Planetary Radio: Space Exploration, Astronomy and Science - Space science under fire: Your questions answered

Episode Date: May 21, 2025

As debates over NASA's future heat up, questions about the value of space exploration are popping up everywhere. This week on Planetary Radio, we're tackling the tough questions head-on with The Planetary Society's staff, including Casey Dreier, chief of space policy, and Ambre Trujillo, digital community manager. They break down the biggest misconceptions about space science, public versus private investment, and why exploration still matters in an ever-changing world.  Then Jack Kiraly, director of government relations, joins us for a space policy update. We discuss the growing movement to save NASA science, how community action is ramping up, and what’s happening behind the scenes on Capitol Hill.  And in What's Up with Bruce Betts, we explore some of the most recent NASA spinoffs, technologies developed for space that are making life better here on Earth. Discover more at: https://www.planetary.org/planetary-radio/2025-space-science-under-fireSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Can space exploration continue to thrive in a changing world? And why does it matter for all of us? We'll address some hard questions this week on Planetary Radio. I'm Sarah Al Ahmed of the Planetary Society, with more of the human adventure across our solar system and beyond. As many of you know, NASA is facing the largest proposed budget cut in its history, threatening missions, technological advancements, and our understanding of the universe. Today I'm joined by Casey Dreyer, our chief of space policy, and Amber Trujillo, our digital

community manager, to break down the toughest questions people are asking us about NASA's budget. Then Jack Corelli, our Director of Government Relations, returns with an update on the growing community movement to save NASA science. He'll share how organizations, student groups, and even podcasts are stepping up to protect space exploration. And as always, we'll wrap up with What's Up with Bruce Betts, where we'll discuss some of the most recent NASA spinoff technologies that are making our lives better here on Earth. If you love planetary radio and want to stay informed about the latest space discoveries, make sure you hit that subscribe button on your favorite podcasting platform.

By subscribing, you'll never miss an episode filled with new and awe-inspiring ways to know the cosmos and our place within it. Before we jump into our conversations for today, I want to take a moment to celebrate all of the graduates out there. It's that time of the year again. Whether you're finishing high school, college, or earning that advanced degree, you did it! Your hard work and perseverance have brought you to this moment, and you should be proud. A special congratulations to Finley, the son of our audio editor, for graduating high school. We're cheering you on, and we can't wait to see what you do next. And speaking of bright futures, it's moments like these that remind us why space exploration matters.

It's about pushing boundaries, asking huge questions, and fighting for the discoveries that are going to shape our understanding of our universe and ourselves. But not everyone sees it that way. As debates around space exploration heat up online, so do the questions. And sometimes they're not exactly friendly. With NASA's future in the spotlight, misconceptions and doubts are spreading fast. To help set the record straight, I invited Casey Dryer, our chief of space policy, and Amber Trujillo, our digital community manager, to join me for a Q&A. We're diving headfirst into the toughest and most common questions people

are asking about NASA's role, the value of space science, and why all of this matters. Hey, Casey and Amber, thanks for joining me. Hey. Hi. So space exploration has always sparked some really big questions and some bold opinions, especially when it comes to how it's funded. And with all this recent news about proposed budget cuts

for NASA, we've been dealing with this surge of debate. So I'm going to be asking you some questions that we've been receiving online. I apologize ahead of time if any of these seem rude, but I'm speaking for the anonymous person on the internet. Amber, are anonymous people rude online? Do you have any experience? Oh no, never.

Right? But I also feel like in some ways, the anonymity allows people to ask questions they might have been too scared to ask publicly. It's great to get questions if you're embarrassed to ask them. I love answering all types of questions about space and how space works. I love doing this. So it's a great opportunity to ask us questions. But just don't be a jerk about it. Yeah.

And to add on to that, I want to say that, especially with my job being in the trenches of social media, I am a huge, huge proponent of asking questions. And I think that our society right now rewards being right over asking questions. And this starts from a young age. And so unfortunately, I don't know about for you guys, but for me growing up, I eventually

was kind of like shamed out of asking questions. So I think that we are kind of seeing a fruition of this because I think a lot of people go through this on social media because people don't know how to ask questions. Sometimes it comes from a statement or a comment or through anger, but I think at the core of it, a lot of people are curious. They just aren't sure how to ask the question that is deeper. And I feel like part of my job is to get people to see what their question really is. And yeah, I think the thing that we're coming up to right now is when do we ask questions? And when is the time to stop asking the questions and taking action? And what I mean by that is you can ask all the questions in the world,

but there's certain situations like in a fire in your home, you're probably not gonna ask the firefighter a million questions, you're gonna take action. And I think in social media right now, people aren't really sure where that line is. And it's our job as science communicators to communicate the time to answer the questions and the time to take action.

So we are in the moment of asking questions, but we are fast approaching the point where we need to start doing the actions before the house is burned down. That was beautifully put, Amber. That was well said. Yeah, now is definitely a critical moment for space science. But it's particularly a critical moment for space science in the United States.

And this speaks to one of the first questions we've been kind of getting a lot recently, which is that why is it so important for the United States to remain a leader in space exploration? And why is this such a priority for us, the Planetary Society, especially considering that we're an international organization? So I'm happy to address that one. One of the reasons is that there's a practical way to think about this, and there's kind of a bigger picture way.

