In the beginning, there was darkness and in that darkness stood a body containing all mass, energy, and space-time; and in less than a millionth of a second came forth a bang of all mass, energy, and space-time that ever was and ever will be. After billion of years humans came into the picture; and with the coming of humanity the universe finally had a way to experience itself, through us. Humanity has always gazed upon the night sky always wondering, questioning, dreaming, even before our long recorded history, but for most of these questions, wonders, and dreams, they could only be put in the realm of mere speculations and theories. The 19th and 20th century's could be considered to be the epicenter for the ground work in subjects including …show more content…
Most debate and controversies surrounding space exploration could be seen becoming most prevalent after the cold war when the Soviet Union collapsed. As both the U.S and Russia's past rivalry were left behind, the incentive for space exploration dwindled and eventually became more about a "cheaper" and "faster" way to provide results. The result from a "cheaper" and "faster" method has made a post-cold war generation question the mere importance of space exploration. Matters that include poverty, war, disease, or politics have become more prevalent in the 21st century. People today raise many arguments including the mere cost of just funding space programs, let alone send a shuttle to space. Why spend billions of dollars to send a few people into space when there are homeless people starving on Earth? The cost of space travel is a reasonable point that most people for and against space exploration would agree with. A simple reason people in favor of space exploration would agree with a cost argument is due to a growing concern with where billions of dollars of funding is going and how …show more content…
The first point which should be raised is the massive size of the universe; so massive that if a spacecraft was to travel to the nearest star system (4.2 light years from Earth) going significantly faster than a speeding bullet than it would take approximately 70,000 years to reach. The second point is that nothing in the universe can exist in the present. Everything that is perceivable exists in the past, e.g., a man standing 3 feet away from his dog would technically see his dog 0.00000003 seconds in the past; and this is due to light having a speed limit. Thus, 0.00000003 seconds would be the amount of time it takes for the dogs light to travel to the man's eyes. The speed of light is applied to everything in the universe when it comes to measuring distance and time. The reason why an alien threat, caused by space exploration, would be an unlikely scenario is because if an alien observing Earth today from they're world(e.g., 3,000 light years away) then the alien would perceive Earth as it was 3,000 years ago and vice versa. They're would be no motive for an alien race to invade. A foreign invader doesn't particularly have to be a living alien to be deadly, the fact of the matter is that there are plenty of "end of the world" asteroids, solar flares, and