David Amerland on the race to space.

David Amerland on the race to space.
Communication and non-communication among scientists and between nations.
A thought-provoking read.

  #spaceexporation   #internationalcommunication   #scientificcommunication  

Originally shared by David Amerland

The Final Frontier…

We can hardly finish uttering the three words of the title before unbidden images of Star Trek, the Starship Enterprise (and it’s “five year mission”) and the future these evoke, come flooding into our consciousness. 

Space seems so forbidding it its vastness and unnamed threats and forbidden in its cost and known risks that it seems, to us, as a species, to be the one frontier whose very nature has become symbolic of many other things. Its conquest is a signal of our growing up (as a species) and, maybe, our growing together (if the Star Trek future is to be believed). It is a symbol of what makes us great and a reminder to stay humble. It is a symbol of our longing to be much, much more than hairless apes, occasionally staring at the heavens and throwing advanced weapons at each other in the moments in-between. 

The official version of the events that put this dream in motion (http://goo.gl/yZ6B1) reads like we are already one species, with a common purpose and will. Yet seen through the eyes of “academician Sagdeev”, the man who for most of it was “on the other side” the picture becomes decidedly different, full of detail that wants to make you scream and laugh and cry, sometimes all at the same time: http://goo.gl/r6mni.

Sagdeev’s account is not just full of humanity, swimming in the desire of the human spirit to do something great, it is also detailed in what happens when there is a disconnect between our thoughts and our words. When we hide behind symbols and meanings and ideal and ideologies become blunt instruments to beat us into submission rather than tools we can use to rise above and beyond ourselves. 

Star Trek’s bold statement, paid homage to a notion that fired up the human imagination to the point that it came back and paid homage back to it (http://goo.gl/fLBpG) in a self-reinforcing loop which suggests that to realize our dreams we, really, ought to dream them: http://goo.gl/Jg2fAe. I am not sure what’s more fascinating the fact that the pull of space is a dream big enough to want to make most of humanity to vicariously want to live it, or the fact that we relied on Disney films to tell us how we would conquer space. 

We’ve come some way since then, landing probes on comets and studying the results (http://goo.gl/IB4v4K) and, as the popularity of the NASA Page (http://goo.gl/uSKtW) suggests, looking to those who work in the field to pioneer research (and thinking). 

The pull of space is such that even at the height of the Cold War it led to some cooperation between seemingly sworn enemies: http://goo.gl/QXNcZU. Part of this may be simple economics: http://goo.gl/52Yixg. But if that was the case then the sea, rather than space should be on our sights as Graham Hawkes’s TED Talk suggests: http://goo.gl/Tzv0Xf. It seems to be more accessible, within our grasp and bound to produce more immediate returns: http://goo.gl/JdIXlj. 

The reason Space features so promptly in our mental horizons is divorced from practicalities. In a share by Annabeth Hanes' Bill Nye’s explanation of why space is so important hits home: http://goo.gl/dN6ETa.

Unlike the sea which anyone, armed with a bathtub and a paddle, feels they can conquer, space stretches our imagination, capabilities and ingenuity to the very limit, taking our hopes and fears to a brand new level entirely. One that is perhaps sufficient to help us overcome our differences: http://goo.gl/QINpNr. 

Maybe … (http://goo.gl/ufwYyb). Technology, which seems to pool some of our resources, has also frequently given excellent examples of just how we can squander them: http://goo.gl/JdZTme. 

We all know that together we can achieve incredible feats. We sense the potential of this in the better moments of our interactions with each other and we can see it in the better outcomes of long conversations and debates on G+ when the thread itself becomes more illuminating and instructive than the post that started it. 

Intellectually we know that perhaps a common danger like climate change ought to be enough to unite us (http://goo.gl/3eiyDy), or perhaps something a little more basic, like food (http://goo.gl/1nY6aa), or for the technocratic purists amongst us: environment and infrastructure (http://goo.gl/pIVNue), some would say love is enough (http://goo.gl/HqcNPK). And everyone knows that tragedy brings us together: http://goo.gl/YoLqxN. 

None of these though are enough. None of them is big enough in scope and broad enough in hope to take us out of the narrow narrative of our everyday, self-serving condition and transform us into the heroes we feel we can be, ought to be. Only space does that. So funnily enough, “the final frontier…” that we look to cross in a symbolic gesture of our biological coming of age, is also a mark of our spiritual and psychological maturation. Its conquest signals, unequivocally, that as a species “we made it” we overcame the greatest frontier, solved the deepest riddle, won the greatest challenge: we overcame the limitation of our own humanity, sailing past our fears and finding sufficient commonalities to make us all look upon each other if not necessarily as complete equals all the time, at least as brothers and sisters, one family. (And for the Trekkies amongst you, a special treat: http://goo.gl/HMchWN). 

I hope this Sunday Read finds you all united in your swilling of coffee and partaking of sugary treats (donuts, croissants, cookies and cake, at the very least). Have an awesome Sunday, wherever you are. 

#davidamerlandsundayread