The practical way is that, you know, we are an international organization, but something like 90% of our members are in the United States, we're based in the United States. We know the system here really well. We understand exactly where we need to go, who we need to talk to. And actually very somewhat uniquely, the distance between a citizen and a decision maker when it comes to NASA priorities and budget is very small. You can literally walk into your congressional

representative who maybe is serving on the NASA Appropriations Subcommittee and talk to them. And they have direct ability to write the legislation that then funds NASA. You just really don't have that at other space agencies around the world. There are many more layers between kind of the voter and the policy setting, you know, and that has its advantages and disadvantages in that context. But in terms of just direct way to engage with this, this is where most of our effort goes to, almost as a practical matter, because it's a lot,

it's much less clear how you make that one-to-one connection. In addition to that, why do we want the US to be, well, I mean, the US just at the moment spends, relatively speaking, compared to other nations, just much more on space science and space exploration. As much as I would love other countries to spend more, the US sets a lot. And what the US does in space tends to drive the activities of our international partners. We saw this with Artemis, where a lot of other nations start to join the US with going to

the moon. We see this with a lot of scientific partnerships, and it happens the other way as well. But just by the sheer kind of volume of activities, where the US goes and what it does and doesn't do really has these kind of echoey impacts across the world. And then also like why I want the US and it's I'd say it's not an exclusive claim but I mean broadly in the ideal sense right and how the US has classically operated with its partners with a coalition of its allies and partners. It's kind of exemplified by what's in the Artemis Accords, about what values we're bringing into space. Openness, scientific curiosity, transparency, mutual aid,

respect for kind of historical monuments and places and various places of the solar system. And again, actual, your mileage may vary, I'm kind of like how this actually comes out. But in terms of the ideals being presented, those are the ideals that we want to see. And I'm an American, and I think it's very important to encourage those best ideals, setting

the types of normative behaviors in space, the goals in space, and acting as a way to bring others with us. So that's why we frame it a lot of the way like that. And if someone else wants to, if the other nation wants to send a mission to Europa, we're really excited about that too and we are with with JUS and other missions like that. So when we talk about it in that framing, that tends to be what we mean by it. So we're talking more broadly about NASA and space agencies and what they accomplish in space, but we're in a very different age where it's not

just government entities that are going into space. There are huge numbers of these commercial space companies coming online. Many of them want to do this work in space. Why is it so important that we spend money to try to fund things like NASA when conceivably we could put that out for the commercial entities to do. If NASA does what the private industry, I don't want to say they can't do it, but they really have no incentive to do it, right? I'm sure a private company could make a web telescope if they, you know, invested enough money into it. Fundamental science, like telescopes, don't have an immediate economic return

in the way that something like a rocket does. A rocket you can have payloads on, right? A telescope, it does bring an economic value in the fact that it creates jobs, right? But it's more of a long-term economic value. So like NASA spin-offs are a big thing that come off of a lot of these missions, right? And I think that those are extraordinarily important. They lead to some of the biggest advancements that human beings have ever been able to embark on because of the fact that when you go to space and you do these space science missions, you are forced to think out of the box, right?

So if you have to build a parachute that's going to land a Mars lander on Mars, you have to be able to think about how it's able to withstand an impact. And that forces someone to think outside of the box in different aspects. And then an entrepreneur can come along later and go, oh, you know, that same fiber we can use to protect first responders. But that kind of like out of the box thinking doesn't really happen unless you are forced to think outside of the box in these space missions. And those economic returns happen much, much later. So NASA does and develops these missions

that not only fuel the answers to the questions that we don't have yet, but they also answer the, as Casey would put it, the secular sublime, right? The inspiration behind things. There was a gentleman back in 1962 named John F. Kennedy who posed a very similar question, why go to the moon, right? Well, why do we climb the highest mountain? Why fly across the Atlantic Ocean? And it's because it's not easy, it's because it's hard. And it speaks to the human spirit, right? Why do we make music? Why do we make art? There's something intrinsic in us that, you know, wants to find out more. And private industry, unfortunately, right now, I don't know if this could change, Casey, you can weigh in on this, but there is no immediate profit value into answering those questions. So if they want to be viable as an organization or as a company, they need to make money. And I don't want to villainize profit

because that is what runs our economic society. It's what we build off of, but there is not right now, there are no consumers of fundamental science and research. And NASA exists to advance exploration for the benefit of everyone and not just those who can pay for it. Yeah, that's exactly right, Amber.

