The first category contains jokes, often related to call-centers. These can be safely ignored. The second category includes comments congratulating human-kind for its achievement. While overly repetitive and probably unnecessary, such comments can be easily tolerated.

Finally, there is always a bunch of people whose argument goes like this:

Why is India wasting money on space research when there are millions afflicted by poverty?

This line of reasoning is flawed for a variety of reasons. Here’s why:

1. The argument assumes that there is no (or very little) benefit accrued by spending money on the space program. Further, it assumes that money not spent on the space program would be used to fight poverty, whatever that means.
2. Poverty is not caused by a shortage of resources. There are individuals who are very rich, and yet there are communities that are facing starvation. If the solution were as simple as taking wealth from the rich and giving it to the poor, all the socialist countries would be models of good governance.
3. Wealth is not something that moves from one individual to another; it is created. As a silly metaphor, think of it as a flame that keeps you warm: you need to keep adding fuel if you want it to last.
4. Teach a man to fish, and he will eat for a lifetime. Charity as a way of life is detrimental to the progress of society.
5. We can’t wait to solve the problem of poverty before moving on to the Next Big Thing. That way lies madness.

In a historic event, the Indian space programme achieved a unique feat today (November 14, 2008) with the placing of Indian tricolour on the Moon’s surface on Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru’s birthday. The Indian flag was painted on the sides of Moon Impact Probe (MIP), one of the 11 payloads of Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft, that successfully hit the lunar surface today at 20:31 hrs (8:31 pm) IST. This is the first Indian built object to reach the surface of the moon. The point of MIP’s impact was near the Moon’s South Polar Region. It may be recalled that the modern Indian space programme was initiated in 1962 when Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru was the Prime Minister of India.