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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (March 5, 1997)
T EDITORIAL EDITOR-IN-CHIEF: StevenAsbury MANAGING EDITOR: Thom Schoenbom NIGHT EDITOR: Thom Schoenbom EDITORIAL EDITORS: Ashley Bach & Brian Diamond editorials, letters, commentary and perspective NEWSROOM: (541)346-5511 DISPLAY ADVERTISING: (541)346-3712 BUSINESS OFFICE: (541)346-5512 CLASSIFIED ADVERTISING: (541)346-4343 COURTESY ARTWORK SPACE: The Final Frontier? OPINION The US. space pro gram provides a wide range ofbenefitsfor everyone for a very reason able cost. The United States is the world’s leader in space exploration and use. From civil space to national security, U.S. programs have dom inated the field. On Sept. 19,1996, Presi dent Clinton announced a new space poli cy that commits our nation to a strong and stable space program in the coming years. The policy is a valuable document for un derstanding current space goals and activi ties and their effect on national security, foreign policy, economic growth, environ mental, scientific and technical excellence. Civil space activities include space sci ence, earth observation with remote sens ing, human space flight to conduct scientif ic as well as exploratory activities and space technology applications. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is the lead agency for research and development in civil space activities. Our nation’s achievements in civil space have benefited the economy, the environ ment, science and technology. These achievements have and will continue to re quire government funding. Sometimes it’s hard to understand the benefits of a govern ment program, and the taxpayers of our country question the need for a space pro gram. Our outer space operations have ad vanced mankind and changed our lives. The space program is only three decades old, but it has become a permanent entity in our world. Almost S14 billion of the fed eral budget will be used by the space pro gram in fiscal year 1997. Do the benefits of the civil space program justify the public expense to conduct it? An important area of the civil space pro gram is space science, which includes ro botic and human exploration to enhance knowledge of our solar system, universe and fundamental scientific and physical sciences. Experimentation and observation of the earth with satellites has revolution ized geographic, atmospheric, ionospheric and meteorological sciences. Exploration of the solar system utilizes deep-space probes and earth-orbiting satel lites like the Hubble telescope. The Hubble is an observatory orbiting the earth that has clearer resolution than any earth-based telescope because it doesn’t have to look through the atmosphere. Recent Mars fossil findings in rocks suggest the possibility of life on the red planet. If we could find and observe life on other planets, it would help us better comprehend life here on earth and how we came into existence. Environmental monitoring from space is important in helping us to understand our planet and its natural processes better. Me teorological satellites allow scientists to view cloud patterns in a way that offers new insight into the weather process. Satellite remote sensing brings the weather to your home every night on the evening news. Earth observation helps scientists better understand the effects of both human and natural influences on the environment. En hanced satellite imagery helps the forest service detect landslides after recent wide spread flooding in the Pacific Northwest. Satellites take enhanced digital pho tographs of the flood areas, and when com bined with geologic, soil information and previous images, these can be used to as sess flood damage. Space communication satellite systems have revolutionized communication, al lowing everything from cellular phone calls and precise global positioning data to television and information transfer to be come commonplace. Without U.S. achievements in space, the world would be a primitive place. A citi zen of this country benefits from space every time he or she turns on the television set, uses a laptop, makes a phone call, uses a product that contains Teflon, slaps to gether velcro or uses a host of other prod uct spin-offs. Space product spin-offs are products originally designed for use in space that have been found to have appli cations here on earth as well. In the end, the economic impacts and advantages of the space program are nu merous. The space program positively im pacts the United States in four ways: 1) Economically: It alters the sales and em ployment levels in the space industry. 2) Technologically: It changes the structure of products, techniques and materials via ad vancements and discoveries and promotes progress. 3) Scientifically: It increases the understanding of our earth and solar sys tem, and fosters further investigation when discoveries are made. 4) Socially: Influ ences the quality of life by creating new spin-off products. Over its three-decade existence, the civil space program has had many successes and a few failures. It has been the catalyst for many new discoveries about ourselves, our planet and the universe. It is hard to imag ine a world without a strong space program, because it indirectly benefits us in so many ways throughout the course of our lives. When it is viewed in context of econom ic and scientific value added to our soci ety, the U.S. space program is definitely a bargain worthy of continued taxpayer sup port. Chris Hutchinson, a sophomore majoring in fine arts, is a guest columnist for the Emerald. His news do not necessarily rep resent those of the newspaper. E-mail: chrhutch@gladstone.uoregon.edu fifi The space program is only three decades old, but it has become a permanent entity in our world. Almost $M billion of the federal budget will be used by the space program in fiscal year 1997. Do the benefits of the civil space program justify the public expense to conduct it? 99
