We imagine that in the future, the human species will expand and learn to live on other worlds, creating life where there was nothing. For years we have thought that it would only be the subject of one’s fantasy, but now, NASA is attempting to make that dream a reality by trying to send a crewed mission to the moon in 2024 and seeing the conditions that are required to live there. However, what implications will this have on other factors, such as the economy, politics, and what will arise of this scientifically?
A good place to start is, how much will this all cost? NASA requested an extra $1.6 billion to be added to the 2020 budget. This would be quite controversial on its own, but they are also planning to take the money from Pell Grant Reserves, which gives money to financially struggling students. This is outrageous to me as if you know anything about modern day colleges, you know that a lot of students barely have enough money to keep up rent and they are taking more away from them. How do they expect students to pay for their courses? To add to this, they are not taking any money away from other NASA projects to fund this. Now, this can be a good or bad thing, depending on how you look at it. It’s good for the people included in those other projects as it means they will still have money to function to their full extent without being limited by budget too badly, but it can be seen as a bad thing to the people who are being affected by the cuts to education, as they will have to work in worse conditions than before the budget cuts, such as fewer adults in the classes providing support, larger class sizes and less attention for individual pupils.
At the forefront of these plans to take even more away from the students of America is President Trump. Trump declared in May that he wanted for Americans to “return to space in a BIG WAY!” and to do so he’s pushing NASA towards a hasty, yet-to-be-funded goal for 2024. The question has arisen that do the politicians of the United States really want to take money away from education? Not only would it affect the youth but it would also make people look at the party in a negative light, meaning that they may lose their voters in the next election. On the subject of elections, some have even speculated that the original plan behind this was to give more reasons for people to re-elect Trump in the next election, as the project would take place in a possible second term of Trump. This is now being re-evaluated due to the impact on education.
However, even though the talk of students having less to work with and the possibility of a second Trump term is quite negative, the scientific side of things is quite positive. The moon can actually help us understand how the entire solar system was formed and how it developed. The surface of the moon is around 3.5 billion years old and it’s many craters and scars tell the story of the environment of our solar system from when it was created. When the moon gets hit by a crater, it remains there permanently unchanged for the rest of time, unlike on Earth, where life and tectonic plates slowly erase this natural history from the surface of our planet. The moon rocks brought back from the Apollo missions helped scientists understand that the surface of the moon was formed from an ocean of magma, just like the Earth, and the data lent evidence to the hypothesis that the moon was formed when a Mars-like object hit the Earth billions of years ago. Going back and collecting more samples, particularly from the far side of the moon which have never been collected before, will give scientists a more detailed look into the history of the solar system. Another reason to venture to the moon is to do more research on how to travel further afield. If humans are going to become an interplanetary species, we’re going to have to learn how to live in the unfamiliar environment of space. This moon mission is a great opportunity to report what the conditions of living on another mass in space is like. We could also use resources on the moon, like water, trapped in ice, which exists on the moon, to help keep those moon missions going.
If this project goes ahead, in addition to being a scientific breakthrough, it could also go down in history. As part of the project, NASA is planning to send the first woman ever to the moon, as the only 12 humans that have previously been on the moon are all male and it’s about time we sent women up there, both to see if there is any difference of the effect of the moon's gravity and environment, and because it would be great to show how women can do things just as well as men, probably even better! There are also talks of possible inhabitants on the moon, which, I think, could be the start of a new space faring age of mankind. If we are able to do this, we could use this research to travel further afield in space and humans could become an interplanetary species, and then, who knows what incredible things humans will do in the future!
So, should we return to the moon? It’s a very good question, with both positive and negative outcomes anyway you look at it. I have looked at how it would affect politics, the government's budget and the science of the solar system, and given reason to be for and against the moon missions. Currently, I am undecided whether the benefits would be worth the negative points made or not and I will require deeper analysis before making a decision.