Everyone I know who says that going to Mars is a ‘waste of resources’ gives me too high a number for how much they think NASA is getting. I say, ‘How much do you think they’re getting on your tax dollar?’ They say 10 percent, 15 percent. It’s one-half of one penny (per taxpayer). And you’re gonna attack NASA for its one-half of one penny, and say its ‘spending it on the wrong things,’ when NASA is a force of nature unto itself to inspire a generation to wanna become scientifically literate?! And one of the greatest problems this nation has today is the absence of science literacy!
Dr. NEIL DeGRASSE TYSON, responding to host Bill Maher saying that going to Mars is “a waste of resources,” on Real Time.
Fuck yeah.