And just to build on that, I mean, it's essentially why we have a public sector and a private sector. And we do see this question a lot. So it is worth dwelling on a bit why it can't just SpaceX do it. And Amber, you outlined exactly right, that the incentive structures of private companies who have to answer to investors or, you know, have limited amounts of funds, they are forced to, by necessity, focus on things that have

markets, right? And in space, still, the only real completely commercial market is for sending things up into space and then pointing them back down to Earth. So whether you're taking pictures of Earth or observing Earth in various different wavelengths of light to understand kind of, you know, vegetation and growth and other practical things or weather, or just reflecting communications back and forth between humans, right? That's where the market is. You know, so far as we know, there's no Europeans

on Europa who are willing to pay for Starlink satellites, and so they're not going to send them there. Now that's, again, those are just the fundamental distinctions of a private and public entity. And we created, you know, we, society, the United States in particular, created agencies devoted to the fundamental scientific research of various things starting with the National Science Foundation, adding NASA and others in the wake of World War II, where it turned out that you know World War II was a war largely won by technology and which countries had the most advanced technology and were able to develop it and utilize it. And this famous report by Vannevar Bush, who was the president of MIT to

President Roosevelt at the time, basically laid this argument out, this answer, you know, so if you want to say why doesn't SpaceX do this, read Vannevar Bush's Science, the Endless Frontier. It was published in 1945 because it's the same argument, which is it was published in 1945, because it's the same argument, which is that it is in the national interest to direct investments in things that have uncertain, but potentially foundational levels of payoff in terms of functionally changing forever

the way something works. We owe it to ourselves as humans who exist in the cosmos to better understand the cosmos in which we exist. And NASA science and NASA things like this, you know, again, as Amber said, there's no markets for going to these places and we shouldn't expect private companies to do that. That's not their job. NASA will work with them and their tools to do it. And, you know, as I said, they build rockets. You got to put something on that rocket, right? You can have all the rockets in the world, but if they don't build something to go on top of it, what do you do with them?

If you send humans to Mars without kind of a scientific purpose, what are they going to do there? Just stare at the wall, right? Or just, you know, dig things. It's a foundational responsibility of the public sector. And we have seen this over and over again, while individuals, and we've seen this with Jeff Bezos and other wealthy individuals have made infrastructure to even send themselves into space,

we have not seen any wealthy individual commit to building a science mission to Enceladus or Neptune or a space telescope, right? We haven't seen any individual foundation or commercial company build their own scientific spacecraft because it just doesn't make any sense financially. The only closest example is perfectly illustration of this rocket labs mission to Venus. Anyone want that you should listen to my interview with Peter Beck CEO of rocket lab. He said, oh yeah, we love Venus.

It's so fun to do, but like we cannot justify working on this unless we have nothing else to do. And so it is a nights and weekend project. It is a hobby. And you can't build a leading scientific research capability on hobby time, right? And so this is a unique responsibility. It is a profound responsibility.

And it is a perfect example of where we should actually invest public money in, right? Where commercial sector cannot do these things, and then leverage the tools provided by the commercial sector to do everything else. But this does speak to another question that we get quite frequently, which doesn't have to do with commercial space,

but speaks more broadly to the major financial issues that people are facing here in the United States. I think you've made a good case for the fact that NASA spinoffs and things like that are a result of this kind of research. But people still ask all the time, why should we be spending money on space science when there are so many more urgent financial issues that we have to deal with and larger issues that people are dealing with here at home? Well, if you look at, you know, so I'm a budget guy, right? Anyone who listens to my show, I love numbers, not just because I'm nerdy about them,

but I think they, you know, words are free, clearly, right? I'm using a lot of them. And so people can say lots of things. Policies are free to write, but you can only spend a dollar or once, or a euro once, or whatever. And so what you actually spend your money on is a true, in a sense, reveals what your actual priorities are as a nation, as a person, whatever,

because you ultimately have a limited number of them to spend. So if we look through that lens, I'd say we have ethically, overwhelmingly, the correct response to that question, which is the vast majority of what the United States, at least, as a nation, spends its money on, 75% of it, is for social and medical programs, for the elderly and for the poor. That's 75% of our annual budget. National defense takes up about a sixth,

and then everything else that includes NASA fits in that last little bit. And so NASA as a proportion of how we spend our money is 0.3%. If you round the percentages that we spend in our space program to the closest digit, we spend 0% of our money as a nation on NASA. If you look at what NASA science does, that's a third of that. So 0.1% is what NASA at science costs, right? If you look at the overall amount of money we spend, we spend it on very immediate social and national interest needs. NASA is a high risk, high reward,

small portion of our, in a sense, national investment portfolio. So you could cut NASA, you know, I like to say it this way. If you take all the money we have ever spent cut NASA, you know, I like to say this way, if you take all the money we have ever spent on NASA, going back to 1959, fiscal year 59, the first year it existed, add that up, adjust for inflation, and you subtract it from just this one year in the United States' budget deficit, we would still run a budget deficit. So NASA could have never existed,

and we basically would have the same financial situation. So it is not where we want to focus our attention. If people are serious about money and either saving it or applying it to things, there are other areas to focus on. And I think on top of that, a lot of people are concerned about how they're going to pay for rent or gas prices. Are they going to be able to even go to work or buy the food that they need for their babies?

