Yes
It depends on the entity, and whether or not there are hidden motives. Even those probably benefit someone, but maybe not humanity as a whole.
On R&D, yes. On commodification, no.
A lot of that R&D mainly benefits the military. But there are some things that do benefit humanity.
Space travel has plenty of practical value. Whether that value accrues to humanity as a whole has little to do with the inherent properties of space travel and more to do with social relations.
weather satellites are pretty cool.
As a Space Nerd™ here are my two cents:
- Satellites: Very worth it. Loads of benefits.
- Space telescopes, probes and robotic missions: Costly, but the science return is great.
- Human travel: Not great cost/benefit, but great for national morale. Crewed low Earth orbit laboratories like the International Space Station also allow for faster and more advanced experimentation than an automated platform.
Exploring space helps us understand and also monitor our planet better and also brings technology forward. Especially satellites might be one of the most benifical technologies emerging from space travel.
Until humanity is taken care of – space is an unnecessary travel destination. Space research doesn’t require inhabiting planets. Not yet. Let’s get fusion figured out and end scarcity. Then we can talk about playing on cloud platforms over Venus or playing with hydrocarbons on Titan.
i dont really care for the idea of human travel. the world is so ginormous that you can travel your whole life and not see everything so its not like we have a thirst to travel outside.
Depends on who is traveling where and what for.
Actually trained astronauts exploring the solar system to learn and advance human knowledge and science? Yes.
A bunch of rich fucks showboating their wealth for some zero G selfies and jerking off their own egos? No.
Depends who’s doing it.
