Why aren't we sending unmanned probes all over the solar system.

2 HUGE reasons i can think of off the top of my head are $ it costs millions and millions to send each probe out and billions for manned missions. Developing a probe for pictures and atmospheric samples is a rediculously complex process and making something to land on the surface is far more complex and expensive. Also the amount of math it takes to figure the trajectory needed to hit such a precise target (a planet may not seem like a precise target but when things are hurtling around space at tens of thousands of miles per hour and it takes months to get there, it truly is hard to figure it out. Also you dont want it to just hit the planet you want it to either go near or land softly not crash into it) you have to figure in how many months it takes to get not where it is now but where it will be, then figure the gravitational field the planet has, find out how much fuel to make, etc, etc, etc all the while using TONS of money that our nation needs to be putting in other places for a while. In a perfect world, wed have that kind of money to blow but we dont :/ hope this answers your questions!

edit: i forgot to address your question of OTHER solar systems. looks like ryan has that covered. and he has some good points. but sending one to even the nearest solar system with current tech would still take millions of years.

1 yes they have sent them to every planet and moon

2 other systems are so far away it will take millions and millions of years to reach them and that's at the speed of light which is a speed that cannot be accomplished because the laws of physics do not allow an object to travel faster than the speed of light because it gains infinite mass then implodes in on its self and creates a black hole it will more like take billions of years and humanity and earth for that matter will more than likely not exist then because the sun is to explode in around 5 billion years

edit chas is incorrect

i just want to say i dont hope the 2 other answers are what all american thinks because they are very uneducated answers

mercury

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MESSENGER


Venus

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus_Expre…


Jupiter

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juno_(space…


Pluto or Charon

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Horizon…

Started in 1961 and since then hundreds have been launched.

sadly we mostly spend on war, then a liťtle on science and helping people, but there are not enough people looking to learn like you talk about :-(