Ocean vs. Space

Early on in the term the class watched a show of TEDTalks. In this show, Robert Ballard discussses the need for further ocean exploration and contrasts the vast amounts of money being spent on space exploration compared to the measly pocket change that's tossed to ocean research. In his opinion the area of interest should be the oceans, not space, as it is literally right on our doorstep, and is something that can be of immediate value to us. It would be interesting to do a study on what opinion the public has towards this conflict of interest and whether they agree with Robert Ballard or not. Perhaps they would say that exploration in general is not something that should receive much attention or funding, space, ocean or otherwise in concequence to the economic challenges that are facing many of the worlds nations at the moment.

Personnaly I am torn between the two groups. Great benefits can come of ocean exploration and space development alike, and as a geography student, the discovery of the unknown is always an exciting place to be. But we must face reality at the same time. With less money to go around, areas of priority must be addressed. Both space and ocean exploration must be put into perspective of the larger issues. More money should go to food management. While this includes ocean fisheries it must expand across the continents to include better crop and fertilizer management to ensure the continual maximum sustainable yield that our land has to offer. Money should also be allocated to poverty reduction and the education system. While the concept of exploring and making new discoveries in the interest of mankind, it may be wiser to attend to mankind directly.

However, if a decision needed to be made between the oceans and space, the oceans seem to be the wiser choice of the two. Beyond the region where our satellites orbit, space exploration yields little immediate impact on humanity, the oceans however have a substantial influence on most aspects of life on this planet and as so we should attempt to have as deep (parden the pun) an understanding of them as possible.