Book: The Practical Values of Space Exploration

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The answer undoubtedly is that such grassroots demand will bring about
increased academic curricula in astronautics in direct proportion to its
magnitude.

Meanwhile, the availability of work for persons with a background in
space-related subjects can be gaged to some extent by observing the
variety of personnel requirements on major space exploration projects.

A single American firm, for example, uses 49 different professional
specialists in its work for the National Aeronautics and Space
Administration and in its space work for the Department of Defense.[71]
Multiplied by the thousands of companies which are doing similar work,
the list gives an idea of the astronautic demand confronting the
Nation's educational institutions:

Acoustician
Aerodynamicist
Aeronautical engineer
Agricultural engineer
Astrodynamicist
Astronomer
Astrophysicist
Biochemist
Biophysicist
Ceramics specialist
Chemist
Computer specialist
Crystallographer
Development engineer
Doctor of medicine
Electrical engineer
Electronic engineer
Experimental physicist
Flight engineer
Gyroscopics specialist
Hydraulic engineer
Information theory analyst
Inorganic chemist
Logical designer
Magnetic device engineer
Mathematician
Mechanical applications engineer
Mechanical engineer
Mechanisms specialist
Medical electronic engineer
Metallurgical engineer
Methods engineer
Nuclear physicist
Oceanographer
Organic chemist
Physical chemist
Pneumatic engineer
Process engineer
Production engineer
Project engineer
Psychologist
Reliability engineer
Sociologist
Solid state physicist
Structural engineer
System analyst
Theoretical physicist
Thermodynamicist
Transducer engineer

[Illustration: FIGURE 14.--Exploration within the solar system
means a wealth of new knowledge which could lead to learning the secrets
of life.]

FOOTNOTES:

[50] 25 supra. See also address to the American Bankers Association,
Oct. 28, 1958.

[51] Space Business Daily, June 17, 1960.

[52] Feldman, George J., cited in a letter to the House Committee on
Science and Astronautics, Apr. 29, 1960.

[53] From Michelson, Edward J., "How Missile-Space Spending Enriches the
Peacetime Economy," Missiles and Rockets, Sept. 14, 1959, pp. 13-17.

[54] Tischer, R. G., "A Search for the Spaceman's Food," Space Journal,
December 1959, p. 46.

[55] Kraar, Louis, Wall Street Journal, May 4, 1960.

[56] 7 supra.

[57] Release No. 38-60, Air Research and Development Command, May 2,
1960.

[58] Lear, John, "Where Does Rain Begin?" New Scientist, Mar. 24, 1960,
p. 724.

[59] "Wind and Soil," New Scientist, May 26, 1960, p. 1327.

[60] Wexler, Dr. Harry. Press conference conducted by the National
Aeronautics and Space Administration, Apr. 22, 1960.

[61] Lockheed, Missiles and Space Division, medical research, Sunnyvale,
Calif.

[62] Lewis, Dr. F. J., before the Space Flight Symposium, San Antonio,
Tex., May 28, 1960.

[63] Kleitman, Prof. Nathaniel, before the Space Flight Symposium, San
Antonio, Tex., May 26, 1960.

[64] Taylor, Lt. Col. Richard R., USA (MC), testimony before the House
Committee on Science and Astronautics, June 15, 1960.

[65] Lederberg, Joshua, "Exobiology-Experimental Approaches to Life
Beyond Earth," Science in Space, ch. IX, National Academy of Sciences,
Washington, D.C., February 1960.

[66] Ibid.

[67] Dryden, Dr. Hugh L., speech before the Engineering Society of
Cincinnati, Feb. 18, 1960.

[68] Michael, Donald N., "Space Exploration and the Values of Man,"
Space Journal, September 1959, p. 15.

[69] 67 supra.

[70] Space Age, August 1959, p. 3.

[71] Minneapolis-Honeywell, Military Products Group.




V. LONG-RANGE VALUES

In assessing the _practical_ values of space exploration it does not
seem logical to limit considerations to those values which are immediate
or near-future ones. The worth of a present activity may be doubled or
trebled because of its long-range potential.

