This won't put an end to the humans versus robots debate, but it should.

Via emailer Jon Bossard, who notes:

The argument that robotic missions are far cheaper and more effective than human missions is belied by the fact that, even with more than half a dozen robotic missions to Mars, we still don’t have an unimpeachable answer as to whether or not there’s water there or not. I think this is one of the fundamental issues of telemetered data: the necessarily small number of measured parameters allows for too many possible plausible explanations, as opposed to a human explorer which would be using a much larger number of “meat sensors”, and can thus develop an interpretation in real time with better fidelity.

That's interesting. I was of the opinion that most of the arguments for using humans were more along the lines of what having a frontier does for society. This makes a pretty good case that even the things the robots are supposed to be as good at could be done better by humans.

There's an example from Apollo 17 where one of the astronauts was moonwalking and discovered an unusual patch of orange regolith. They walked over, dug a trench to take samples, and brought it home to study. Back on Earth, scientists concluded it was from a volcanic eruption from over three billion years ago. What took humans a few minutes to do would have taken a current-technology robotic rover several hours if not days.

I think humans outperform robots in surface science operations as a person can quickly recognize which nearby things are important and worth studying.

If we only ever send robots into space, only ever plan to send robots into space, and make no progress into human spaceflight/settlement, why are we looking at space at all?

We could apply better AI to the explorer robots, but that could have consequences.

"We could apply better AI to the explorer robots, but that could have consequences."

That is just .. wrong. AI is overrated. The key word is: teleoperation ( more precisely, tele-assistance or tele-decisionmaking ).
A robot like ASIMO could do the exact same thing that our good Apollo 17 astronauts did, maybe even better and faster. Just hook the system up similar to Lunokhod, i.e. feedback to earth, and there you go. Humans in spacesuit dont have any sensory advantage over humanoid robots, just their two eyes. If you link this sensory input back to earth you have all the brainpower you need to be inventive and spontaneous. At moving around and lasting longer, robots can be several times better. And the greatest advantage, they dont need a return ticket or ultrareliable transportation.

Dont get me wrong, i am pro humans in space, but humans are definitely not the best workforce for lunar mining operations.

Kert, click the link or buy a new snark meter.

i did. i get the humor etc. but the email that Rand posted and Gavins comment are just plain wrong or uninformed.
Space tourism is a great idea and it would be fantastic if everybody could buy a trip to the moon. But dissing robotic capabilities just because a few uninformed space scientists use them as an argument to trounce government sponsored human spaceflight is just not right.

Kert's comments provide a very good example of exactly what's wrong with the current debate on robotic vs. human exploration capabilities: the implicit, unquestioned assumption that robots are a more cost effective tool than human exploration. When this assumption is questioned, the response is to merely state that the one who posed the question is "uninformed", that thus dispose of the question with an ad hominem response.
Responses like this don't help address or clarify this issue, which is probably why we're still having this debate which should have long since been resolved. Note that Kert makes no direct resonse to the comment regarding why we still don't know for sure if there's water on Mars yet, despite many robotic missions. He too busy defending the implicit assumption.
Its interesting to note that in history of this debate, which really should more properly be a dscussion, that advocates of human exploration have generally supported the importance and value of robotic exploration as a parallel and mutually supporting function. It was only relatively recently that advocates of robotic exploration have started taking the stance that robots are the sine qua non for exploration, and that robotic missions are obviously cheaper, give more information, don't require a round trip, etc. But what really heated the debate up was the notion that perhaps humans don't even need to go into space at all, because robots are so great. This notion needs to be debated vigorously , because it will serve to help clarify the reasons we go into space at all. Kert, let me answer to question for you:
BOTH human and robotic exploration are good and necessary, and will help us understand an appreciate our cosmos, and for goodness sake, don't fool yourself into thinking that robotic missions can and must replace human exploration. That's a certain recipe for getting permanently stuck on planet Earth.

But what really heated the debate up was the notion that perhaps humans don't even need to go into space at all, because robots are so great

The idea that the people who send the robots don't have a longing to go there and visit the place themselves, but are satisfied to be long-range couch potatoes, should disqualify them from their jobs.
(The line that "it's just as good as being there" having been mouthed by more than one JPL rover team member. Why not add the line "Makes me want to join them there even more...")

It was only relatively recently that advocates of robotic exploration have started taking the stance that robots are the sine qua non for exploration, and that robotic missions are obviously cheaper, give more information, don't require a round trip, etc.

Really? I thought that it was a debate as old as the space program itself. Van Allen was making such arguments in the late fifties. As was the Planetary Society when it formed in the early eighties. I'm not sure what you're basing this statement on. It certainly doesn't conform with my own memory or knowledge of history.

>>Responses like this don't help address or clarify this issue,
Well, let me clarify then. First, saying that a statement by someone is uninformed, is not an attack on the person, at least in my book. I am prepared to hear that my opinions about 13 century handicrafts in eastern parts of maldives are uninformed and half baked, because i know that i dont have a clue on this topic.

But to the point.
I pointed out two provably false statements in comments before. First, that Apollo 17 astronauts did something that robots couldnt. That is a false statement, at least in year 2006.

The original email by Jon Bossard asserted that humans have some kind of "meat sensors" that can result in better realtime interpretation of data. That is also obviously false. Suited astronaut has no sensory advantage over a modern robot. Where robots fall short ( congnitive thinking, reasoning, decisionmaking ) they can be backed up by human operators on earth.

If this isnt reasonable discussion for you, and not directly addressing the topic, i dont know what is.

>>Note that Kert makes no direct resonse to the comment regarding why we still don't know for sure if there's water on Mars yet, despite many robotic missions.

I did make a direct response .. ( but i left it on a thread over at selenianboondocks, so my mistake ) My opinion here is that "robots" that have been sent to martian surface are very far from the current state of the art in modern robotics.
As for orbiters, i think they are pretty much the best we have in remote sensing, but remote sensing is not robotics. Also note that finding that drop of liquid on the surface on the planet, is the task for remote sensing first, and the orbiters that have been sent there HAVE delivered the goods.
I couldnt write a lecture here for you on current robotics technology, mainly because most of the really relevant reference materials are written using hieroglyphs, and second, by the time i'd be done the technology would have evolved even further. Robotics is currently undergoing a revolution, with most advances being made in Asia, with western technology lagging behind.

So what im trying to get at.. First the traditional "robots vs humans" argument is first stupid, as there would be no point in sending robots if humans wouldnt follow. Second, the argument that "humans are better at exploration" does not hold true in 2006, and actually sounds foolish ( let me clarify that im discussing this in context of lunar exploration where relatively high-fidelity teleoperation is possible ). There are other valid arguments why humans should and will go to space, but this isnt one of them.
Let me also predict that whatever off-earth for-profit industry gets started first, apart from tourism, it will be largely telerobotic operations, because of the cost-effectiveness. This is just straight business sense. On earth, we are at the point where in many places robots start to take jobs of humans, it will make even more sense in space.
So i hope you see that im not arguing whether humans OR robots should go to space. They both should, but argument that "robots lack the capabilities of humans" should not really be used to argue the case for humans. Not in this century.

We can see water ice at the Martian pole in the summer with centuries old technology, the optical telescope and the human eye. I think that we should outsource space policy to robots. Let's have robots decide what are the pressing needs for science, exploration and expansion of our civilization. Perhaps they will decide that the Moon is a better place to go based on total cost of ownership of a colony including imported spring water. Perhaps they will have a competition to provide the data they need from the Moon or Mars and open the competition to both humans and robots and see who wins.