Category Archives: Space Exploration

Ah, space. The final frontier. The place of infinite possibilities and endless adventure.

Unless you are not a white American male. Then you might assist the handsome captain, as a button-pushing member of the crew. Or you might contribute your body to the cause, by dying in the first act, provoking the captain into heroic action.

This is why I'm looking forward to the release of the film version of the acclaimed Hugo Award-winning novel The Three-Body Problem by Chinese writer Liu Cixin, which was published in English in 2014.

I am keeping my fingers crossed that the made-in-China movie, due to be released later this year, will stay true to the book genre of "hard" science fiction, which imagines far-out scenarios, but with the laws of physics as we know them today driving the plot.

If so, this will be a breakthrough in Chinese cinema, which makes plenty of comedies, romances and action-thrillers, but no science fiction.

For the first time, we might see space-faring people speaking Mandarin and watch scientists based not in Houston or Cape Canaveral, but in Beijing.

It will be interesting to see how the literary, character-driven tone of the book will be made more commercial. But more interestingly, how will the film be received in Asia? Will audiences in Singapore, Seoul or Kuala Lumpur buy the idea of a science-fiction world rooted in Chinese characters and Chinese locales on Earth? The book does feature American characters and casting notes show that this notion has been carried through to the movie.

After all, in Singapore we have been weaned on American science fiction, from hard stuff, such as Gravity (2013), to soft fantasy, such as Star Wars, and the in-betweens, such as Star Trek.

It would be - pun intended - an alien experience to see an Asian nation at the forefront of space exploration.

But why isn't The Three-Body Problem a Hollywood property?

There is a distinct possibility that the reason the film rights do not belong to a Los Angeles studio, as has happened to other Asian science-fiction works, is that despite its critical acclaim, its appeal is too niche.

The Three-Body Problem might have been saved by its obscurity.

Hollywood, for example, de-Japanised Hiroshi Sakurazaka's popular novel All You Need Is Kill, turning it into the movie Edge Of Tomorrow (2014), starring Tom Cruise and Emily Blunt. That was a well-constructed movie and a commercial hit.

Another Hollywood adaptation of a Japanese property, this year's Ghost In The Shell, based on the manga by Masamune Shirow, was neither good nor a commercial success. It would be awful if the lacklustre makeover given to Shirow's creation were given to Liu's book.

We have grown up with movie science fiction that depicts a future in which American men rule the known universe, even if on paper, it is supposed to be a universe run by a pan-planetary union comprised of human and non-human citizens.

I guess that's show business.

There were a few moments when I glimpsed an alternate timeline of Things That Could Have Been, such as when Japanese actress Rinko Kikuchi appeared in the monster epic Pacific Rim (2013), or when Michelle Yeoh, Benedict Wong and Hiroyuki Sanada were in space disaster movie Sunshine (2007).

The latter three (spoiler warning) were rapidly disposed of, leaving the stage clear for the standard heroes to take the spotlight.

Kikuchi had a larger role, but it was a sprawling, ensemble movie, with much screen time devoted to male lead Becket (Charlie Hunnam).

I am not a Star Trek fan, but the release of the trailer for upcoming American television series Star Trek: Discovery a few days ago raised the hope that once more, science fiction might represent the make-up of Earth properly.

Chinese Malaysian actress Yeoh has a recurring role as a starship captain, as does African-American Sonequa Martin-Green, playing the protagonist Michael Burnham, the first officer of the ship.

Space is vast, and it is about time there was room for other kinds of heroes.

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Asian-led space exploration? It's about time for this in film - The Straits Times

Juno spacecraft in front of the planet Jupiter lit by the Sun (3d illustration, elements of this image are furnished by NASA). Photo Credit: Dotted Yeti/Shutterstock/NASA

The verdant lawn of Washingtons National Mall was trampled to sod on two successive weekends, as tens of thousands marched for science and to call for action on climate change. Protest attire ranged from nerd chic lab coats to Leonardo DiCaprios dont-look-at-me-Im-just-an-ordinary-citizennewsboy cap. Outrage at the decimation of science agency funds in Trumps first proposed budget was a unifying theme, stoked by concern that his administration discounts rigorous scientific inquiry in favor ofalternative facts.

The proposed cuts touch on a broad range of initiatives, from critical medical research at the National Institutes of Health to standards for applying forensic evidence in criminal trials. Perhaps, most pressing for many protest participants is a fear that climate deniers are so embedded in the Trump Administration that they will force US rejection ofthe Paris accord on climate change. Though a 2 May bipartisan Congressional budget deal funded most science agencies at a much higher level than Trumps initial requests, the new president will have another chance at significant cuts when he releases his detailed budget in September.