Such values may not be practical within the context of today's usage,
but they may be extremely practical if we are willing to concede that
those of us living today have an interest in and a responsibility for
what happens on Earth in the decades and centuries to come.


TROUBLE SPOTS

Thinking along these lines it is not difficult to conjure up a picture
of some of the difficult physical and social problems which will be
facing the Earth in the years which stretch ahead. The foregoing
sections of this report, for example, have already indicated extensive
difficulties inherent in at least five major categories.

(1) Bursting population.
(2) Acute water shortage.
(3) Soil erosion and disappearance.
(4) Too much leisure.
(5) Intensified nationalism.

In each area it is probable that space exploration will ultimately play
an important role.


_Population_

Social scientists have been warning for years of the drastic social
upheavals which must inevitably accompany an "exploding" population. It
is a problem the complexity of which grows in geometric progression as
time goes on. In the United States nearly 300 years were required to
produce 90 million people. In the past 60 years this number has doubled.
The implications are obvious. They are only too plain to urban and
suburban planners who endeavor to cope with the antlike construction and
activity of the human race as it burgeons with each succeeding year.

Of course, this is not a domestic matter but a global one. Its
seriousness has been described as follows: "Projection of the post-World
War II rate of increase gives a population of 50 billions (the highest
estimate of the population-carrying capacity of the globe ever
calculated by a responsible scholar) in less than 200 years."[72] A
European professor of medicine adds that any surge in human longevity at
this time is quite undesirable from the standpoint of making elderly
persons useful or cared for. "The problems posed by the explosive growth
of populations * * * are so great that it is quite reassuring to know
that biologists and medical men have so far been unsuccessful in
increasing the _maximum_ lifespan of the human species * * * and * * *
it would be a calamity for the social and economic structure of a
country if the mean lifespan were suddenly to increase from 65 to 85
years."[73]

Some anthropologists pessimistically wonder if man is going to prove
like the locust by populating himself into near extinction from time to
time.

Without subscribing to this view, one must nevertheless take notice of
the difficulties posed by population increase, not merely those of food,
shelter, education, and the like but also those resulting from cellular,
cramped, close living.

Whichever phase of the problem is studied, it seems not unreasonable to
conclude that space research will help find a solution. New ways to
produce food, new materials for better shelter, new stimuli for
education--all of these are coming from our space program. As for the
matter of adequate living room, space research may result in ways to
permit an easy and efficient scattering of the population without
hurting its mobility. This might result from the development of small
subsidiary types of craft, or "gocarts," originally designed for local
exploration on other planets. Such craft, whether they operated by air
cushion, nuclear energy, gravitational force, power cell, or whatever,
conceivably would permit Earth's population to spread out without the
need for expensive new roads--which, by the way, take millions of acres
of land out of productive use.

A development of this sort, together with new power sources to replace
the fossil fuels on which factory, home, and vehicle now depend, might
also all but eliminate the growing smog and air-pollution blight.


_Water shortage_

A direct result of the population increase, multiplied by the many new
uses for which water is being used in home appliances, etc., and plus
the greatly increased demand for standard uses such as indoor plumbing,
irrigation, and factory processing, is the likelihood that water
shortage will be high on the list of future problems. Ways to conserve
and reuse water, together with economical desalting of sea water, will
be essential in the decades ahead. Space research may provide part of
the answer here, too. (See New Water Sources and Uses, sec. III.)


_Soil erosion_

The Russian steppes of Kazakhstan are providing the world with a great
contemporary dust bowl, reminiscent of the middle 1930's when dust from
the Great Plains stretched from Texas to Saskatchewan. Questionable
agriculture policies, drought, and strong easterly winds are among the
forces blamed for the trials of southern Russia.[74] So great is the
extent of this disturbance that the dust cloud has been identified in
photographs taken by American weather satellites.

Of course, "wind erosion is only one of the processes whereby the
Earth's arable land is diminishing and the deserts increasing; erosion
by water can also sweep away the soil."[75] But insofar as the current
dust bowl of the Soviet steppes has "diminished food resources at a time
when the number of mouths to feed is increasing so rapidly, the world is
the poorer."[76]

What can space research do about this vital trend, which again seems
destined to accelerate in the future?

