Space. It’s pretty big, you know. For aeons, man has gazed into the stars and wondered, aghast at the sheer scale of it all. The most ancient civilisations on Earth pondered the many questions that still plague us today: is there life out there? Are we about to be struck by a comet/enslaved by aliens/plunged into a black hole? We kind of need to know.

It’s this thirst for knowledge that drives us as a species. Man has always strived to better himself, to know everything that can be known, and then learn how to know the rest. It is, in a nutshell, what separates us from the animal kingdom. From the deepest questions of the universe to the fat content of that kebab scoffed at 2am, we want answers.

Which is why Obama’s new budget proposals are such a tragedy. Yes, he put forward many well-thought-out ideas on how to reinvigorate the ailing US economy and create jobs, but ultimately, it came at the expense of space exploration. Obama cancelled the ‘Constellation’ program, which aimed to return man to the moon by 2020, in order to trim a few pennies for essentials like jobs, public funds and blowing up other countries (note: that last one may not be true).

Yes, the Constellation program has already cost a staggering $9 billion which America can ill-afford, and no doubt the cash freed up will help ease the pressure on a nation choking on its own debts. Obama is in a difficult position. It can’t be easy to juggle so many key spending areas in times of recession. But the space programs are not just fat to be trimmed, they are as intrinsic to America as a nation as they are to the development of our species.

Imagine if someone told Stephenson: very sorry, but your revolutionary new railway network which will connect the whole country in a way previously unimaginable is a bit pricey.

These are milestone developments in the course of human history, and as a species we need to keep pushing new boundaries of exploration and knowledge, for that has long been what has defined us. Now, we are in danger of becoming obsessive bean-counting, fat-cat fools. Nothing is about discovery or scientific advancement any more; it’s all to do with the bottom line. Giant conglomerates issue profit warnings if their takings are a few pence short of the billions they thought they’d snatched. Concorde was canned because the seat sales would flat-line after its crash – never mind that it was a glorious aeronautical achievement.

This commercial culture has spread to even the government, an institution supposedly working in the interests of the public, rather than the money in their wallets. Obama plans to privatise the movement of astronauts to and from the space station, saving another few billion for the American administration. Richard Branson will no doubt be laughing – he can double the price of Virgin space flights if you can get an astronaut’s autograph on board.

Sadly, it seems like this is where we are headed. In the future, we’ll only invent with the intent to sell. Cancer is still being researched because whoever finds the real cure can hawk it at some eye-watering mark-up and meet an astronaut on the next tour to the space station. But furthering human knowledge for no benefit other than to learn? Returning man to the moon to set up a base? Sending man to Mars? Unless it’s to build Mcdonalds’ Mars Housing™, forget it.