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Most of the scientists I know would be thrilled to see humans exploring space, landing on Mars, for example — they just don’t think that science should pick up the check. Many of them were suspicious of the shuttle, both because of the cost drain and because making instruments like the space telescope compatible with it would compromise the potential science, restricting them to low earth orbit, for example, and making them hostage to the exigencies of human spaceflight.
But politically, if not technically, the shuttle and the space telescope needed each other.
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Given that NASA says that right now we don’t know how to get to Mars and Back without the possiblity of a serious dose of radiation since it would take at least 3 years to do. It seems that just combining the technology of autonomous driving that DARPA has been working on with proved rover technology could lead to more through exploration at much less cost and danger to human life. Although rather than the serious upsizing and complexification of the new rover I would rather have built 4 or 5 more copies of spirit and opportunity and set them loose on different pieces of Mars. Then also build similar rover types for the moon. Humans are expensive and hard to support at a distance and nominally need to be returned to the earth a silicon explorer does not have that problem.