While we cannot be sure, we can conjecture that improved soil
conservation might turn out to be the greatest benefit of weather
understanding and modification. Agriculture policies might be adapted to
the long-range patterns uncovered by weather satellites and, eventually,
through better understanding of the making of weather, it may be
possible to modify weather forces in a manner which will preserve the
soil.

In a more remote vein, it may be that knowledge gained from a first-hand
study of the Moon or other planets in the solar system will eventually
contribute to the conservation of soil on Earth in ways as yet
unimagined.


_Added leisure_

Acquiring more time for leisure sounds good. Very much more leisure than
most people now have, however, is apt to present trouble in itself.
Since it appears that the time is not far away when those living in the
highly developed countries will no longer have to concentrate their
prime energies on the traditional quest for food, clothing, and shelter,
a potentially dangerous vacuum may be the result. At least the
psychologists seem agreed that people must feel a useful purpose in
their lives and have ways to pursue it.

Above all, leisure makes a challenge to the human spirit. Athens,
in her Golden Age, displayed a genius for the creative use of
leisure which can be seen as complementary, and indeed superior, to
her genius for military and commercial ventures. There have also
been such periods of all-pervasive inspiration in the history of
other peoples * * *. The doubling of our standard of living will
present a growing challenge to the human spirit and produce graver
consequences, should we fail to meet it. We neglect the proper use
of leisure at our peril.[77]

In other words, the answer to the problem does not lie solely with the
golf course, the yacht club, the theater, or the lengthened vacation.
Much more will be required.

The intellectual stimulus of space exploration and research, which
undoubtedly will divide into numerous branches like capillary streaks
from a bolt of lightning, should be markedly useful in helping to fill
this vacuum. Space research would seem particularly applicable in this
role since it deals with fundamental knowledge and concepts which are
satisfying in terms of psychological needs and sense of purpose.


_Intensified nationalism_

Ever since World War II the era of colonialism has been on the wane.
Many nations have proclaimed, won, or wrested their independence during
that period. Others appear to be on the verge of doing so. At any rate,
it is clear that in the decades ahead the world is going to see the rise
of even more independent nations with strong nationalistic feelings.

History implies that developments of this sort are often accompanied by
international unrest--because of the normal ebullience of national
adolescence and the desire to be accepted by the world community, as
well as a variety of concomitant political and economical upheavals.

For whatever trials may lie ahead on this score, space exploration may
prove to be much needed oil on rough water.

Ambitious, advanced, sophisticated space exploration in the future is
almost certain to require a high degree of international cooperation and
perhaps even a pooling of resources and funds to some degree. Already
America has found it expedient, in some cases mandatory, to depend on
facilities in other countries for her ventures into space. A good
example is the close cooperation between the United States and tracking
bases located in Canada, Australia, South Africa, and elsewhere. An even
better one is the important part played in U.S. efforts by England's
giant radio telescope at Jodrell Bank. Most of our launches are followed
by this equipment and much of the best scientific information gained
from it. In the case of Pioneer V, Jodrell Bank was essential to keep in
touch with the satellite at the longer distances and, moreover, was
actually required to separate the fourth stage of the launch vehicle and
direct the payload toward its Venus orbit.

Mutual need and cooperation thus fostered by space exploration can be
expected to siphon off some of the political tensions of the future,
especially as more and more nations become interested in space and
inaugurate complex programs of their own.


LIMITATIONS ON SPACE RESEARCH

There are some who are convinced that the exploration of space is
rigidly limited and that the landing of men on extraterrestrial bodies
other than the Moon is quite improbable. They are sure that extensive
travel outside the solar system is impossible.

Admittedly, the problems of such travel are enormous. But are they
incapable of solution?

Twenty-six million miles to Venus, 49 million miles to Mars, 3,680
million miles from the Sun to Pluto at the outer edge of the solar
system. The nearest of the stars is 25 million, million miles away,
and travel to it at 10 miles per second would require 80,000 years.
Is the travel of man to the stars a futile dream? Each generation
of man builds on the shoulders of the past. The exploration of
space has begun; who now can set limits to its future
accomplishments?[78]

[Illustration: FIGURE 15.--Need for international cooperation
in the U.S. space program is illustrated by this map showing the areas
from which help must be procured for projects already planned or
underway.]

