The Artemis II astronauts have returned, with Americans closely watching the news feeling pride, awe and a sense of unity that too often has been missing from our national conversations.

“It is a true gift,” Commander Reid Wiseman told the Associated Press at one point during the mission.

The work of space exploration has spanned decades and generations.

Even at its inception, people questioned the necessity of lunar missions and space exploration.

Beyond the aforementioned sense of awe, our nation’s research under NASA’s auspices have yielded stunning advances in robotics, medical technology, satellite communication and a myriad of other new technologies in a wide variety of fields.

Technologies that allow people to live longer and healthier, that allow for communications across continents and mere moments, that allow our lives, our work and our aspirations to reach unparalleled successes.

But we suspect for many, that sense of awe, that sense of wonder at what men and women can accomplish working together is enough to justify devoting resources to space exploration. We suspect for many, the chance to tell our children that if they work hard, and work together, they can reach past the moon. That if they work hard and work together, they can solve any problem for their children’s futures.

We suspect for many, that lesson is well worth NASA’s budget.