To the Editor:
Do we really need a space program that will carry astronauts to Mars?
According to the Nobel laureate Steven Weinberg, the manned space program “masquerades as science.” You could say it is a spectator sport, having about the same relationship to science that intercollegiate football has to education.
V. K. Balakrishnan
Cedar Park, Tex., Feb. 9, 2010
Note from KBJ: This is an interesting analogy. Can you think of any relevant disanalogies?
Keith Burgess-Jackson, J.D., Ph.D. 