Amid such well-founded alarm, it has gone largely under-reported that one prominent science agency escaped massive cuts in Trumps proposed budget: the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). The overall allocation for the agency in the fiscal year 2018 is $19.1 billion, a slight increase overcurrent funding. But within the agency, planetary science stands to gain a whopping 20 per cent a remarkable contrast to the budget austerity Trump hopes to impose on most federal programs.

If Trump has his way, NASAs earth science programs will be one such casualty, slated to receive a cut of nearly 13 per cent from current funding levels. The work of these programs has been used to provide a foundation for evidence of climate change and has become a favorite target of Congressional Republicans and fossil fuel lobbyists.

At an October 2016 campaign rally, Trumppledgedthat he would free NASA from the restriction of serving primarily as a logistics agency for low-Earth orbit activity big deal. Instead, we will refocus its mission on space exploration. Under a Trump Administration, America will lead the way into the stars. Trump has thrown support behind the notion of public-private partnerships for expanding deep space exploration. The Congressional authorization bill attached to the agencys funding mandates that NASA cannot utilize space flight services from a foreign entity unless no NASA flights or domestic commercial providers are available. This could help launch US commercial flights to the International Space Station (ISS), rather than hitching rides on Russian or French rockets.

Although Musk has said the cost of the trip is confidential, thrill-seeking high fliers have paid$20 millionfor a Russian-piloted trip to the ISS. A lunar excursion could be the ultimate joyride for the billionaire boys club. Yet, while other commercial space efforts have carried legitimate research goals, space tourism flights have little value beyond the cachet of an interplanetary passport stamp, making the public underwriting of these projects questionable at best.

Trump has repeatedly called putting a man on the moon one of the US greatest victories, and has invoked images of Neil Armstrongs historic walk on the moon in his rhetorical quest to make America great again. Whenever I hear the name of the Apollo astronaut, I am reminded of a decades-old urban legend about Armstrong that I first heard from a Somali traveller I met in Yogyakarta many years ago. According to the tale, when Armstrong was visiting Saudi Arabia several years before, he heard the call of the muezzin, urging people to come to prayer, and asked what it was. Upon being told its source, the astronaut said he had heard the very same sound on the moon, and converted to Islam on the spot.

Due to the storys spread, Armstrong was inundated by requests to appear at Islamic religious observances around the world. He was so deluged that he worked with the State Department in 1983 to send a respectful, but firm, rejection of the claim to embassies and consulates throughout the Middle East, North Africa and Asia.

But, the myth lived on through word of mouth. A few other individuals I have met in my travels over the years, generally in the Middle East, have asked about the tales validity.

It is interesting to speculate about the storys genesis. It may be that Armstrong unwittingly gave rise to the rumor when he was asked by a reporter in Egypt how he found his first visit to the country. He supposedly remarked that he found the sound of the adhan (the muezzins call) spacey. Lacking a vernacular Arabic term, the reporter translated the comment as meaning something Armstrong had heard in outer space.

I have always been enchanted by the legend, not because I believed the conversion story, but because it underscores the essence of space exploration in our collective imaginations a sense of awe and wonder at the beauty and mystery of the universe, coupled with a belief in the power of science to help unlock those mysteries.

This perspective an understanding of the vastness of the universe, offset by our own precarious position in it recently helped inform the first known political protest in space. The Autonomous Space Agency Network (ASAN) attacheda tweetdirected at Trump (Look at that, you son of a bitch) to a weather balloon sent into near space orbit.

The quote comes from Apollo 14 astronaut Edgar Mitchell, who said, From out there on the moon, international politics look so petty. You want to grab a politician by the scruff of the neck and drag him a quarter of a million miles out and say, Look at that, you son of a bitch.

Similar thoughts have been voiced by others who have had an interstellar vantage point, including Apollo 9 astronaut Russell Schweickart, who said, When you go around the Earth in an hour- and- a- half, you begin to recognise that your identity is with that whole thing. That makes a change. You look down there and you cant imagine how many borders and boundaries you cross, again and again and again, and you dont even see them.

Psychologists have a name for this enhanced sense of perspective the overview effect.Researchersat the University of Pennsylvania are studying the effect in space travelers, and are hypothesizing ways to reproduce it in the Earth-bound, with the goal of helping individuals become more adaptive, and feel more connected to others.

Although I have never been to the moon, I think that international travel has helped me develop a small-scale form of overview effect. At 48 countries and counting, travel has underscored for me the essential interconnectivity of the human experience, though vastly different depending on where it unfolds and has reinforced my own infinitesimalplace in life on Earth.

Perhaps, those will be some of the notions discussed at the Asian Space Technology Summit 2017, sponsored by Space Exploration Asia, taking place 11 & 12 May in Kuala Lumpur. In addition to promoting space technology curricula and exploiting the untapped business opportunities afforded by space exploration, thegroups stated goalis to build the kind of infrastructure on which all of humankinds impossible achievements have been built: the infrastructure of desire and the infrastructure of vision.

