獨立寫作　　

　　Independent Writing:

　　It is a waste of time to spend funds on space travel or space exploration.

　　Nowadays, an increasing number of citizens are discussing the recent launch of ShenZhou carrier rocket. While there are some people who claim that this kind of launch is a waste of money or time because it could not bring any benefits for citizens, I hold a different opinion. From my perspective, space exploration is necessary.

　　Admittedly, space travel or space exploration would waste a large sum of money. By spending much money on doing research regarding outer space life, government loses their focus on civil life where many people are suffering from starvation, air pollution and epidemics. Under this circumstance, there is no doubt that people would complain about government’s aloft behaviors. However,if viewing from a different angle, space exploration is a long time investment. Never should we expect the journey would bring immediate economic returns to the country. In this case, space travel and space exploration is quite helpful for the country.

　　To begin with, space exploration might bring benefits for us to search for new energy resource. That is to say, other planets may be rich in certain kinds of resources that are in great shortage on the earth. According to the report released after the exploration to the Mars, the officials from NASA confirms that Mars contains a great volume of natural gas and iron. Moreover, engineers have also noticed that these resources on the planet are able to explore, and if they could solve the problem of long time transportation, these resources could be used on the earth. Consequently, the use of natural gas will not consume burning of petroleum and make our planet a better place to live in.

　　In addition, space exploration aims to improve level of technology. In other words, it is the development of advanced technology that makes it possible to explore the outer space. It is usually the case that without the technology of launching satellite into the space, it is impossible for people to conduct research. As a result, scientists have to improved their knowledge in related areas so that they could guarantee the launch of these rockets, as well as satellites. Meanwhile, to ensure astronauts’ safety in the outer space, scientists have to repeated work on their suits in order to keep astronauts away from radioactivity. Also, to fill with enough oxygen, scientists have to run encapsulation tests again and again. Only if these equipment are guaranteed can astronauts be safely working in the outer space.

　　To sum up, the seemly useless space exploration would cost a large sum of money; however, this space activity could still bring benefits in both new energy searching and technology improvement.