so, you can just map the sky day and night for 6 months a year without stopping, and it gives the best maps we can make short of going to space. >> anthony: i grew up in the kennedy era, where the space program was everything. the first man on the moon, the space race, the whole nation can't wait till we could get to mars. nobody gives a [ bleep ] now. i mean, have you seen that change because i felt it change. >> dan: it's true that there is an increased skepticism of objective reality these days, but this science stands on thousands of years of human, accrued understanding. >> anthony: who's interested? like who's most likely to benefit? >> dan: there's no immediate answer to that question. >> anthony: but you're asking basic questions about the fundamental nature of matter, time, space. surely there were people asking those kinds of questions that led directly to technologies that we take for granted now. >> dan: that's right. i mean there's no question. we have to solve hard problems to do these things and when we solve them they have other