Since most of us will never travel through space, photos of our planet taken from deep space have helped affirm for many the notion that we on Earth play a role in the Big Picture, but are not the entire Big Picture.

Unfortunately, one of the line items slated to be zeroed-out in Trumps proposed budget is for the instruments on the DSCOVR spacecraft. They transmit daily images of Earth, suspended like a blue marble in the boundless universe, which have highlighted the planets fragility for many viewers. Some have even been inspired by these images to call for a greater commitment to joining with other nations to find solutions to shared challenges, such as food insecurity or income inequality.

This is evidently not a perspective afforded by the view from Mar-a-Lago, so one can only hope that Trump rethinks his space policy emphasis, allowing what goes on beyond Earths boundaries to inform work here. It should be a policy goal to forge ahead in space exploration, without ignoring what is in the rear-view mirror. Humankind will be the better for it.

This article was originally published by Policy Forum. Read the original.

Sally Tyler is an attorney and policy analyst based in Washington, D.C.

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Could Space Exploration Mark a New Beginning for Trump's ... - AlterNet

I am a student at Garrison. We Americans often fantasize over our glorious future of space colonies and asteroid mining.

However, with the state of our space programs, accomplishing this is hardly possible. NASA has turned from a revolutionary space program that gave children dreams of being astronaut heroes to a mediocre waste of government funds and a tourist attraction.

When you think of astronauts you think of the 1960s, not anything that has happened recently. Our space program would be a humiliation to astronauts such as John Glenn, Neil Armstrong or Sally Ride.

They were astronauts who risked, and some who lost, their lives to explore and now after several generations of invention and innovation we have come to a standstill. It seems as though our generation is an awful case of writers block in the story of the human beings explorations and inventions.

We havent sent a human to space since July of 2011, which was over five years ago. We havent even been able to put a human on a different planet. The closest weve done to this is land a man on the moon, and that wasnt our generation, that was back when they needed large warehouses to hold a computer with the power of one of our servers.

We have computers that the early mission controls would have died for, and the best we could do with them is play video games. During the first launches technology was extremely limited, and they were still able to do things that were unimaginably complicated.

With our technology we should be able to achieve more than they ever would have been able to, yet we have done practically nothing.

In my opinion the solution is to encourage competition in the space industry and support private space companies. The most well known private company in this field is SpaceX, which is a perfect example of a type of company we need more of.

If there are more private space companies there will be a greater chance of a one of them doing something amazing, like landing a craft with humans on mars or something similar.

It is up to our generation to continue the legacy of those before us, and the way to do this is through private space companies.

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Space exploration must continue - Walla Walla Union-Bulletin

At a recent forum, Sen. Ted Cruz also announced a Senate hearing to revisit the half-century-old Outer Space Treaty, and he warned about potential military threats to the nations satellites.

Going to Mars wont be easy, even if we sent Matt Damon, star of the 2015 film The Martian, U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) quipped at a Tuesday forum about deep-space exploration held in Washington, D. C.

But the venture is worth doing, helps unify and propel space exploration going forward, and is codified in the NASA Transition Authorization Act of 2017 (S. 442) that President Donald Trump signed into law in March, said Cruz, chair of the Senate Subcommittee on Space, Science, and Competitiveness. He sponsored the legislation, which calls for a human exploration road map that includes the long-term goal of human missions near or on the surface of Mars in the 2030s.

Space exploration is NASAs central mission, and I certainly am doing everything I can to encourage as many resources as possible [and] as much of NASAs leadership to be focused on exploration.Although Cruz said that NASA space exploration should not come at the expense of the agencys Earth science missions, he said Earth science is not central to NASA. There are a host of agencies that do science research, that have a science focus. Thats not NASAs central mission, he said. Space exploration is NASAs central mission, and I certainly am doing everything I can to encourage as many resources as possible [and] as much of NASAs leadership to be focused on exploration.

The forum, sponsored by the Atlantic magazine, focused on the issues of sending astronauts to deep space, including Mars; efforts to support commercial space endeavors; the challenge of retaining American leadership in space; and bipartisan support for space exploration.

In an intensely partisan environment, Cruz said that there is bipartisan commitment to American leadership in space. There are not many issues to which there is bipartisan commitment, but thats one, and I think thats very good for those of us who care about continuing to explore space.

Its written in our hearts: We want to explore, we want to push forward. And I think NASA is probably the symbolic piece of that.That bipartisan congressional and administration support stems in part from people looking at the agency as a symbol of leadership for the country, said Robert Lightfoot, acting administrator of NASA.

Its written in our hearts: We want to explore, we want to push forward. And I think NASA is probably the symbolic piece of that, he said.

