Things you didn't know about Europe's tug to Mars

blogs.esa.int

4 pointsgoatsneez2 comments

Nice engineering.

Too bad it's focused on seemingly useless missions. Maybe they should start with "Why should we sent people to Mars?".

My understanding is that ESA is paid by public money, right? Shouldn't public money be used to work on the major problems we have on Earth, like the current mass extinction (did you know we lost 80% insects in the last 20 years?), climate change and the beginning of the end of fossil resources?

When looking at costs, one should keep a reference point in mind. For example, the ESA's total budget is ~7.7 billion euros, which is taxpayer money. However, the US alone spent about 1 billion dollars bombing the Houthis in three months (https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/trump-ope...), and the direct military costs in Gaza alone are over 22 billion dollars (https://www.forbes.com/sites/williamhartung/2024/10/15/the-h...). The total cost of reconstruction is estimated to be over 100 billion. The direct costs of the EU's sanctions on Russia alone cost taxpayers more than 200 billion, but these are poor estimates. We could continue in this way and examine Africa, Asia, and other regions to gain perspective.

However, it would be improper to claim that the ESA's budget for this project is a matter of diverting taxpayers' money to something negative.

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