Comment: Re:totally bogus argument (Score 1) 46
This is another point against anyone who claims NASA, and going to space in general, is a complete waste of money.
This has always been a totally bogus argument, because you can't do a controlled experiment. Suppose that the US had never engaged in the Cold War propaganda exercise known as the space race. Later, suppose that the US had never gotten into pork-barrel projects such as the space shuttle and the ISS. What would the world have been like? We have no way of figuring out what scientific advances would have been made in this alternate history.
Although your point is true, the argument is that NASA and going to space in general is not a complete waste of money. No one is claiming that investing the money otherwise could not have yielded better results; in which case a controlled experiment would be required.