died in the terrible even of Apollo 1, and cheered when James Lovell, John Swigert and Fred Haise returned safely after the disaster befell them during Apollo 13. Our "Friend" considers that a failure, when I consider any space mission that returns the astronauts back to Earth safely a success.

I cried when Challenger exploded killing Ellison Onizuka, Christa McAuliffe, Gregory Jarvis, Judith Resnik, Michael Smith, Dick Scobee, and Ronald McNair. And cried some more when Rick Husband, William McCool, Ilan Ramon, Michael Anderson, David Brown, Laurel Clark, and Kalpana Chawla died when Columbia went down. But through all those tears, I knew that their sacrifices should not be in vain, and that we needed to strive to reach space and if we can't reach the stars, at least reach the planets.

I said this in my earlier post, and I'll repeat it again. I remember seeing the first astronaut in space, and never thought I would see the last.

Until thr President, Congress and NASA put the excitement back into the space program and catch the public imagination like in the day's of Mecury, Gemini and Apollo. I grew up in those day's and would like to see them again. Hope I live long enough to see man back of the moon, doubt I will be for a Mars mission.

Would be nice to see some conceptual models of those vehicles not already on the drawing board, like we had back in the late 50's and early 60's

About your comment: That the 'thing' (due to its ugliness) sends pictures that we can never touch is probably one of the main reason so few are interested in outerspace.

We don't even have spaceships yet. The spaceshuttle flies to the outerspace thx to its super huge rockets. Hardly advanced in innovation. Put simply our technology is not really up for the outerspace exploration. Wait a few centuries or millenia after the invention of a new propulsion system. The current space technology makes the greeman mock the humankind evrytime they see one of our satellite/probes.......I'm sorry i don't mean to humiliate anyone. I'm sure NASA haas the top brains in the whole globe but even that is still not enough. The human race needs a breakthrough in propulsion system technology otherwise we could only see pictures that we can never touch in reality. So what's the point? Besides every other scientists are busy perfecting machines of war. Our tech development comes mainly from the defense industry........

 

Have your fingers crossed that the Martian would chose humankind as their ally sometime soon......then we'll see....SPACE....