@SamanthaJaneSmith @coreyspowell well, I don't generally want to argue. I am not really scientist, partly for dumb reasons, which I regret now, partly simply because the required decisions would be needed at age, when I was not ready for it, may it was about the era our country was going through... I was too much hypnotized by "informatics" taking over everything. It was the mindset, which finally resulted in current LLM bubble, RAMageddon, etc. But I did not have enough concentration and focus anyway. Who knows, what could I focus on, if there was no programming around.

But I am fan of basic research and scientific knowledge. The "manned spaceflight vs. science funding" is mostly artificial political dilemma, and it could be compared to competitive sports vs. availability of some sport activity for public. There can be synergies on many levels.

You could argue, that particle colliders suck funding from other fields of basic research. Sometimes you just bet on certain direction of research and sometimes you spend money finding nothing. Eg. manned spaceflight, while basically just publicity stunt, would be probably better investment, than some attempts on dark matter detection. Maybe better publicity stunt, than "please give us money, so we can find nothing and prove it". I mean, there are worse scams, but sometimes, finding nothing with high level of signifixanxe is not the best message for general public, while cool space selfie may be much better message :masto_wink:

I don't want to join the general speticism about physics, which may be even somehow encouraged by climate change deniers. There are some parts of physics, which can be locally tested and are well known and probably won't be disproved any time soon. But at the same time, I would definitely invest into fine tuning of technologies for storing energy, instead of building larger collider. Sorry. There are real technological needs with political consequences...