I think that's okay to ask. But I think what is sometimes a challenge to communicate is what you've been saying a lot, Casey, is the fact that this is making the lives of you and your children better in the long run. Why? Because societies that invest in science and technologies remain leaders on a global scale. And I think they're just more dynamic too. Societal, like you're, we're constantly have to ingest new information and challenge our beliefs and just novel information, I think is critical in the society. Absolutely. and you look at all of the societies that have risen and have fallen, and the societies that began to thrive were the ones that invested in science and technology. I just think that you have to reframe it in the sense that this is creating jobs for us in the economy, and then, for us in the economy and then, you know, down the road, it is providing opportunities for our children

to have better paying jobs or whatever it might be. But it also strengthens our national security. A lot of people are concerned about, you know, war and all of these things and learning about where we are as a nation and what our values are as a nation. It really is an expression of that. Do we value that curiosity, that cooperation in that discovery? So I think it's a bigger picture thing and it's hard for a lot of people to think in

that bigger picture element because of the fact that they are worried about getting groceries that week and I get it. I get it. It's the fact that this is what defines and ultimately helps a nation and a society thrive. And yeah that's basically why you know science investing in education and science and technology is so important too. But the space science and the missions and everything that, what that ultimately gives us is the opportunity to live better lives. I think it's building on that.

It's this idea that there's something to look forward to, and that there's something bigger than ourselves, and that you or your children or their children will have the most astonishing and wonderful and amazing opportunities to be part of that, to learn about it, to live in a time when they had a deeper and more profound understanding of their own place, and always have something to look in the distance and aspire to that is welcoming and bringing them all together to say, let's do this together and figure it out. That the world is not ossified and static and diminished, but in fact, we are just,

as Carl Sagan said, just dipping our toes into this cosmic ocean. And it's so much bigger and weirder and stranger and more wonderful than we had ever imagined. That is really enlivening. And to be able to pursue that, to realize that we're among the very first humans in what, more than a quarter million years of humans existing on this earth who are able to think about this and pursue it at the same time, that's something to treasure.

Why would we walk away from that? Why would we deny ourselves or our children's opportunities to participate in that the world is so much bigger? And even becoming much more prosaic, I've always said that, do you want, like if you're worried, you know, in terms of economics, NASA gives that minimum a three to one economic boost to wherever they spend their money.

Do you want, would you rather or rather not have a NASA center in your neighborhood, right? Would you rather have all that investment and future oriented individuals and maybe yourself, like working at these institutions or serving them or, you know, there's huge economic benefits wherever we put that funding. And on top of that, then we get to unlock, you know, maybe why we would that maybe there's life beyond Earth and we now know that for the first time. So it's all the way from this big esoteric kind of sense of self down to this practical

pure economic benefit. It is a worthwhile thing to do. And I think another maybe another way to think about this too. Every other nation is trying to make a space program pretty much. It can't be that bad of an idea, right? They can't all be misguided or something, you know, the same way they want to build and create these avenues and opportunities and potentials and be a part of this big endeavor as well. And that says that there is a fundamental value to this idea that goes beyond this political situation that we're facing now.

I think that people tend to think about either or, right? We have to either have space science or we protect Earth. And space science is actively protecting Earth through our missions. We have telescopes looking for potentially hazardous asteroids. We have satellites that are tracking wildfires and droughts and helping to save people

every single day. We are learning how to filtrate water filtration through technologies that we use on the ISS or on Mars, and then we can bring it back home and use it here at home. We are actively addressing those financial issues on Earth through space science. So they are not mutually exclusive. They work together in many ways. Yeah, I feel like this might be a problem of people's exposure to understanding what technologies are spun off from NASA

I've gotten questions all over the board, you know, why why invest all of this money? But everything from your ability to get LASIK to the camera in your phone comes from space exploration So maybe it's just an issue of people's awareness of these kinds of spin-off technologies I think also there's a function of how we talk about space. This is for deep cut. This was, I think, literally my first article I ever wrote for planetary.org, which is a surprising number of years ago now, but it was in the wake of the Curiosity rover. And something I observed then that I still observe now is that the way people talk about a NASA mission, the cost of that mission is part of the title of it. So it was always the $2.5 billion Curiosity rover. $2.5

billion, you know, a lot of money. I wish I had $2.5 billion, right? When it's presented that, you know, NASA, what it does, it's so big, literally and figuratively, it's so unique and distinctive and you associate it again with this constant discussion of its cost that I think it creates this perception that everything is this luxury expensive item when in reality social security spends in three days what NASA spends in a year, right? That's like the level of priority

that we've spent on these types of things. That NASA is actually among the smallest national federal agencies in terms of budget compared to, you know, Department of Education, Homeland Security, Transportation, you name it, right? NASA is actually one of the smallest ones. And it's just because what NASA does is so much more visible and unusual that I think it creates this perception of unusual expense when it's actually again, 0.3% of what we spend our money on. So I think it's a, and that's not, I don't blame people for feeling that, that makes sense in terms of how things are presented. And that's why I think this context is always so important.

That's not a luxury item. I think it's a smart, savvy investment in the future and done for again, a fraction. Remember NASA's budget rounds to zero as a percentage of what we spend in the United States every year. And it's just because, you know, and again, $2.5 billion Curiosity Rover,

that's adding up 12 years of expenditures, right? So that's, you know, this, all of this stuff is just spread out like a piece of taffy. You're taking that money and it's just dripped out through the years. And this is why it can add up over time. But again, compared to what we spend on other things, it's modest at best. We'll be right back after the short break. Hi, y'all. LeVar Burton here.