Another reason for agency support is that NASA is basically changing textbooks, he noted. The pursuit of knowledge and scientific discovery intrigues people and is different than some of the other things most people talk about in government, Lightfoot added.

The authorization act, he said, also provides a sense of constancy of support for the agency and for long-term projects such as the International Space Station and efforts to journey to Mars. NASA fared well in the fiscal year (FY) 2017 budget, signed into law on 5 May, and the agency hopes for steady support in the FY 2018 budget that the administration plans to release next week.

Getting to Mars calls for a number of intermediate steps that NASA has outlined. These include using the International Space Station in low-Earth orbit as a local proving ground to learn about things such as needed technologies and the impacts of a microgravity environment on the human body and then building infrastructure in the vicinity of the Moon to test and improve technologies.

But Lightfoot emphasized that the momentum is there to go to Mars. Can you imagine the first steps on Mars? Lightfoot asked. He said it could be a civilization level change event for us, just as the first steps on the Moon were. I tell my guys all the time, Youre making history. You just dont know it.

Ellen Stofan, former chief scientist for NASA, said at the forum that now is a unique moment for pushing on toward Mars. We know where we want to go, we understand the path of technologies that we need to get there, we think theres an affordable planand I think youve got broad public support.

We need leadership at the top of government and at the top of NASA, and we dont have it right now.Robert Zubrin agreed at the forum that Mars should be the destination. Mars is where the science is, Mars is where the challenge is, Mars is where the future is, said Zubrin, founder and president of the Mars Society, a Lakewood, Colo.based organization that promotes the exploration and settlement of Mars.

However, he complained that what we have right now is just drift, it is not a program, and he questioned the necessity of some intermediate steps, such as a lunar-orbiting space station, to get to Mars. Right now, NASA is not spending money to do things. It is doing things to spend money, Zubrin said. We need leadership at the top of government and at the top of NASA, and we dont have it right now.

At the forum, Cruz announced that his Senate committee will hold a hearing on 23 May to revisit the Outer Space Treaty to see how the treaty can help expand commerce and settlement in space. The treaty, which entered into force 50 years ago, provides the basic framework for international space law.

He predicted that the first trillionaire would be a person in the space exploration world who invests and makes discoveries in space that we cannot even envision.

The senator tied American efforts in space not just to the spirit of exploration and economic opportunities but also to national security and the safety of the nations satellites that GPS and other critical technologies rely on.

The development other countries are making in space weaponry to take out our communication equipment is truly chilling, he said. Some of the classified briefings would take your breath away at the potential threats we face. He called for serious investments to address that vulnerability.

Randy Showstack (@RandyShowstack), Staff Writer

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Scientists, Policy Makers Push for Mars Exploration - Eos - Eos

Motion Designer Christian Stangl and his brother, composer Wolfgang Stangl, just created one of the most beautiful odes to space exploration weve seen and they did it without ever taking a single photograph. Every photo in their tribute was pulled from NASAs Project Apollo Archive.

Stangl came up with the idea after stumbling across the archive. He was struck by how many incredible photographs the Apollo astronauts had taken.

The whole film is based on the photos which NASA released in September 2015: The Project Apollo Archive, Stangl tells PetaPixel. I was fascinated by the amount and the quality of the Pictures. They were thousands of that beautiful high-res photographies made by the famous Hasselblad-Moon camera. When I looked at the Archive, I knew immediately that I want to make a film with these photos!

And so he did. Using panoramic stitching and stop motion sequences, Christian created what is essentially an animated collage. With so many beautiful frames to choose from, the hardest part was picking what to include and, later, how to score it.

Christian described the process to us over email:

I tried to bring the photos to life using 2 different techniques:

The video portion done, Christian handed the production off to his brother Wolfgang for scoring.

It took Wolfgang 18 months to complete our short film, Christian tells us. We constantly had to change or reject scenes, adjust the music, and fine-tune on effects until we were satisfied with the story.

Check out the brothers creation at the top preferably with the lights off and headphones on cranked all the way up. The video is a true experience. And if you like what you see, visit Christians website for more.

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A Beautiful Ode to Space Exploration Made Using Only NASA Apollo Photos - PetaPixel (blog)

Space exploration games have been with us since the very first days of gaming, with the likes of Star Control 2 (1992) still recalled with much fondness. The Long Journey Home continues this tradition of massive, procedurally generated galaxies populated by alien races. It's a highly promising game about exploration, trading, upgrading and, occasionally, fighting.

Theres a lot going on in The Long Journey Home

Developed by Daedalic a company best known for narrative adventures The Long Journey Home isn't just about resource and upgrade systems. It's also a story, in which a team of four members are lost in space and trying to get back home. The player chooses the team from a roster of 10. Each has their own personality, quirks and specialties. I haven't studied them in detail, but they seem like a varied and diverse bunch, allowing for experimentation on different playthroughs.

