re: #56 danarchy

I agree, unmanned missions are great for setting the stage, but a human being can do in minutes what it could take a rover weeks to accomplish. Also, as exciting as robotic missions can be, there is nothing like a manned mission to inspire whole generations of people into science and exploration.

Unless it ends in tragedy. The Moon is one thing, sending people to Mars, months of space travel away from earth, is an order of magnitude more difficult and dangerous.