Our second talk was from John Logsdon, Professor Emeritus, Space Policy Institute at the Elliott School of International Affairs at George Washington University, about “Policy Rationales for Space Activities.” I am really excited to learn the policy side of things. This is such a great summer to be here because of the uncertainty of NASA’s future. The last shuttle liftoff occurred the day I left for ISU and we don’t currently have a replacement vehicle. I’ve been staying plugged in to the NASA discussions in Congress via Twitter (@SpcPlcyOnline, @jeff_foust). Logsdon has recently written several articles (here's one) on the current NASA mess. His talk on Tuesday was about the most common rationales for space programs since the 1950’s – national security, national prestige and leadership, and scientific knowledge. More recently the rationales are enhancing military capabilities, creating basis for commercialization of space, tangible benefits for society, and assisting in social and economic development. Sometimes people try to use exploration as rationale but so far that is not a strong enough reason. We talked about whether human exploration is more compelling than robotic exploration. Most of us agree it is. It’s an interesting debate!
The third discussion was “Economic Rationale for Space” by Michael Simpson, President of ISU. I really found this interesting because as an engineer, I have never had a real class on economics. Some of the economic rationales for space programs are: creating minimum demand for certain high tech products and shortening the very long run.
After the 3 lectures we had lunch and then an introduction to the 7 departments. After that we had a fun debate about human exploration vs robotic exploration. We all had to argue one side or the other in 60 seconds depending on which half of the room you were sitting in. Luckily I was on the pro-human exploration because I don’t think I could have argued the other side. My argument was tongue-in-cheek. I asked, “Have you seen Battlestar Galactica, Star Trek, and basically any sci-fi with robots? What is common in all those movies? The robots rise up and try to kill us!” After the debate we took a vote – all but one person voted to continue human exploration. Yay! Maybe a slightly biased group though. *wink*
1 comment:
About robots: You should study the work of Isaac Asimov. Especially the three rules of robotics. One of them is "robots cannot harm humans."
I'm writing you from Panera using my new tablet PC a Ziio. It was only $289.00! DOES NOT DO 3g or. 4G, but who needs it with free wireless so iniquitous?
I love you, and am LOVING your blog!!!
;-b
DAD
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