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Members get quarterly mailed packages that take them on learning adventures through the many worlds of our solar system and beyond. Each package includes images and factoids, hands-on activities, experiments and games, and special surprises. A lifelong passion for space, science, and discovery starts when we're young. Give the gift of the cosmos to the explorer in your life. We're also seeing an uptick in this kind of discourse, I think, because of the rise of commercial space. I get asked all the time, why am I advocating so hard for

space exploration, when really I'm just advocating for billionaires going to space and having a joyride. And so I think being able to compartmentalize these two things, what NASA does and space exploration for scientific gain versus going to space to see that overview effect or because you own a rocket company, they're very different types of space exploration, although we want to have as much access to space as possible through whatever means. Yeah, I mean, those billionaires, they're paying for themselves. Most of those, there's no NASA money. Blue Origin now has some money for its human landing system on the moon, but that wasn't what Jeff Bezos was building for otherwise. That was all self-funded. Same

with Virgin Galactic. SpaceX people have purchased those. Notably Elon Musk himself has not gone into space. Kind of interesting now that I think about it. But all of these investments are now available for use by the public sector, paid for by individual billionaires. That's great.

That saves a lot of money in having the taxpayer build new rockets, right? And again, I think there's an interesting broader discussion that maybe we don't have time here to really delve into, but this kind of reputational shift that's happening as we have more individuals going into space, you associate, you know, with human brains, we're tuned to individuals, right?

Social structures or social animals, and individuals have, can be weird or idiosyncratic or frustrating or are cool or whatever, you name it. Harder to do that with an agency, right? And as we add to space by having more individuals own parts, you know, capabilities or themselves go, I think our brains are starting to tune to how we feel about those individuals and apply that backwards to what NASA does, which is for the most part, very distinct. Maybe sometimes NASA will purchase some of those hardware, you know,

services, but that's about it. NASA's mission is not space tourism. The programs that are at risk from this budget cut aren't about sending people to space for fun. And that's kind of what you already touched on, Casey. When people used to think about space, they used to think about NASA, right? And that was the only kind of reference point that they had. And then there's all these other commercial companies that started coming in and they still associated NASA with everybody else. So now we're at this point where it's become a space economy, right? There's all these other, all these different players in space and now it's the job as science communicators to kind of help the public understand that there are differences in, you know, the goals of different organizations, private and public, as you mentioned, Casey.

So I think at this point, it's a communication issue as well. Yeah. And it's something that we really hope that we can get people to understand is that this kind of investment helps all of us here in the United States, but also around the world, and that it is worth this kind of scientific exploration for our own betterment. And because of that, because of the value that NASA has given us, I think even when we first let people know that there was this potential budget cut coming down the line for NASA, I think there were a lot of people out there who were incredulous, thought that was absolutely not going to happen. And even now, people still say that it's fear mongering for us to say that this is something that might actually happen.

And won't Congress stop it, particularly knowing how much economic value this brings to their states? What would you say to that? I hope Congress stops it. I mean, that's why we're asking. I mean, you know, in our democracy, they need to hear from their constituents asking them to stop it. There's a lot going on right now, right? And this is an unusual time in both a function of the gridlock in Congress makes it hard to respond rapidly, and kind of the overall dynamic of kind of turning over a lot of power to the executive

branch, which we don't need to go into, but just in terms of that's just what's happening. And so there's a lot more power under the executive branch than there has been in the past in terms of impacting here. The fundamental issue, and I think it's worth dwelling on this for a second, that yeah, this is very serious. When you have an official budget request out, this is now formal administration policy. That means that NASA, even though this is not approved yet by Congress, anyone at NASA now has to plan accordingly that this will be their budget next year. They cannot make new contracts. They cannot extend contracts into following years for projects that may be canceled.

They have to start planning to ramp things down. They have to not hire people if they would have otherwise hired. They cannot move projects forward the way that they should, right? So this becomes, this is now formal policy. Jared Isaacman, assuming he gets confirmed, will have to champion this because he will be part of the administration. This is administration policy. This is serious. This is very, very serious. And in any situation where Congress does not act, the White House proposal becomes the de facto implementation. And so assuming Congress does not pass an appropriations

by October 1st, the start of this 26 fiscal year, this White House proposal will go into effect. And that is bad. That's terrible. And you know, Congress has not passed a budget on time since late 90s. And so an extended period, and this year they didn't even, they just did a full year of what's called continuing resolution. They never did pass a budget.

So any extended period of congressional uncertainty, which seems very likely considering how tight the margins are in Congress, means that this budget is almost a de facto standard the moment we turn into the next fiscal year. And it's so extreme. And again, I'm not being hyperbolic here. This is, in terms of just NASA top line, the largest single year cut ever proposed ever proposed to NASA If this goes in as proposed this would be NASA's lowest budget adjusted for inflation Since before the first Americans flew into space in 1961 obviously a lot has changed at NASA since 1961 and You know you have to start turning off missions in flight, you have to start turning

off spacecraft, you have to start laying people off. Not clear if you can turn them back on. And so an extended uncertainty where this becomes imposed on NASA will have the same types of consequences and potentially irreparable consequences. So we cannot just assume, I want to assume Congress will fix it and be very clear about it. We have not seen that yet. Maybe that'll change in the next few months. This is why we're asking people to take action to make sure that they do.

