"Larry Dighera" wrote in message
...
http://www.space.com/missionlaunches...nh_launch.html
Riding aboard the NASA spacecraft are ashes of the late astronomer
Clyde Tombaugh, who discovered the planet in 1930 at the Lowell
Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona.

I must confess, I don't understand the reasoning behind sending the
ashes of the discoverer of Pluto aboard a spacecraft.

Um...I guess you missed the text that reads "who discovered the planet".

I see absolutely no reason that science needs to be completely devoid of all
human influence. Sentimentalism is just as valid a reason for doing
something as anything else, IMHO. This newsgroup is *littered* with
sentimental tributes and comments about aviation, and yet you never saw a
need to comment on *those* (when your comments would have actually been ON
TOPIC, as opposed to this thread which is decidedly NOT on topic).

And it's NOT "unenlightened", it's NOT "medieval", and it's NOT
"superstitious". It's just about making an acknowledgement to human needs
and desires.

Frankly, I find it fairly "unenlightened" for a person to go around
pretending that rituals in memory of the dead have no useful purpose for
humanity.

Pete