That is the thought of one of the Nation's most expert space scientists.


_"Who now can set limits * * * ?"_

It seems to mesh curiously well with one of the most interesting
phenomena of our day--the emergence of a breed of engineers,
technicians, teachers, and scientists who do not recognize limits and
who refuse to concede that something cannot be so because it fails to
fit conventional patterns or conform to the physical laws of the
universe as we now know them. Of this there is growing evidence.

For many years it has been an accepted "fact," for instance, that the
Moon is a dead world with no life upon it. The suggestion made by the
great 16th century mathematician, Johannes Kepler, that some life might
exist on the Moon was debunked into silence long since. Yet today a
fellow of the British Royal Astronomical Society writes that the first
men to arrive on the Moon may find not only plant life but possibly
animal life. "The fact that terrestrial organisms may be unable to
survive in the surroundings of another planet is by itself no more
significant than that fishes and other marine animals die when exposed
to the air. From their point of view air is uninhabitable because they
have failed to equip themselves with lungs."[79] And he adds that his
surmise "leaves out of account the possibilities of the Moon's
underground world, which are incalculable, for there water, the vital
gases, congenial temperatures, and increased pressures will all be
present. Only sunlight is absent."

Then there is Project Ozma, the search for life on other planets or in
other star systems, which began in April 1960 at Green Bank, W. Va. It
is being undertaken by the National Radio-Astronomy Observatory and
consists of carefully directed listening by radio-telescope for signs of
intelligent broadcasts originating outside Earth.

At Stanford University another astronomer is concentrating the efforts
of part of his laboratory on behalf of a similar idea. The chances are,
he believes, "that the superior races of other planets in other galaxies
have already developed a communications network among themselves, and
have entered a joint program to scan all the other solar systems looking
for signs of awakening civilization among the backward planets. Each of
the advanced communities might pick as its probe assignment a single
other solar system--and one such probe may well be circling our Sun
right now on a routine check for life."[80] Unexplained delayed echoes
of earthly radio transmissions received in the past, it is thought,
could be evidence of such a scheme.

Are goings-on such as these nonsense?

Here is the answer given by one hard-headed science writer:

Centuries may pass before there is any sign of intelligence outside
the Earth. But the advantages of communication with another
civilization that has survived our present dilemmas are far too
great to permit the experiment to be abandoned.[81]

The results of recent and more orthodox experiments have already done
much to shake the complacency of scientists in regard to their concepts
of space. Investigations have disclosed that, far from being a complete
vacuum, space is relatively full of matter and energy. Hydrogen gas,
radiation belts, cosmic particles, solar disturbances of unknown nature,
micrometeorites--and, from Pioneer V, proof of a 5-million ampere
electromagnetic ring centered about 40,000 miles away.[82] The director
of the Smithsonian Astrophysical Laboratory in Cambridge, Mass.,[83] has
said that more and more startling astrophysical information was gathered
during the first few weeks of the space age than had been accumulated in
the preceding century.

In brief, it is becoming the vogue in science to refuse to say
"impossible" to anything. On the contrary, the watchword for tomorrow is
shaping up as "take _nothing_ for granted."


FUNDAMENTAL KNOWLEDGE ABOUT LIFE

Everything learned from space exploration thus far indicates that the
knowledge lying in wait for those who manage to observe the universe
from outside Earth's atmosphere will be far grander than anything
uncovered to date.

We may finally learn the origin of our universe and the method of its
functioning. A good part of this knowledge may be no farther away than
the next 3 to 5 years. Satellite telescopes now under construction are
expected to elicit far more information than even the 200-inch giant at
Mount Palomar. One such observatory satellite, to be launched in 1963 or
before, "will permit a telescope of about 10 feet in length to point at
heavenly bodies within a tenth of a second of arc for periods up to an
hour. Present plans call for an orbit between 400 and 500 miles, as a
lifetime of at least 6 months is required to observe the entire
celestial field."[84]

Perhaps, and sooner than we think, we shall find a clue to the destiny
of all intelligent life.