But this is, I cannot emphasize enough how serious a situation this is and how deep the potential impacts could be even if six months into the next fiscal year Congress puts some of the money back. Can you get Voyager back if you have to shut it down in interstellar space? Who knows? There's a big misconception, I think, right now that what is happening is we are in debt as a nation and we're trying to cut the fat, right? And this 47% budget cut is just cutting fat. And it is not, it is decimating an agency, not only the missions, but you spoke in your last podcast with Janet Vertesi. And you had a fascinating conversation about how we lose knowledge as humanity. So we're not only cutting those missions, but we're cutting those experts

that hold that institutionalized knowledge that can be passed down to generations. A lot of people ask, how do we lose languages? How do we lose the ability to sculpt these gorgeous buildings? And it's because the people that taught them are not there anymore. And so we're not just trimming the fat, we're not just cutting little things, we're cutting huge missions and people are losing their jobs that have the ability to pass on amazing exceptional knowledge that can only come from years of expertise and years of learning. Can I, I want to add one more thing, because Amber, you mentioned something that I think is really important here, about this idea of trimming the fat

and that we all need to cut because we're in debt. Yes, the US has a lot of debt. The US is spending more than it's taking in. That's been true for a long time. Now, I'm not going to talk about that. I mean, we're not going to touch the larger thing. But yes, I fully acknowledge that, right? However, this is not in the context.

These cuts are not being done in the context of we have to cut everything back and raise revenues to address the debt. I can tell you that because just today as we're recording this, Congress is moving through what's called a budget reconciliation package that is mainly caring for the president's priorities on taxes. And in order to pass that budget reconciliation package, they are required to vote to increase the debt limit by $4 trillion

over the next 10 years. That's the action of the conservative estimate. So the actual policies, and I'm getting, this is not a number I'm making up, this is what they themselves have scored in their own budget reconciliation. So they are moving forward a series of priorities that will increase the overall debt of the United States by a minimum $4 trillion over the next 10 years. So do not tell me that these cuts to NASA science are to trim the fat so we all need to save money

because that is not what is happening at the broad policy level. We are going deeper into debt. This is not the price I wanna pay to do that, given how little this actually impacts this debt, right? Remember how you saw the overall, if you took NASA, rolled it all up in history and added it into one year number,

$4 trillion is two and a half times more than we've ever spent on NASA in history. So that's where we are. So this is not being done in the context of trimming the fat. We are gorging ourselves on debt and cutting the things that we do uniquely and are noble and make us, you know, make us really engage and pursue something special. turn this around and whether or not we actually manage to prevent this budget from going into effect because as you said it is often a thing that Congress passes budgets late or goes into a continuing resolution. No matter what the situation is after that I think all of us as space fans and people who are

passionate about this will continue to fight for this because space exploration and scientific discovery and looking out into the universe and hoping to answer these deepest questions is something that makes us all better. It grows our society and is something that is worth pursuing no matter how many hurdles end up in our way. So whether or not this is the end of this age of space exploration, I am confident that together we can build it back because this is important to all of us. Sarah, I can tell you we will never give up. Never making this point. This is why we are here as the Planetary Society. This is why I worked at the Planet.

This is why I wanted to work and devote my life to working at the Planetary Society. We will never stop making this case. And we do not know how this will turn out. But I do know how it'll turn out if we don't do anything. And so this is the time to, as Amber was saying, this is the time to do something. We give you options to do that at planetarium.org. Save NASA science. It's on our homepage.

Thank you for sending us questions, everyone who has and posted. I'm happy to answer them. And a lot of these questions, we do have an FAQ on that Save NASA Science page that we have linked off our homepage. You can reference them there. If you need more details or questions, email us or submit them. And I think we should do this again. Thank you so much for your thoughtful answers and for helping to answer some of these questions for everyone.

And seriously everyone, if you need to ask any more questions you can contact any of us online at our email. That's planetaryradio at planetary.org. Thanks so much Amber and Casey. Thank you. Thank you. We've heard from Casey and Amber about why space exploration matters and how it drives innovation and discovery. But right now, NASA's future is facing real challenges. To get the latest on the community movement, the growing list of supporters, and what's happening on Capitol Hill, I sat down with Jack Corelli, our Director of Government Relations, for a space policy update.

Hey Jack, welcome back. Hey Sarah, how's it going? Doing alright, all things considering. Hey, Jack, welcome back. Hey, Sarah, how's it going? Doing all right, all things considering. I feel like ever since this situation with NASA's budget began a few months ago for us, I am just every day there's some new thing, but I'm just trying to keep hope in my heart that we can accomplish this and save NASA. Otherwise I will fall to despair.