The game begins with a space exploration mission that goes awry, throwing the team into the far nethers of creation. Physical gameplay consists of navigating through star systems, making use of planetary gravitational slingshots to inch closer to home.

Planets are discovered, explored and mined for resources. As in many such games, these planets have personalities of their own, offering different opportunities, dangers and environments. Some yield useful or trade-able artifacts.

Planetary exploration is conducted by a single, chosen crew member who drops down in a Lander-style pod. Depending on the crew-member who discovers the artifacts, different outcomes can occur. So one might favor scrapping the item for its raw materials, while another will see the value of saving it for a later trade.

Resources like gases, minerals and metals are used to repair and upgrade the ship's systems and to travel. These come in different bands of value. The ship can take damage when, for example, the player is negotiating asteroid fields. The crew's health must also be maintained, as accidents can happen on missions.

Alien races are encountered in transit or on space stations, where they can be wooed via on-screen communications. A dialog system using basic words and phrases makes use of the potential to trade and barter.

Sometimes they can be persuaded to part with useful maps that help to show the most efficient way forward. Others offer optional quests that confer useful items.

Generally, their demeanor is something to be discovered and exploited. Alien relationships with one another are a factor to be considered. This leads to some tough choices about who to chum up to, and who to avoid. On the whole, aliens won't automatically see humans as a threat more a faintly harmless curiosity so it's up to the player to avoid cultural errors that can lead to conflict.

But space is also home to various scumbags such as crooked customs officials and pirates. And so there are occasions when combat is unavoidable. Battles take place in age-of-sail style dodge and maneuver, with gun ports stationed on ship broadsides. But the cost in damage makes combat a chore to be avoided.

The Long Journey Home is currently in beta, and launches fully at the end of this month, on Windows PC with PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions to follow.

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The Long Journey Home offers a rich vision of space exploration ... - Polygon

Director Ridley Scotts Alien science fiction horror film franchise continues with its sixth installment that debuts in U.S. theaters this week. Alien: Covenant, the second prequel in the series, picks up years after the events depicted in the 2012 film Prometheus, in which a small group of explorers from Earth is sabotaged by a relative of the intelligent, acid-bleeding space monsters first introduced in the 1979 original.

Along with Parkour-adept parasitic extraterrestrials, a common thread runs through Scotts Alien films:In his universe, space activity is a private, commercial enterprise. The first film takes place on the Nostromo, a commercial cargo transporter named after a1904 Joseph Conrad novel centered on a fictional South American private silver-mining concession. In the subsequent films we learn the back story that Nostromo wasowned and operated by the fictional Weyland Corporation, an intergalactic mining company focused on terraforming planets for profit that wants to capture, study and weaponize the aliens.

Unlike Scotts 2015 feel-good space film The Martian, whichis focused on scientific research and intergovernmental cooperation for the advancement of science, the Alien films depict a grimmer, for-profit take on space exploration. Even without the monsters, outer space from this perspective is a dark and cruel place, characterized by blue-collar workers toiling in the outer reaches of the void on behalf of a giant soulless corporation back home on Earth.

Most of the tech industry billionaires who have founded space-oriented companies Richard Branson (Virgin Galactic), Jeff Bezos (Blue Origin), Larry Page (Planetary Resources) and Elon Musk (SpaceX) among them profess libertarian politics or come close to doing so. And as private space exploration increasingly captures the attention of these free-market boosters, the Alien movies offera dark parable in whichspace becomes the final frontier of colonial capitalism

How humanity should tackle the immensely costly and potentially profitable process of space-based research, transport and exploration is something thats only recently become a point of discussion and debate. Gone are the days of the Apollo mission, when national pride emerged from public efforts to be the first to reach the Moon or to develop Voyager 1, the first man-made object to leave the solar system. Today members of thepublic are as willing to celebrate private ventures, like SpaceXsrecyclable first-stage rocket, as they are to applaud public efforts like theCassini mission to send back to Earth detailed images of Saturn and its moons.

When you talk to people involved in space policy, theyll tell you there are currently no clear boundaries between the roles of government and the private sector. But there may soon be one in the form of distinguishing between missions near Earth and deeper space exploration, such as manned trips to the moon.

Last week famed Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin called on the U.S. government to reallocate resources toward a human mission to Mars. To do that, he said, public funds on near-Earth missions involving crews should be ceded to the private sector. (Near-Earth missions are generally defined as ones that take place at an altitude of about 250 miles fromthe planets surface. We must retire the ISS as soon as possible, Aldrin told an audience during theHumans to Mars Summit in Washington on May 9, referring to the International Space Station, which is currently jointly funded by the U.S., Japan, Canada, Russia and the 22-nation European Space Agency.

