"From the Wright Brothers in Kittyhawk to Tranquillity Base was 66 years. From Tranquillity Base, 66 years in the future takes us to 2035. I believe we deserve to do a little bit more than footprints on the moon." -- Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin, Apollo 11 Lunar Module Pilot, second man on the Moon.We can do better than that.
Nearly 100 years ago, my grandmother's uncle told her that she would live to see men fly. Almost everyone else thought her uncle was crazy and said so. She not only lived to take several flights on a jet airliner, she saw men walk on the Moon.
I have a niece who is close to the same age, now, that my grandmother was when her uncle said she'd see men fly. It would be nice if my niece lived to see people on Mars. But I am not as confident as my great-great uncle was in his day.
I hear a lot of this: "We have too many problems at hone, we cannot afford to go to Mars, we can go when we fix our problems here."
That is a false argument. We are always going to have problems here. If gaining near-perfection at home before we go exploring is the metric, we will never ever go anywhere. We never would have gone anywhere.
So what are we waiting for?
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