Uniting the Space Community

The current debate over President Obama's plan for space exploration does not appear to directly affect the work of the Overview Institute, at least in the short term. Regardless of how it happens, people will still be going into orbit and beyond, they will still be experiencing the Overview Effect, and we will continue our work of changing the world by changing the way we see the world.

At the same time, it does seem likely that far more people will be able to experience the Overview Effect directly if the president's plan is accepted. His approach puts more emphasis on private enterprise and commercial activities in space, and I believe strongly that this will be the only way to bring large numbers of people into the off-planet environment. The government-dominated program that we have had in place for the past half-century hasn't done it. So far, only 500-plus people worldwide have actually had the profound experience of seeing the Earth from space and in space, while floating weightlessly in the silence of our vast universe. And NASA has been responsible for only some of those flights.

But change is difficult. We have recently witnessed some of our most distinguished astronauts opposing the new approach. We have also seen politicians from the states that are most affected by the cancellation of the Constellation program rallying and railing against that decision. I find it so ironic that many of these same people have opposed the president with great ferocity when he has extended the reach of government, but in one of the only areas where he is taking a different course, they are supporting a program that calls for more government rather than less.

The current proposals for the NASA budget have, unfortunately, split the American space community, which is a sad outcome of it. Regardless of how the inevitable compromises work out in the coming weeks, I hope they will help to bring us closer together again. We are not, by any means, the largest community in the United States, so we can ill afford high leves of disunity.

Big Space, Little Space

Portions of the Augustine Commission's report to President Obama have now been made available, and it appears to me that they have gotten some of it right. First, they have recognized that President Bush's vision for space exploration may not be viable because of the costs involved. If this insight is recognized and handled honestly by the president and congress, it will be a major breakthrough. For too long, NASA has been pursuing plans that could not be supported by their budget. The agency should either be fully funded, or the plans should be scaled back.

The Commission also emphasizes the global nature of space exploration and the value of NASA partnering with private enterprise to realize some of our more ambitious goals as a nation. Again, this is a paradigm shift away from a NASA-centric view of space exploration that is long overdue.

I don't know the final shape of American space policy, but our thinking does seem to be coming into alignment with reality, which is a good thing. Still, whatever NASA does will be a variation on the theme of "Big Space," i.e., lots of government money being spent on relatively large space exploration efforts. By contrast, I was struck recently by reports of a different approach, a kind of "little space program" if you will. Two MIT students have apparently sent a weather balloon high into the atmosphere and have taken pictures of the Earth from space! Their total cost was $150, and I could only think, "Wow, that is the least expensive experience of the Overview Effect so far!"

These students proved to me that any barriers that might be preventing the opening up of the space frontier are not financial in nature---they are simply failures of the imagination!

Frank White

The Augustine Commission

The Augustine Commission is about to make its report to President Obama on options for NASA in the future. The Commission has done all of us a service by pointing out that NASA cannot achieve President Bush's vision for space exploration with the funds that will be available in the near term.

This means we need a new vision, and the problem is this : a vision needs to be exciting to be meaningful, and all the options currently facing NASA are rather limited, if seen on their own. We will only become enthusiastic about space exploration again if we see it in a global context, as part of a Human Space Program.

I will have more to say about this issue in future posts.

Frank

Wow: NASA TV!

I've become a fan of NASA TV. Okay, I know it is sometimes like watching paint dry when they have those shots of mission control and no sound whatsoever. I'm thinking, "How can they make space exploration so boring?"

But then, suddenly, they switch to live shots from the International Space Station or the shuttle, and there it is, the Earth rolling past. It is what I am talking about all the time, the Overview Effect! It's what the astronauts see!

The views aren't perfect, because there is often a lot of hardware in the way, but can still be impressive. The other day, they offered commentary, which was even better. The NASA person told us we were over the Pacific Ocean, then over Saskatchewan, and so on.

Now I have an idea, and if anyone reads this, please let me know how to do it. I would like to create a screensaver that is made up of edited NASA TV videos of the Earth from orbit. Ultimately, I'd rather have live video, but this will do for now. The Overview Institute could distribute these screensavers for free, and spread the word (and the images) of the Overview Effect.

I like the concept, now I just have to figure out how to do it.

Suggestions welcomed.