Aldrin suggested the private sector should instead take over all near-Earth orbit space missions to free up public funds to put boots on the ground on the Moon and Mars. This is a common proposal in the space-exploration community, said John M. Logsdon, founder of the Space Policy Institute at George Washington Universitys Elliott School of International Affairs.

Theres unlikely to be enough money in the U.S. or other government budgets to operate both the space station and fund deep-space exploration, Logsdon told Salon.

Certainly there wouldnt be enough money for space exploration without allocating more funds to NASAs budget, which is minuscule compared withthe $596 billion the U.S. spent on defense last year.

NASAs fiscal 2017budget requestsought $1.43 billion to contribute to the maintenance of the International Space Station plus an additional $2.76 billion for transportation to and from low-Earth orbits, mostly to deliver payloadsto and from the space station. Thats roughly 82 percent of NASAs proposed budget for science expenses (which excludes operational expenses). Passing these costs to the private sector would therefore free up billions of dollars in NASAs annual budget for deep-space exploration.

To publicly fund both near-orbit and deep-space operations would require a massive increase in public allocations, which is unlikely to happen inthe current political climate. President Donald Trumpsfiscal 2018 budget proposal spares NASA deep cuts but reduces its budget by 0.8 percent, to $19.1 billion, while continuing to expand public-private partnerships.

Robert Frost, a NASA instructor and flight controller who contributes frequently to the online forum Quora, rejects any eitheror notion about whether space exploration should be completely publicly funded or not, but he saidits important to keep the publics interest in mind for the process through government-funded scientific research and exploration.

The role of government in space exploration is to do the things that the market cant support, but the people agree is beneficial, Frostwrote. When we send a spacecraft like New Horizons to take close up pictures of Pluto, we do so because, as a people, we understand that science is important.

Frost and Logsdon share the view that the role of governments is to set up the infrastructure and transportation systems, and in the process to collect scientific discoveries and develop new engineering techniques, such as harvesting oxygen from lunar ice.

But and heres the question thats yet unanswered what happens when these processes of discovery lead to something that can be turned into a business? How is that business regulated? What is the governments role in ensuring the operations are safe, transparent and ultimately beneficial to the public?

The mainstream view in the space exploration community is that you hand this profitable venture off to the private sector, if theres a business model that works, which has yet to be proved.

We dont know whether theres money to be made from research or other activates on the moon or Mars, Logsdon said. There are a number of people who suggest thats the case, but it has to be demonstrated.

This is particularly true with deep-space exploration. Its one thing to shuttle millionaire tourists into low-Earth orbit, like Virgin Galactic is trying to do, and its another thing entirely to send robotic miners to an asteroid and send back natural resources profitably, considering the immense costs and engineering challenges.

Current private-sector involvement in outer space is a long way from the deep space dystopia depicted in Alien, but it raises important questions about the future balance between the publics interest in outer space and whatever businesses can be built out of publicly funded space exploration.

In many ways this not much different than the debates were having today here on Earth regarding a broad range of issues about the roles of government and private institutions, from the handling of public education to the privatization of prisons. The question is whether we want to transfer this debate into a distant and dangerous environment where companies may not be as accountable for their actions as they are (or arent) on Earth. To paraphrase the original Alien tagline, when something goes wrong out there, nobody can hear you scream.

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Libertarians in space: Is Alien: Covenant a parable about the privatization of space? - Salon

Matt Damon plays fictional NASA astronaut Mark Watney in the 2015 sci-fi blockbuster film "The Martian."

Though Hollywood doesn't get everything about space exploration right, entertainment is an important way to get space-related messages out to the public, a panel of experts said this week at the 2017 Human to Mars Summit in Washington, D.C.

"For me, when I'm writing papers about whatever scientific project I'm doing, there's often a very long background piece very dry, and not interesting to the general public," Peggy Wu, a human-machine interaction engineer at United Technologies, a conglomerate whose portfolio includes aerospace products said Tuesday (May 9) at the summit.

"Usually, I don't have a fun time reading it, and I don't think the general public does," Wu added during the panel discussion, which was webcast live. "Media helps make that more accessible and more exciting." [Learning From 'The Martian': Matt Damon Talks Movies As Teaching Tools (Video)]

Even many movies without a direct space connection some in the Marvel comic book universe, for example tend to use space technology, said writer and producer Tamara Krinsky. Her credits include the 1996 film "Star Trek: First Contact," and she is a part of The Scientific Research and Education Network, which aims to increase science literacy in youth.

Krinsky noted that Marvel uses science as a core for a creative concept. The 2015 film "Ant-Man," for example, mentioned the multiverse and nanotech. While such scientific concepts are starting points for inspiration, she said, "You're not getting an education in nanotech technology, and you're not expecting an education in nanotech technology."

