Ramblings of a Technology Addict

Monday, February 3, 2003

Understanding Space.

Finally, someone gets it. I've been angry as hell this week, and I know some of you are paying the price.
From Lee Gomes' article in the WSJ today:
The program was, in fact, conceived in emotion -- the need to feel the thrill of beating a rival team to the moon. There have been many other emotions since then: joy; awe; pride; and now and then, horror.
That's why it's hard to imagine a space program without people. We could fill up many gigabytes with the data streams of probes, monitors and robots sent zooming skywards. But no unmanned mission could ever put a spring into your step the same way John Glenn did when he went back up, this time as a wise old man.
Just as futuristic science fiction is really about the present, so is the space program really about Earth. Space used to be the domain of white men in crew cuts; now we have shuttle teams that try to look like America.
Or the world. An Israeli was on this trip; a Saudi astronaut was on another. The Family of Man has lately been in for some tough sledding; at least it still has boosters back at NASA.
At Friday's bachelor party, after the Holodeck argument played itself out, the groom-to-be, who had taken the optimistic side in the debate, looked up at the stars. It being a clear, moonless, nonurban evening, the stars were present in abundance. Among them were the night sky's Greatest Hits, like belt of Orion and the fingerprint-like smudge of the Pleiades. Gazing skywards, the groom became angry, in the philosophical way that is allowed of slightly drunk young men at a great but stressful moment in their lives.
Damn it all, he said; if it weren't for our petty political preoccupations here on Earth, we could already up be there. The stars await us, he said; we just need to stop mucking things up and be on our way.
I wasn't at all sure why anyone would want to trade the Earth, especially on an evening like this one, for the sterile weightlessness of some space station. It seemed I was encountering the less sanguine side of the technological temperament: an impatience with the occasionally messy daily affairs of human beings.
But after a while, the details of what my friend was saying didn't really matter. I looked up too, and drew my own conclusions. Space has room for lots of them.
So for those of you out there who want the feds to stop funding NASA, a polite "Please, Go choke on your own wang. You're holding the rest of us back."
6:59:47 PM  comment []

yarr? YARR!

What is wrong with you people?
4:42:14 PM  comment []

Damn You Monday!

Dammit, it's turning into a perfectly worthless monday. I had a great blog entry a minute ago. Now it's gone. Why? Because I pushed apple-q in Safari. Why did I do that? <gomer>Wull, I'm guessin' I was done with that there winder, and I dun fergot that there was another one-a them thar winder thingies on the other monitor</gomer>
Exactly. Because I am a dumbass this morning, that's why.
Okay, so, links away, here I go. Lileks via InstaPundit on why men should go to Mars and not robots. I like the way he thinks. Rent My Chest will rent you Chris' chest for $20. Boobies will cost two grand. No word on whose they are. Should we take a collection and find out?
Dammit there were more, but I lost 'em. yada yada someone suing apple mumble mumble Dave Winer said something smart hmmmm I think that's all. I don't care.
*zerbert*
11:34:39 AM  comment []