Abstract The author confronts the question of whether lunar and planetary exploration and research should be carried out by men or by automatically operated equipment. Soviet and American accomplishments made with automatic devices in the various space programs are reviewed. He discusses the advantages and disadvantages of the use of automatic devices guided from Earth, such as the Lunakhod. He concludes that not only will automatic lunar and planetary laboratories be possible in the not too remote future but also that their operation would be much less expensive than if research were carried out by men, although an automaton cannot fully replace a man.