That is surprising, isn’t it? Also it’s funny how many Americans and people from all the rest of the world will drop a few grand as often as they can afford it to get on a plane and spend a week or two in the bleak deathscape that is Europe.
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I hope Bruce Willis remembered to pack an extra drill bit
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I’m from Europe. I’d fucking move back in a heartbeat if I wasn’t so tethered here.
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Where is “fossil fuel” in the article? It’s a scientific pursuit…and guess what: they don’t have to do it your way or have your priorities.
What did you do today to fix “global economic problems” or “world hunger” other than stuff your own face?
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Anyone that calls Europe a “bleak death space” is an absolute idiot. I grew up there and frankly can’t wait to go back. Fix your own back yard clown…,that’s what they say in America.
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The money could’ve been have been better used to give tax cuts to corporations and the One-percenters.
The point being: if you think the money saved by not doing this sort of thing would go to the issues you care about, you’re nuts.
.
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Who are you to dismiss this accomplishment? Just who the fuck are you to place yourself above such a massive achievement?
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I believe Matt is speaking as if a Teabagger was saying it.
Just as my use of “inefficient, bureaucracy-driven, tax-and-spend socialists” in reference to Europeans was intended to be sarcastic, considering they’re doing really well on the science front lately.
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You’ll have a hard time with this provincial crew my friend. You might better spend your time trying to get McDonald’s to add campaign to their menu than to get these boorish louts to understand the advancement of knowledge. After all…there’s a new “walking dead” coming up Sunday…and you can watch it after watching the NFL and NASCAR.
That whooshing sound you heard? Yes, There was something flying over your head.
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Check your snark detector - probably needs a tuneup
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It’ll certainly help when we need to land Bruce Willis on one of these to blow it up and save the human race from devastation.
Seriously, there is a good chance we’ll need to be able to get to one of these some day to protect the Earth or the Space Station or satellites.
And there’s the scientific advances which are usually of outcome of these efforts that wind up benefiting all of us.
Someone doesn’t understand the “god particle.” They weren’t looking for “god” but an underlying particle that was postulated and the proof of which answered a lot of questions about how matter and energy are intertwined and function.
Finding the Higgs Bosom may help us develop incredible advances in energy, transportation, etc.
In fact, the person who first coined “god particle” hated the name because it was so easily misunderstood.
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I wasn’t talking about the scientists, sir. I know what they meant.
I was talking about the idiot republicans.
Michio Kaku did a great segment once where he suggested that when the scientists were confronted by dumbass congressional Republicans asking if we’d find “god”, that they should have replied (instead of saying they’d find the Higgs boson) that what they were instead hoping to find was the secrets of Genesis…which would have been less atheistic-sounding and still symbolically true.
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Yes, and we should ONLY think about the next 12 months because the people 120 years from now can take care of themselves.
It’s also true that the odds of global warming heading up the atmosphere more than a fraction of a fraction of a degree in the next 12 months is nil, so we should ignore that, too!
I mean, why plan for the future or study the universe. It’s not like it leads to things like solar energy, efficient engines, instant communications, etc.
Oh, one more thing. This was the Europeans doing this. Pretty sure none of the money spent on this would have gone to the American poor, anyway.
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It did, until I remembered how many of my fellow humans voted into office politicians that routinely dismiss science for ideological reasons and that see little or no value in government activity that is not aimed at protecting private assets and private for-profit activities. If an activity that inspires and challenges us as a nation or species is not profitable, these politicians would say, why do it? And, if it is profitable, they would add, private entities should be the ones doing it.
But, then, I consider that a few tens of millions of fellow humans do not define us, and I can choose instead to appreciate the work of those who do value communal efforts to inspire, to challenge, and to push into the frontiers of engineering capability and scientific knowledge. Working with the ESA, an artistic team has created a marvelous short film that captures both the inspiration for and appreciation of the Rosetta mission:
It cheered me back up.
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I’m hopeful that we’ve now found a place for Republicans to relocate to start their own “perfect” world - no illegal immigrants, no taxes, no religions other than Christianity, no Obama, only Emperor Cruz. All aboard, next stop Comet Regan!!
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The Europeans are able to spend on scientific research like this, because the U.S. government throws our money at its military. We have so much surplus military gear, that the government is giving assault vehicles to small-town police departments and schools. It’s ridiculous.
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Sorry Sniff, I agree with a bulk of what you post here, but on this one we disagree. The search for knowledge is critical to the human race, and the fact that SOMEONE is still asking questions, and creating ways to find answers to those questions, is very encouraging to someone like me. The fact that it’s a consortium of European countries doing this and not us is disappointing to me, but It’s a brief distraction from the questions OUR gov’t is asking: who’s in charge of a woman’s vagina, why isn’t the church more involved in government, how can we make sure the poor stay fucked, etc.
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I had a PBJ for lunch. I don’t know how that fixes global economic problems… but it was a good sandwich.
Rosetta wasn’t designed to do any of the things you mention. The spin-offs from the basic science research do have many applications in everyday life. Go rub a lamp if you want a godlike wish.
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