Another "Bridge too far" (for now)

Please don't misunderstand. I believe aspirational goals are valuable; more so when they're acknowledged as such. But, in my opinion, when the context for, and complexity of, attaining an aspirational goal isn't made evident, the effort can, and too often may, become a source of misinformation or even disinformation.

I was around when President Kennedy announced in 1962 a goal of putting a man on the moon by the end of the decade. Many of my aspirations have been shaped by the picture of our blue marble, Earth, taken by the Apollo 17 crew.

our "Blue Marble"
Image Credit: NASA/NOAA/GSFC/Suomi NPP/VIIRS/Norman Kuring

That image brought home just how rare and complex life on our home planet is. And, we didn't, and won't, get from earth to the moon, or to Mars, on an actual bridge. So, we need to be sensitive to what, and how much, we can bring with us or ship ahead if we''re going to survive in / on extraterrestrial environments. The research undertaken so far is interesting.

Eight go mad in Arizona: how a lockdown experiment went horribly wrong

Such constraints don't appear evident in the efforts of the world's first trillionaire to promote a scheme that would probably be highly profitable for one or more of his companies.

SpaceX Mars colonization program

This wouldn't trouble me as much were it not for reports about who has been funding much of the corporate development (and salvaging) of those companies.

Today a Welfare Trillionaire Is Born

President Kennedy's brother, Bobby, was also a politician. In remarks at the University of Kansas, on March 18, 1968, he noted:

..."Gross National Product - if we judge the United States of America by that - that Gross National Product counts air pollution and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for the people who break them. It counts the destruction of the redwood and the loss of our natural wonder in chaotic sprawl. It counts napalm and counts nuclear warheads and armored cars for the police to fight the riots in our cities. It counts Whitman's rifle and Speck's knife, and the television programs which glorify violence in order to sell toys to our children. Yet the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country, it measures everything in short, except that which makes life worthwhile. And it can tell us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans."

 In my opinion, we have much more significant efforts to invest in than space colonization and Artificial Intelligence. It is well past time for US to invest in making an escape to Planet B (as if there were such) unnecessary by practicing stewardship of earth and to put more resources into developing, protecting, and using human intelligence.

Kennedy spoke about an "other America." We need, aas a priority, to create one America much closer to our long-standing aspirations of freedom, equality, and justice for all.

You Could Never Take a Car to Greenland

by Maggie Smith

my daughter says. Unless the car could float.
Unless by car you mean boat. Unless the ocean
turned to ice and promised not to crack.
Unless Greenland floated over here,
having lifted its anchor. Unless we could row
our country there. Our whole continent
would have to come along, wouldn’t it? Unless
we cut ourselves free. What kind of saw
could we use for that? What kind of oars
could deliver one country to another?
She asks, Why is Greenland called Greenland
if it’s not green? Why is Iceland called
Iceland if it’s greener than Greenland?
Unless it’s a trick, a lie: the name Greenland
is an ad for Greenland. Who would go
promised nothing but ice? Who would cut
her home to pieces and row away for that?