In a 1988 interview with The New York Times, he voiced disapproval of proposals to send humans to Mars, saying: "It's just as wrong as can be. It's wrong because it guarantees there won't be any space science. We know how NASA treats science as a second-class citizen when it competes with man-in-space programs."
I'm inclined to believe that.
But I must say, when I saw the headline about a 90-year-old "Explorer of Mars," an idea that occurred to me was having a one-way mission, sending some quite old persons to Mars, with no way to bring them back. I was assuming he'd be in favor of sending a man to Mars and imagined him saying I'm 90, send me! I'm going to die pretty soon anyway. I'd like to have a shot at making it to Mars. And you can just leave me there!
Would it be wrong to have a mission like that? Why is it that young people take the most risks with their lives? Shouldn't the oldest people take the most daring risks, since they've lived the greater part of their lives and therefore risk less of it?
But Horowitz what not that kind of Mars explorer, not the physical adventurer, but a man who did his explorations intellectually.
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5 comments:
Tom: I agree. If only people were more rational!
Mark: But how can anyone bear to think of dying? You'll have to leave this place forever, never to return. An old person is used to the idea of leaving forever. I could imagine an adventurous old person saying goodbye to all of this and going to Mars to live out their days. They aren't going to live forever.
Less dramatically, how did immigrants leave their homelands, back in the days when they wouldn't have thought they could ever go back? They weren't crazy. It's not the equivalent of suicide to turn your back on home forever.
NASA treats science as a second-class citizen
I would say that was true, certainly in the 60's and perhaps the 70's, but not so much today. I say this as one with some modicum of inside experience. My brother Mark Craig who just retired as a director of NASA, was at a time in the past the Director of Mars Exploration. Although trained as an aeronautical engineer he is first and foremost a scientist and persued his career with that in mind. Just this last January he helped write a NASA implentation study, Extending Robotic and Human Presence that stresses the need for both robotic and manned missions.
Ann: not only is it strange that we ask young people to risk their lives and not the old, but shouldn't we give pensions to the young,who could enjoy life while they are physically able to? Let people work from 40 until their deaths, and let them die "in harness," if work is supposed to be so fulfilling.
Instead what we effectively say is, "we're going to wring every last bit out of you, and if, IF, YOU've been diligent, we'll let you spend all the money you've saved on the very end of your life, which could be quite miserable physically."
if that be "productivity", than to hell with it!
I'll go.
May I take my beloved wife along with me? Otherwise, I'm afraid I'd miss her and I would be sad and lonesome.
I hope they don't send her to Venus instead but if they do, they should give us unlimited texting and high speed internet.
Surely that would not be asking too much.
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