Discoveries using the telescopes on Mauna Kea

[kalianna]

Thanks for some interesting food for thought.  I've also been pursuing this.  I tried to research the annual dollar amount of astronomical research and quickly gave up on that.  The most interesting thing I saw was that Kodak film came about as a result of early attempts to photograph the sun.  But from the information that I've seen so far, it seems that most of the humanly/earthly benefits have come about as a by-product of space exploration rather than its aim.  So maybe the question should be:  How does the quest to learn our place in the universe benefit human kind?  Or is it just curiosity?