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Month: May 2020
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1695 – Jeremy
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1696 – Veda
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1697 – Jerry
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1698 – Rebecca
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1699 – Ian
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1700 – Britton
Britton and I went to Orangefield High School together. She became a high school teacher focusing on AP American History.
What will the next 100 years look like?
“Technological things. We have come so far. Politics will revolve around technology than anything else.”
Do we know as much about technology today? Forty years ago people really understood how a car was put together. Twenty years ago people built computer. Now it is all a black box. People do not know how it works.
“Technology in some ways retard us. Kids just expect for the technology to work. But they can’t write as well. They can’t critically think. They don’t know how to type because it is not taught any more.” (My younger son uses https://play.typeracer.com/ to learn typing.)
Many things were going on during the first moon landing in 1969: Vietnam war, civil rights, cold war, Cuban missile crisis, Kennedy assassination. How much of it do you cover?
“Only able to show the video of the moon landing and mention it in the context of sputnik and all the other things going on. The 2024 moon landing will help to re-energize everyone.”
What do you think about 2024?
“Good and bad. Will help with technology. But at the same time how much money is being invested in this when there are other problems that could be focused on.
Everyone wants to be an astronaut at some point of their lives. It can help get people to study science and technology.”
If it was a safe and affordable would you go into space?
“Sure. To be in space would be awesome. To be able to see the earth from the perspective of the moon. Why not?”
(TV Series reference: The 100
Plot: Set ninety-seven years after a nuclear war has destroyed civilization, when a spaceship housing humanity’s lone survivors sends one hundred juvenile delinquents back to Earth, in hopes of possibly re-populating the planet. )
“Having movies like Hidden Figures helps to excite and remind people about space.”
How do you feel about having the first woman land on the moon?
“I don’t feel one way or the other about it. It should be the best person for the job. Don’t send people up there just to fill a quota.”
Big event coming up: May 27, 2020 – SpaceX will be launching two Astronauts from Florida. This will be the first time that American astronauts have launched from American soil on American rockets since the retirement of the Space Shuttle in 2011.
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1701 – Redouane
We will always have problems on earth. “The poor are always with you” It does not mean we should ignore it. We should address it. But that does not mean everything else on earth should be placed on hold. We should explore, discover, create. We have to approach life with balance.
The ice on the poles of the moon is a critical resource. We need to take steps that we preserve it. It would be bad to go to the moon, and do something to waste this resource.
The Outer Space Treaty needs to be rethought. We need to open up the economic forces to move us into space. And this means the ability for countries to claim resources and places off of earth. Yes, we need to protect the rights of countries that will come later. But we need to take a balanced approach.
Maybe we should start with giving every country so much area of the moon for so many years. They can sell their area to another country. But to claim it they must do something with it. Place a lander gives them so much area. A rover can give them more. Humans landing gives them more. A permanent base will give them even more.
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1702 – Mark
Mark and I talked a good amount about the effects of quarantine and Covid19. People are learning how to work online, go to school online, connect with friends online, shop online, and even see the doctor online. This capability will accelerate many of the trends of virtual business displacing physical businesses.
We also did get to talk about NASA’s 2024 moon plans. Mark had heard about it, probably from news relaying the current administration’s goals and objectives. Mark supports exploration. He does not see much value in going back to the moon per se, but supports it for spinoffs of technology, bringing people together to work on a common goal, and how it would support further exploration. And if it were safe and affordable, Mark would go into space. But he would probably not go to Mars.
We talked a little bit about NASA’s current approach with the Human Lander of having companies be responsible for creating the lander and selling the service back to NASA. This is a different approach than what was done in the Apollo program, and it is a different approach than what the US House Science Committee wants to do. They would like to have the traditional approach of having the government define all the requirements, pay a government contractor to build it, and for the government to own it. We know that this approach leads to costly solutions that take longer to build and have very limited use.
Hopefully this new approach, which has had great success in the private sector, will produce great results that will allow for us to continue to use it.
We also talked about this project. Looking at the videos and doing an analysis is something I plan to do. I am thinking the videos will be especially interesting to see a few years from now. What were people thinking and talking about? What were their views of the 2024 moon landing? And to actually see what happens.
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1703 – Rajan
Rajan lives in Pakistan and is a mechanical engineer. He mainly works on design HVAC units. He had heard about NASA’s plans to go to the moon. He supports exploration. And if he could, he would go into space.
Our connection was not good. I am really looking forward to SpaceX Starlink becoming operational and being in widespread use. Starlink can allow for us to connect with people all over the world with high speed internet.