We could easily go to the moon. It's just a completely useless exercise to do so, unless you can find a way to taunt China into another round of the space race.
The scientific case for the moon was always weak, and most anything they could come up with has been done. Just look at the useless lets-grow-salad-in-space-oh-look-its-just-salad timesinks the ISS has been busying themselves with.
So, in a way we've become much smarter. And SpaceX, a commercial outfit with both solid financials, a good track record on safety, and rather unlimited ambition is probably the most exciting thing happening since the first moon landing.
This is called basic research. It's geared towards building greater knowledge of a study area without specific concerns towards application. That's how science works. We don't just fund the stuff that's immediately profitable (though things are shifting that way).
It might seem 'obvious' that salad is just salad when grown in space, but you don't know that until you try. Understanding how various foods grow in space would seem to be a pretty basic necessity if we're going to attempt any kinds of long-term settlements or research stations where regular resupply from Earth is dicey.
The scientific case for the moon was always weak, and most anything they could come up with has been done. Just look at the useless lets-grow-salad-in-space-oh-look-its-just-salad timesinks the ISS has been busying themselves with.
So, in a way we've become much smarter. And SpaceX, a commercial outfit with both solid financials, a good track record on safety, and rather unlimited ambition is probably the most exciting thing happening since the first moon landing.