The panelists agreed that it's OK for a sci-fi film to get some of the science wrong, for storytelling purposes. Wu, however, cautioned that there is a spectrum between "just plain wrong" and "it could be misleading."

She said the best way for artists to avoid misleading work is to lean on programs such as the National Academy of Science's Science and Entertainment Exchange, which aims to increase public knowledge of science through entertainment.

Recent forays into Mars storytelling include the blockbuster 2015 film "The Martian," which saw a fictional astronaut stranded on Mars, and this year's "Life," in which an International Space Station crew uncovers what could be evidence of life on the Red Planet.

Depending on whether a film aligns with NASA's priorities, the space agency may allow its logo to be used in Hollywood films. NASA did grant permission for "The Martian," which featured a quasi-scientific look at how a stranded astronaut could stay alive by himself on Mars, and eventually end up coming home to Earth.

"Life," by contrast, used an alternate NASA logo. That's because the space agency didn't want its logo to be used in a horror film, said Bert Ulrich, NASA's multimedia liaison for film and TV collaborations.

"We do a script review on fictional projects; we review to see if the meatball [logo] comes through or not," Ulrich said during the panel. He added that in some cases, such as Christopher Nolan's "Interstellar," directors may choose not to work with NASA for artistic-freedom purposes. ("Interstellar" also used an alternate NASA logo.)

NASA benefits from entertainment as well, Ulrich said. Last year's "Hidden Figures," which followed the story of black women who worked for the space program in its early days, helped NASA's goal to inspire new generations, he said. And movies such as "The Martian" can plant "an important seed" in the public's mind that Martian exploration is possible, which aligns with NASA's desires to send humans to Mars in the 2030s, Ulrich added. [Images: 'Hidden Figures' Movie Probes Little-Known Heroes of 1960s NASA]

He said NASA faced a public-perception problem after the space shuttle program ended in 2011, making American astronauts dependent on Russian Soyuz spacecraft for rides to and from orbit. As a result, many people thought NASA was dying or dead.

NASA's recent resurgence is in part due to entertainment, Ulrich said. The August 2012 landing of the Curiosity rover on Mars inspired more discussion about the Red Planet than the agency had anticipated, he said, which eventually bled into movies such as "The Martian."

Further, the popular TV series "The Big Bang Theory" had one of its characters go to the International Space Station with real-life astronaut Mike Massimino, specifically because co-creator Bill Prady wanted to give support to NASA, Ulrich said.

"These little things, they help," Ulrich said. "It gets people interested, and then, before you know it, we had films like 'Gravity' and 'Interstellar.' Everything was building up."

Follow Elizabeth Howell @howellspace, or Space.com @Spacedotcom. We're also on Facebook and Google+. Original article on Space.com.

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From 'The Martian' to Mars: How Hollywood Aids Space Exploration - Space.com

If you go

What: Visit and lecture by retired NASA astronaut Vance Brand

When: 7 p.m. Wednesday, May 17

Where: Longmont Museum, 400 Quail Road, Longmont

Cost: $12 general, $10 museum members

More info: 303-651-8374 or longmontmuseum.org

The first hint of looming cosmic journeys and eventual space exploration came to Vance Brand when he was a lifeguard and gatekeeper at the Boulder Reservoir.

It was 1957, and Brand was working his way through college at the University of Colorado. He was making his rounds at the reservoir when someone approached with earth-shattering news. The United States' Cold War adversary had a made a move that would have permanent and profound consequences for the human race.

"They informed me that the Russians had just launched a satellite called Sputnik into space," Brand recalled from his home in the Sierra Madre Mountains north of Los Angeles. "That was my introduction, my first glimmerings of the space program."

In the late 1950s, the prospect of humans sending a functioning satellite into space was the stuff of science fiction and fantasy for Brand, who'd grown up in the largely rural, farm-based community of Longmont. Less than 20 years later, however, in 1975, the Longmont High School graduate would journey into space as a command module pilot on the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project mission. That would be the first of four space flights for Brand, who logged nearly 45 hours in spacecraft over the course of his impressive career.

Brand will reflect on his deep ties to the formative days of the U.S. space program during a visit to his hometown this week. The former naval officer, aviator, aeronautical engineer, test pilot and NASA astronaut will lead a presentation at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, May 17, at the Longmont Museum. Brand will sign copies of his new autobiography, "Flying Higher and Faster," which will be available to buy in the museum's gift shop.

For a community that's long held Brand as a local legend, the visit will be a chance to consider the evolution of technology, aviation and exploration in the 20th century. On a more essential level, it'll be a chance to catch up with a hometown hero.

