Possibly the most useless news story of the week…
December 13th, 2007 at 10:37am
…and perhaps the most useless scientific study of the year.
TWO scientists studying at the Australian National University are part of an international team that has discovered the Milky Way galaxy actually spins in different directions.
In their paper to be published in the journal Nature, the scientists describe how the outer edge of the Milky Way, the halo, is made up of two components that rotate in opposite directions.
(Source: Herald Sun: Milky Way ‘likes it both ways’)
Can anybody explain to me why we are funding studies like this when we could be using that funding to find a cure for cancer or any number of other medical ailments?
Samuel
Entry Filed under: General News
4 Comments
1. randombrainwave | December 13th, 2007 at 12:49 pm
c’mon samuel. you don’t agree that discovering how the universe works is important? not only that, they’re astrologists, not cancer-cure-discovering-scientists. they would be completely useless in that area.
2. Samuel | December 13th, 2007 at 3:47 pm
Oh no, the study of how universe works is quite fascinating and has many practical benefits…but this doesn’t really seem to fit in to that category, it seems to fit in to the category of how the universe was created, a study with minimal practical benefit, and something that, no matter how much evidence can be collected, will only ever be theory, and will be doubted by many millions, possibly billions of people.
It could just be me, but I see medical research as being more deserving of funding.
I could be wrong, and I think you disagree with me, so please, enlighten me.
By the way, I’m pretty sure the astronomers won’t appreciate being confused with the newspaper fortune tellers, although I’m sure that they’ll understand “astrologist” was a typo and forgive you. I don’t think they will forgive me though.
3. randombrainwave | December 13th, 2007 at 7:41 pm
Damn it! You’re right. Too many new-age girlfriends have ruined my brain. Bloody hippies and their free love, I always get astronomy/astrology mixed up.
I just think that anything that adds to the combined total of human knowledge can only be for the greater good. Cancer research is important, but funds shouldn’t be diverted from astronomy research. You could quite easily make the case that there are many other branches of research that should be diverted to cancer, and frankly, cancer research does pretty well anyway.
4. act | December 15th, 2007 at 11:53 am
Then sam you believe that the spin offs from the Apollo program were a waste of time…. especially the medical ones.
http://space.about.com/od/toolsequipment/ss/apollospinoffs.htm
You need to open your mind boy-oh you never know where the next innovation will come from.