Just finished listening to the audiobook of The Martain and got me to thinking.

Submitted ⁨⁨19⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨Fredselfish@lemmy.world⁩ to ⁨showerthoughts@lemmy.world⁩

Under the current administration not only will we not be going to Mars, but even If we did and a astronaut was left behind. No way no how would current political parties in Congress, ( much less our current president) spend the money it would take to save said astronaut.

My real wonder would be if the majority of Americans would okay the amount of money it would cost to save that one man? I know Maga wouldn’t. But the rest? Just made we wondered. Now with Project Hail Mary coming to theaters and the excellent novel. Its the same question.

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jballs@sh.itjust.works ⁨19⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I feel like if the Project Hail Mary crisis happened today, the response would be more like what happened in Don’t Look Up.

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- SkaveRat@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Of all the stuff happening in PHM, Stratt is the most unrealistic part
  
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- Moonrise2473@feddit.it ⁨16⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I watched that movie with the expectation of watching a comedy but I was left with the realization that it’s 100% what would happen nowadays
  
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  - jballs@sh.itjust.works ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    I watched the whole movie thinking it was about COVID. Afterwards, my wife mentioned it was about climate change. I suppose the reality is, we’re just awful at responding to any large threat.
    
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  - Fredselfish@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    Why I refused to watch it. See I didn’t see it as a comedy but a tragedy.
    
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JakenVeina@midwest.social ⁨17⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I re-watched the movie a few months ago, and I had a similar realization: it was quite depressing to see a depiction of NASA that is now entirely lost to us.

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tartarin@reddthat.com ⁨18⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
If someone is left behind, he will die anyway whatever the amount of money thrown to his rescue. Mars isn’t the Moon, it’s a much more hostile environment, even just the journey from the Earth to Mars is a much more hostile environment.

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Moonrise2473@feddit.it ⁨16⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Well I think the opposite.

Saving that one single person is great propaganda. Donald would definitely throw one million people under the bus in order to save that single individual

See the recent medicaid cut to make a few hundred billionaire friends happier/richer

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- queermunist@lemmy.ml ⁨16⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  The recent Medicaid cut to make a few hundred billionaire friends happier/richer was terrible propaganda. Doesn’t that contradict your point?
  
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KoboldCoterie@pawb.social ⁨17⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

My real wonder would be if the majority of Americans would okay the amount of money it would cost to save that one man?

Depends where the money is coming from. Military budget? Absolutely. Being taken from social services and whatnot? No. The amount of money that would cost could save so many more lives if it was used for things here. Choosing to spend it on saving an astronaut rather than on, for example, feeding homeless people and distributing medication and disaster relief is like a version of the trolley problem where the trolley is already heading for the 1 person, but you have the option of switching it to the other track to kill more people if you want to. I’d have a really hard time calling that moral by any metric.

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