As a scientist, I want to go to Mars and back to asteroids and the Moon because I'm a scientist. But I can tell you, I'm not so naive a scientist to think that the nation might not have geopolitical reasons for going into space.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
One of the big things about space exploration is that it is as expensive as it is complicated, and you need all the countries of the world to help if you want to accomplish big goals.
Perhaps the best motivation for going to Mars is political. It is obvious that no single nation currently has either the will or the resources to do it alone, but a consortium of nations and space agencies could achieve it within 20 years.
If you want a nation to have space exploration ambitions, you've got to send humans.
Space exploration is important research to our economic and national defense, and America's space program is a symbol of our success as a scientifically and technologically advanced nation.
It's our destiny to explore. It's our destiny to be a space-faring nation.
Space is not an enterprise that belongs to the U.S. or to Russia or to China - it is a human endeavor and experience. And that's as it should be.
To most people in the U.K., indeed throughout Western Europe, space exploration is primarily perceived as 'what NASA does'. This perception is - in many respects - a valid one. Superpower rivalry during the Cold War ramped up U.S. and Soviet space efforts to a scale that Western Europe had no motive to match.
Sending people into space is very important culturally. That's really the justification. You cannot rationally justify it on the basis of the science and technology we get out of it.
Space offers extraordinary potential for commerce and adventure, for new innovations and new tests of will. As Americans, we can't help but reach for the stars. It's our nature. It's our destiny.
You don't go into space just for the science. Economically, it is not worth it. I think the reason we should be in space is for the exploration; it's the human endeavour.