To the moon, maybe4/19/2018 The moon is our closest extraterrestrial body. It has protected us from meteoric impacts and regulated life here on earth. If we manage to become a multi-planetary species, it will be the first step in extending our reach towards that goal. The ESA has plans to create a permanent settlement on the moon called "Moon Village", NASA is looking to use the moon as a launching point to get to Mars on the Orion spacecraft. NASA has even scheduled a test launch for Orion as early as 2019 but reaching Mars is not likely until at least the 2030s. The previous American presidential administration hadn't planned on returning to the Moon, and was going to shoot directly for Mars, but the current administration changed the plans... This photo is from the index page of the stunning book 'Lunar Panorama' by Lowman which is located at the Bibliothek Andreas Zust. Two other recent American presidential administrations have planned to get to the moon (the Space Exploration Initiative during the George H.W. Bush presidency in 1989 as well as the Constellation Program during the George W. Bush presidency in 2004) though neither resulted in boots on the lunar terrain as the last human crew departed the moon in 1972. Luckily though, if the American government doesn't come through, again, there are plenty of other national and private organizations who are looking to take advantage of the vacuum in endeavors for space colonization. For example, private startups from India, Israel, and Japan, along with a Silicon Valley-backed space-exploration company called 'Moon Express' are all shooting for the Google Lunar XPrize, big companies like SpaceX and Blue Origin are also working on concepts, and governmental organizations for Russia, China and the ESA are all working towards returning to the moon and beyond. The ESA's 'Moon Village' (mentioned above) is particularly interesting as they plan to use inflatable structures and 3D printing with regolith (lunar soil). With all of this being said: the future plans, the present efforts and the history, there are still many people who don't believe that the original moon landings happened...According to a 1999 Gallup Poll, approximately 6% of Americans believe that it was a hoax and 5% are undecided. Of course some of these conspiracy theorists sound ludicrous but others propose sound arguments for why they do to believe that it never happened. For an example of some pretty convincing arguments, check out this video by a mustachioed gentleman. This TIME article even looks to it as one of the world's most enduring conspiracy theories and there is even a Wikipedia page for it. Even though people have tried to document the sites of the Apollo landings, conspiracy theorists hold strong to their belief. One example is Marcus Allen who has said that 'photographs of the lander would not prove that America put men on the Moon'. When does our skepticism stop being healthy and start being detrimental to society? Is it that our egos get in the way, as we refuse to accept that there are people who know more than us and that such knowledge is potentially trustworthy. When we don't trust people who have spent their entire lives in search for the truth on the environment/climate, astrophysics, biology, quantum mechanics, whatever...doesn't it hurt all of humanity for us to ignore these people? And why do some of us refuse to believe them while those same people choose to believe individuals who obviously know nothing? Is the truth still out there? Some links to provide more information on future travel to the moon: https://www.popularmechanics.com/... https://www.space.com/... https://news.nationalgeographic.com/... http://www.iflscience.com/... https://www.nbcnews.com/... http://www.esa.int/... Links to provide information on conspiracy theories: https://news.nationalgeographic.com/... http://content.time.com/... https://en.wikipedia.org/... https://www.telegraph.co.uk/...
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Broken pillars4/15/2018
Each Nebula is a nursery which becomes a factory, exploding to become another nursery and so on. We don't see them as they are, we see them as they were, and so we can't see their truth, or any truth outside of our localized region of space/time. Stars go nova, planets are broken, celestial bodies are created, and perhaps life begins again but we can only see things as they were. So how do we find the truth without first hand experience? Either we devise ways of gaining first hand experience or we calculate the most probable outcome based on what we can devise with currently available knowledge, expecting that the prediction is the likely truth. ... Image from page 104 of 'Das Hubble Universum' by Fischer, located in the Bibliothek Andreas Zust. For example, take the "Pillars of Creation" from the Eagle Nebula shown in the image above. According to data from the Spitzer Telescope, the pillars may have been destroyed by an exploding supernova however the visual evidence (light) of that cosmological event will not reach us on Earth for another millennium.
Maybe we wont always be able to discover the absolute truth, but through curiosity, investigation, perseverance as well as space/time, regardless of our position on earth or in the universe, there is no reason why we cannot deduce the truth which aligns closest with reality in all facets of life. Is the truth still out there? M.P.BronsteinA scientist who exists outside of the time-space continuum, looking for the truth, but unsure if it still exists or if it has become extinct. ArchivesCategories
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