Perhaps the theory advanced by a noted eastern astronomer will turn out
to be true--that biological evolution on the habitable planets of the
universe may be the result of contamination left by space travelers
arriving from (and leaving for) other worlds. In other words, the
fruition of life on the various planets of the millions of solar systems
might be the product of a wandering group of astronautic Johnny
Appleseeds who leave the grains of life behind them. "Space travel
between galaxies has to be possible for this, but of course this needs
to be only quite a rare event. In a time of about 3.3 billion years, the
most advanced form of life occurring in a galaxy must be able to reach a
neighboring one."[85]

The notion seems fantastic.

But when we look clear to the end of Earth's road (and assuming the
astrophysicists are right in their theories about the evolution and
ultimate death of our solar system) we know that Earth will one day
become uninhabitable. Life on Earth must then perish or move elsewhere.
If we further assume that mankind will not want to die with his planet
and if we acknowledge that other worlds may have been through this
entire cycle in eons past--perhaps the notion is not so unreasonable
after all.

Whatever the truth is on this score, space exploration will certainly be
of "practical" value to our descendants when that dim, far-off day
arrives.


PSYCHOLOGICAL AND SPIRITUAL VALUES

Long before the arrival of that millennium, however, the knowledge and
understanding awaiting us through the medium of space exploration is
certain to have profound effects on the human race psychologically and
spiritually.

It already has had effects on humans of all ages.

Adults, who are paying the taxes to support the space exploration
program and reaping its practical values, are also thinking of
themselves, their country, and their world in broader, more
knowledgeable terms.

In a sense, children may be even more deeply involved.

There is a special group which may play a useful role in spreading
the new values growing from the exploration of space, and this is
the children who play at spaceman today. Whether or not they take
this interest with them beyond childhood remains to be seen.
However, the unique fact in the present situation is that never
before have children rehearsed a role that really will not exist
until they are adults. To be sure all of them will not fulfill this
childhood role, but the fact that the reality lies ahead rather
than in the past (as with cowboys and Indians) may stimulate them
to retain a sensitivity for the various meanings man in space can
have for our future.[86]

Put it another way--if it is true, as a modern Chinese philosopher has
said, that the search for knowledge is a form of play, "then the
spaceship, when it comes, will be the ultimate toy that may lead mankind
from its cloistered nursery out into the playground of the stars."[87]

[Illustration: FIGURE 16.--Space vehicles of the future may
look like this artist's drawing of an electrical propulsion craft. The
nuclear reactor is located at the extreme left, followed by a neutron
shield, heat exchanger, gamma-ray shield and propellant. The center tank
houses turbogenerating equipment. Excessive heat is dissipated in the
large radiator. At the extreme right are two crew cabins, landing
vehicle and a ring-shaped accelerator.]


MATURING OF THE RACE

The psychological and spiritual changes necessitated by this evolution
may be at a cost far beyond dollars--because many of us will be hard put
to negotiate them, especially if they come too rapidly.

Nevertheless, negotiating them must also be placed in the category of
"practical" values--for in the long run it seems to be an essential part
of the maturing of mankind.

The years ahead will face us with many sputniks and thereby will
require of our citizens stern, costly, and imaginative
participation in programs to meet and surmount the many complex
challenges with which our growing technology confronts us. To
succeed in space and to succeed on Earth, we must somehow learn to
make the larger world of ideas, so brilliantly exemplified by the
satellites, the immediate environment of the individual. There is a
race we must run--the race for an enlightened and involved
public.[88]

So if we can accept the wrenches which space exploration is apt to apply
to our time, pocketbook, energy, and thinking, the values and rewards as
outlined in this report should gather headway and grow continuously
greater.

Space technology is probably the fastest moving, typically
free-enterprise and democratic industry yet created. It puts a
premium not on salesmanship, but on what it needs
most--intellectual production, the research payoff. Unlike any
other existing industry, space functions on hope and future
possibilities, conquest of real estate unseen, of near vacuum
unexplored. At once it obliterates the economic reason for war, the
threat of overpopulation, or cultural stagnation; it offers to
replace guesswork with the scientific method for archeological,
philosophical, and religious themes.[89]

Such conclusions seem a bit rosy. But sober study indicates that they
may not be too "far out" after all.

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