The Tennessee Liberal

If watching the Space Shuttle launch does not get you excited, you do not have a pulse, nor do you deserve to. Watching this launch brought tears to my eyes, thinking about the excitement of this launch and the sacrifices of the astronauts of Columbia, Challenger, and Apollo 1.

The views from the camera on the External Tank were simply amazing, and you can't help but wonder why no one thought to put a camera there before. Seeing the ET separate and watching Discovery smooth its way upward was a sight to behold. My dad called me immediately afterward and said "Was that the greatest thing you've ever seen?" I couldn't disagree.

Lots of people question the wisdom of the manned space program. People I agree with on most everything tend to see it as a waste of money. Scientists (of the purest varieties) see manned flight as a distraction from the "real" science that can be done with things like the Deep Impact comet probe and the Mars Rovers.

It's true that there's less pure science done on manned space flight, though certainly it has brought us a great deal of new information about how humans exist in space, as well as performing chemical and physical experiments that need a human touch to conduct. But it is also important to note that there are questions we don't yet know to ask. As humans, we are driven to learn, evolve and explore. When we go to a space station, to the moon or to Mars, we expand our field of understanding and learn how to ask the question we don't yet know.

So, Godspeed, Discovery.

Here's NASA's coverage.