Debate: Should mankind invest in the exploration of space?
Side: yes

Second: Mr. Aveskde, you said, "Prove it. I follow parsimony, you do not." As I recall, you brought up the argument that there are tons of other planets like Earth. Due to the burden of proof, you are the one that has to prove it.I really wish that people understood how the burden of proof works. When circumstances are equal, the one making positive and negative claims has to back them up. When there are unequal positions, the one on the fringe has to back his claims up, because the established ideas have the majority of evidence in their favour.It is established in cosmology and astronomy that planetary formation is natural, and commonplace due to accretion. It is established that the elements for planets like Earth are not unique to it, and many are quite common. It is established that stars form naturally and commonly.http://periodictable.com/Properties/A/UniverseAbundance.html http://earthguide.ucsd.edu/virtualmuseum/ita/03_2.shtml All the conditions in this universe are ripe for the formation of uncountable planets. A fraction of those will be within the habitable zone. A fraction of those will have liquid water, and atmosphere formation. When dealing with large numbers, it makes claims that the earth is unique sound specious. Therefore I put it to you, same as him, what makes Earth unique in the universe, unable to be created elsewhere?Once again, there is little proof of this. With all of the solar and exosolar planets we've found, none of them come even remotely close to meeting the requirements for Earth-like life.We've barely sampled the cosmos. What you're saying is like the man who puts a cup into the ocean, comes out with no whales, and concludes that they do not exist in the waters. Already we have spotted Gliese 581 d, which has the potential to be an earth-like planet. There is no reason to think we won't find more, and that eventually we may find ways to get more data about those planets.Slippery slope, or something like that.No it isn't. It is a replacement of his pompous language with the underlying message in plain text.Here's a fact: no human was around at the beginning of the universe. There is no written records from anywhere around that time.There are photographic records from that period. Our telescopes do not merely see great distances from us, they can see back in time, on the order of billions of years. The early universe is observed by measuring Cosmic Background Radiation.http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/729750.stm http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2000/ast27apr_1/ The big bang is a theory supported by some evidence, but it's still a theory, and in the end you still have to have faith that it's true.It is the only theory that explains Cosmic Background Radiation. Odd how religious people will have faith in things which are supported only by emotions but won't trust that which is supported by evidence. Selective scepticism, really.I really don't want to go into the 'does god exist or not' argument, as it really has little to do with the idea of space exploration, but I'd say that God also has some evidence going for him.There is none, actually. Every single claim for the existence of god has either been shown to be wrong, has a natural explanation, or is an outright fabrication. This makes perfect sense because religious people have defined god to be supernatural, which means that in addition to making their god unfalsifiable (so they can always believe in him), their god can never have evidence. That's the double-edged blade of supernatural beliefs.You have no more proof that primitive man invented god than you do that the big bang happened. To turn your belief-centered reasoning back on itself, I'll hit you with a phrase similar to yours.I have no proof? Have you ever studied a single religion besides the one you were raised to believe in? Have you never studied ancient and extinct religions? To make a claim like yours one has to be completely oblivious to foreign cultures.http://www.religioustolerance.org/relcomp.htm http://meta-religion.com/World_Religions/Ancient_religions/ancient_religions.htm Just try studying other religions, and their cultures, and you'll see that they are limitless creative constructs with no common points about their gods."What you actually said was:My answer is the authority of quite-possibly damned heathens. They were not there when the universe began, but I'd rather trust in their account than the Almighty Creator and Ruler of the universe."Just food for thought.That is a non-sequitur. There is nothing that demonstrates or could demonstrate that an alleged "Almighty Creator and Ruler of the Universe" is communicating with us. Therefore you cannot claim that kind of authority.