"Given how extraordinary his accomplishments are, he is such a humble person. It's not about him. He wants it to be about the broader issues of space exploration and what one person can do," said Erik Mason, curator of research at the Longmont Museum. "I think that's such a refreshing attitude in our celebrity-driven culture. It's so amazing to hear someone who's had such an incredible series of adventures."

For Brand, the adventures that included journeys to the cosmos had simple roots. During his early days as a Marine Corps recruit in North Carolina, he couldn't stop himself from gazing at the jets that took off every morning. The roar of the engines and the sight of the crafts in flight proved irresistible to Brand, who quickly saw flight as a professional and personal goal.

"It was an emotional decision," Brand said. "I thought that was about the coolest thing I'd ever seen, seeing the jets take off at Cherry Point. I immediately applied for naval flight training program."

That was the first step on a road that would lead to space exploration. Brand became a naval aviator for the Marine Corps, and he worked as a test pilot for the Lockheed Corporation in the early 1960s. He built up an impressive resume that eventually earned him a spot as one of 19 pilot astronauts recruited by NASA in 1966.

"I just wanted to be a pilot and fly airplanes. Once the space program did start, I thought, well, this is just a natural evolution," Brand said. "I went from military to pilot to test pilot. I wanted to fly higher and faster. I decided to apply for the space program."

Brand had to wait until 1975 for his first mission to space the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project mission saw Brand and his fellow crew members meeting Soviet cosmonauts in space. It was the ceremonial end of the space race, which had kicked off with the launch of Sputnik. That mission offered different levels of context for Brand and his fellow crew members.

"When you can go around the earth in 90 minutes, when you can look out at the stars and galaxies ... You come to realize that it's a small place in the big scheme of things, and that you're also a very small entity in the big scheme of things," Brand said. "It was interesting and a bit humbling to look down on the earth. You do realize that people on earth are one big family."

The literal global view of humanity had echoes in Brand's work with Russian cosmonauts. The boundaries of nationalities and countries disappeared outside earth's bounds. In the height of the Cold War, Brand and his fellow crew members found a way to relate to their Russian counterparts in a simple and direct way.

"It all worked out very well. We didn't have any fistfights or anything as a matter of fact, we trained together for some time before the flight," Brand said. "We got to be good friends and comrades in space flight at that time."

Subsequent space missions would follow in 1984 and 1990, journeys that saw Brand deploying communications satellites and conducting complex astronomical research. Still, Brand remains humble when he speaks about his career. After decades of pushing the boundaries of flight and the limits of human exploration, Brand is now happy to travel and explore the stretches of nature near his California home. He has confidence that the next generation of explorers will make even greater strides, and he has confidence in Longmont's coming crop of eager astronauts.

"This field does take preparation, doing well in school, math and sciences. I'm sure there are a lot smarter kids in Longmont High School than me," Brand said. "I've found as an ordinary person that I could get into this field and that it was very exciting," he concluded simply.

Originally posted here:

Vance Brand tells tales of space exploration at museum - Longmont ... - Longmont Times-Call

Those who enjoy games set in space have had plenty of titles to enjoy lately, including the controversial No Mans Sky and the promising Astroneer. If these games havent quenched your thirst for space exploration, you will soon be able to enjoy The Long Journey Home, the space exploration RPG developed by Daedalic

The Long Journey Home, which will see players uncover the mysteries of the universe, will launch on Steam on May 30th for the price of $39.99

Real Flying: Flying in space is a bit complicatedreally, we looked it up. The Long Journey Home provides a flying experience with actual planetary gravity, which can be difficult to master but can also be used to your advantage. Flying in Long Journey Home is a bit different than in many other space games. Be careful not to be sucked into a black hole or outmaneuvered by an alien warship!

Lost in Translation: Meet and try and befriend fifteen strange alien races four empires out of eight, plus assorted smaller civilisations in every game. Will they appreciate you approaching with raised shields as a sign of respect, or see it as an aggressive display? Can you win their respect, and with it, their assistance? With over two novels worth of dialogue, youll feel part of a living universe full of memorable characters and big decisions.

Weigh Your Options: Players have to land on planets in order to gather resources. By doing so, you always risk damaging the landing unit or even losing a crew member. Be sure to carefully consider the risks involved in every reward.

Procedural, not Random: Although most of the game is procedurally generated, there are no random aspects in it. For example, dialogues with aliens may vary in different playthroughs but the lore behind each race is very much consistent. Quests or reactions might change, but their core attitude and character always stays the same.

Same Game, Different Journey: Thanks to the variety of the key elements of the game, the experience can be very different with every new run. Players can expect to see about 20% of the possible content in one run which should only take about 6 8 hours.

The Long Journey Home launches on PC on May 30th.

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Space Exploration RPG The Long Journey Home To Release On ... - Wccftech