Yeah, indeed. There seems to always be something new happening in the news. That's maybe why they call it that. Well, thanks for joining me for this update. Let's start out with something we spoke about, I think, two weeks ago. We've been circulating this community letter to try to get as many different science institutions as possible to sign on to our letter saying that we want to save NASA science and hopefully return the on to our letter saying that we want to save NASA science and hopefully return the budget to a sustainable amount that actually prevents us from having to

cancel most of our NASA missions. So where are we at with that community letter right now? So I will say a lot of things are in flux in Washington, here in Washington. There's a lot of angst and anxiety about what's happening next. So there's a lot of angst and anxiety about what's happening next. So there's a lot of angst and anxiety about what's happening next. But where there is not any angst and maybe it's fueled by the angst

is the fact that a huge number of organizations have gotten behind this community letter. So we started off with just a handful of signatories. In fact, it was including the Planetary Society, there were eight of us, right, American Astronomical Society, American Institute for Aeronautics and Astronautics, Coalition for Deep Space Exploration, the Commercial Space Federation, Explore Mars, Incorporated, the Mars Society

and the Planetary Science Institute were sort of these inaugural signatories. And that represents, you know, a lot of those names had society or foundation or something related to that in their name. And, you know, those are the professional societies and advocacy organizations that focus on this. But then you have groups like the Coalition for Deep Space Exploration and Commercial Space Federation,

which are trade associations, which represent the contracting workforce that supports these NASA missions that does a lot of that, the actual bending of metal to build these things. And so you you not only have the sort of legacy advocacy organizations like the Planetary Society and explore bars and Mars Society and the professional societies, but then you also have, you know, the commercial space sector, right? Not just the old primes,

your big Lockheed Martins and Boeings, but also Commercial Space Federation represents a lot of the new and upcoming commercial space organizations. It's astrobotic and SpaceX and Blue Origin are all members of that. And so signing onto this letter is really significant. So that was our original batch of people, eight of us.

We have grown to be a grand total of 19 organizations who have signed onto this letter. And it continues to grow within all those fields, the professional society, scientific associations, private institutions, like the Planetary Science Institute. So we have some of the new ones that have joined us since the letter came out, American Geophysical Union, Open Lunar Foundation, Scientific Society for Astrobiology. We had our first student group join us, the Aggie Space

Initiative at the University of California Davis. I think our first podcast is as well, the Aspiring Martians podcast has joined, Mars Foundation, National Space Society, the Agnostic Life Finding Association, Satellite Industry Association, a lot of associations, Maryland Aerospace Alliance, and the University Space Research Association. Huge swath of the space sector is behind this letter. Basically saying exactly what you just said, Sarah,

which is these cuts are devastating. They cannot stand. This is not a serious proposal. This would surrender leadership in not just space science, but space exploration, the future of the American experience enterprise in space would functionally cease if these cuts were enacted. We spoke a little bit last time

about how Congress people were reacting to this movement and people peppering them with letters and calls and organizations hitting them up to try to save NASA's budget. We also have a congressional letter that's been circulating but the deadline isn't up yet at this point as we're speaking. What is your general read on how people in Congress are feeling about this right now?

I think the energy that people have brought to their meetings on the Hill, to the messages that they've sent, the phone calls that they've made is resonating in the halls of Congress. I've heard from more than one congressional staff person that they have received this message and they are working through their process. They're talking to their boss about ways that they can support, whether it's publicly in the setting of a hearing or a markup for a bill, publicly in the setting of a hearing or a markup for a bill, or if it's behind the scenes in conversations with the administration, they are looking for ways to be supportive. And one of those ways is this congressional letter,

what we call an appropriations request letter, basically a group of members of Congress going to the appropriations committee, the people who dole out the money year after year, and asking them to reject these cuts outright. They're unserious. They have all these horrible consequences and reinvest, recommit to the science program at NASA. The specific number that the letter asks for is that 9 billion, which is the slightly above the inflation adjusted peak funding for NASA science under the first Trump administration. So we have an administration that has done this before, that has fully funded NASA science before,

and we have a growing chorus of people in Congress who agree with this. I will say, when we did this letter last year, granted the stakes were not as high, but when we did this letter last year, we had 44 signatories. That's 10% of the House of Representatives. And a Senate letter did not happen last year, but is in the works this year.

10% of the House of Representatives said that this was important to them. And obviously we have a continuing resolution for the full fiscal year. So ultimately that request didn't make it into the final bill because it's just the flat funding from the previous year. As of recording this, the deadline is still open. So I don't want to put a number to it, but I'm going to tell you it's significantly more than 44.

And so if you're listening and this is enticing to you, you want to know how many signatories have, have added their name to this letter, head on over to planetary.org slash save NASA science to our action hub. It's also available on our homepage because it's that important. And there is a whole section called latest updates and all of this information on the community letter, new signatories on that, updates on this congressional letter, updates just about the process, what's going on, why are we hearing about this now? What is the next step?

What does this hearing mean? All that stuff is going to be there on the Action Hub. It is your one-stop shop to learn about this budget crisis that we are in with NASA and how you can be a part of the solution. People are putting in the effort. And thank you so much, everyone out there. Seriously, you're giving me some hope

in times that are a little troubling, and I really really appreciate it but let's all remember we're not just doing this for the United States and for NASA we're doing this for all of humanity because we're all in this together and if we can make sure that this funding continues to go to NASA that's opportunities for everyone around the world to learn more about the universe and to collaborate together on something beautiful that truly makes us better as a species. So I really appreciate, I love everyone so deeply for helping us in this effort. And just, you know, I do go through and like read some of the messages that people send. And sometimes when I'm feeling down about what's going on, I'll go through and see some of the

things that that people have sent. And it's so heartwarming to see like what NASA means, what space science and exploration means to people all over the United States. And again, this is just looking at the United States and I'm really looking forward to rolling out some opportunities for our folks around the globe to participate in these actions. But seeing the stories that people are sharing and the things that

people have sent is really heartwarming. And again, the Action Hub is where it's at. It's your clearinghouse of everything you need to know about the budget process, about actions that are happening. Everything's going to live there. So please bookmark it like I have and make sure you're checking that. And please feel free to reach out, especially if you, you know, this is your first time doing it or you want, you want to take those extra steps, writing an op-ed, calling your member or setting up meetings with your member of Congress. Please feel free to reach out. We are here to support the public's enthusiasm for space science and exploration.

