It depends on what your implicit and explicit goals are.
If you start from 'efficiently find out cool stuff' or 'more knowledge
is good' you get one kind of answer.
If you start from 'ask better questions and inform theory and
understanding' you get another kind of answer.
If you start from 'get better at making really complex things' you get
another kind of answer.
If you start from 'protect the planet' you get another kind of answer.
If you start from 'make epic quantities of money' you get another kind
of answer.
If you start from 'inspire more kids to go into science' you get another
kind of answer.
If you start from 'extend the range of human experience by exploring
strange new worlds' you get another kind of answer.
So, what do you wanna do?
C.
On 5/28/12 12:09 PM, Jochen Fromm wrote:
You have heard about planetary resources and the first commercial
flight to the ISS by the Dragon spacecraft from SpaceX. Is this a new
step forward into commercial space exploration? Or a step back into
the orbit? The first man landed on the moon already 40 years ago. I am
just reading 'Carrying the Fire' from Michael Collins, an impressive
book about a tremendous achivement in an exciting time. Although
nobody has repeated this success in the last 4 decades, space
exploration of the solar system with robots and rovers will certainly
continue. Human space exploration is much more difficult, and I am not
sure if it is the right path. Space veterans like Armstrong, Aldrin
and Collins are of course supporters of manned space flight. What do
you think? There is something profoundly affecting about these
spacecrafts, spaceships and the other technical marvels from rocket
science. Do we need humans to control them?
-J.
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============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