And it is not just my duty and job, but my pleasure to work with people from all across the United States and across the world to advance this noble cause. Well, let us not go quietly into that good night and keep fighting that good fight, Jack. Indeed, indeed. Thanks, Sarah.

Hearing about all of the advocacy happening to save NASA science is inspiring. And it's a powerful reminder of how space exploration shapes our world. From life-saving medical technologies to everyday conveniences like memory foam or camera sensors, space innovation goes far beyond rockets and rovers. We'll hear more about some of the most recent NASA spinoffs next in What's Up with our Chief Scientist, Dr. Bruce Betts. Hey, Bruce! Hi, Sarah! Well, this week we got a chance to talk about some of the misconceptions that people have about NASA and space exploration. And a big part of that conversation actually was about the cool spin-off technologies that happen because of space exploration. And if people want to learn more,

I'm going to leave a link to the NASA spin-off website on this webpage for this episode of Planetary Radio. But I wanted to give people a small taste of some of the more recent spin-offs that NASA is sharing with people. So I wanted to go with you through some of the 2025 developments in NASA spin-offs. What are some of your favorites? Well, anything that does new families of composite plastics, I'm excited. Any kind of revolution in material engineering, I think is really interesting because it's something that allows us to build new things

in ways we wouldn't have thought of before. And why are you gonna build something that can brave space unless you have to actually launch it. Well, there you go. But they find clever ways to adapt into these industries. So this one, I would just want to mention not only as composite materials, which are very popular now, uh, and used all over the place, but also as aerogel, the world's least dense solid that was developed for planetary missions,

making them lightweight and fire resistant and water repellent and sound damping. I think it also keeps ghosts away, but I'm not sure. Who are you going to call? NASA. NASA. And what about batteries? Do you like batteries? I like batteries. I mean, super useful. They're very useful. A Hubble, remember that thing launched way back when? Well, they developed some groovy nickel-hydrogen, nickel-nichol-hydrogen batteries for Hubble that now are being used for all sorts of things in the world.

And what do you think about, what are your opinions on gecko feet? Gecko feet? Yes, they've developed like synthetic gecko feet kind of things where they can grip flat surfaces. And that's being used to buy, for example, buy flip stick for phone accessories, but sticking to different surfaces. So, Oh, that would be so useful. The number of times I've tried to mount a speaker in my shower, as an example, only to have that suction cup just fall right off. Yeah, no, that's really annoying. I've played that game, not with speakers, but I've had many a thing fall on me in the

shower and I no longer use this little suction cup things. Yeah, but if I had a gecko to hold those things, then I'd be set. It's really interesting because every time I have conversations with people about these NASA spinoffs, they assume that, you know, maybe there's some tech that is going to be working for big aerospace industry and things like that. And there are definitely those types of spinoffs, but when you start getting to things like, you know, the CCD chip in your phone, which was made for New Horizons or Lasik surgery,

people don't realize how much of NASA influences their real life from day to day. This is true. It's using all sorts of day to day stuff. Hey, how would you like a random space thing? All right, what you got for me? AC So you're probably aware of space tourism, which is happening now and started with Dennis Tito in 2001, who paid a lot of money to fly

up to space. But non-NASA, non-space agency employees actually flew going back in time on the space shuttle occasionally. The first was Charles D. Walker. As a payload specialist in 1984, McDonnell Douglas, who's one of the many aerospace companies that's been absorbed by other aerospace companies, paid $40,000 to have him fly to operate their commercial payload. And he actually flew on two more shuttle missions, but just as an employee of McDonnell Douglas. Danielle Pletka I mean, that's pretty cheap to send someone to space $40,000, but I'd have to calculate that with inflation. Pete Slauson Well, I mean, it's still in the, yes, it's

still cheap because, yeah, it's somewhere in the $100,000 to $120,000 now. But they also were in a partnership with NASA flying their payload. So it was a more complicated thing than just throwing down $40,000 and now our guy could fly. Yeah. We'll get you up there. Someday, some day, Sarah, in space. We'll just envision it. Oh, I do.

Just headed off away. Hi, Sarah. Cruising out into the blackness. Gonna go meet Voyager. Bye, Bruce. Bye, bye, Sarah. And with that thought, everybody go out there, look up the night sky and think about your favorite seed.

Thank you and good night. We've reached the end of this week's episode of Planetary Radio, but we'll be back next week with more space science and exploration. If you love the show, you can get Planetary Radio t-shirts at planetary.org slash shop, along with lots of other cool spacey merchandise. Help others discover the passion, beauty, and joy of space science and exploration by leaving your review or rating on platforms like Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Your feedback not only brightens our day, but helps other curious minds find their place

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