Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!rutgers!apple!amdahl!drivax!macleod
From: macleod@drivax.DRI (MacLeod)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Space travel and the spirit of man
Message-ID: <4239@drivax.DRI>
Date: 5 Feb 89 02:31:30 GMT
References: <3225@vice.ICO.TEK.COM> <258@corpane.UUCP> <1989Jan27.075350.2215@cs.rochester.edu> <293@corpane.UUCP> <1989Feb3.115543.15693@cs.rochester.edu>
Reply-To: macleod@drivax.UUCP (MacLeod)
Organization: Digital Research, Monterey, CA
Lines: 34

In article <1989Feb3.115543.15693@cs.rochester.edu> dietz@cs.rochester.edu 
(Paul Dietz) writes:
:In article <293@corpane.UUCP: sparks@corpane.UUCP (John Sparks) writes:
:
::Wake up Paul! you aren't going into space, I doubt if I ever will.
:
:I *know* I'm not going into space -- for god's sake, why should I *want*
:to?  To spend my children's inheritance on an orbital vacation in my
:old age (I'm now 29)?

I'm 36, and I'd trade the rest of my life for one LEO, assuming I could 
take a stack of (old) Yes and Vangelis CDs along.  Quality, not quantity, 
makes a life well-lived.

Some individuals experience extreme emotions, bordering on the "religious", 
when contemplating the entry of man into space.  I do believe that it is 
spiritual, of the *human* spirit, in the most sublime sense: it is something no 
animal would ever do, nor could it want to.  

Such sentiments usually remain in the background; when somebody does speak of
them, they are typically considered irrelevant or foolishly sentimental.  
The fundamentally conservative values of those who oppose manned space flight
are not to be questioned.  Their values lead to all the satisfactions of
animal nature - more comfort, more ease, a greater insulation from physical
reality, and a homogenization of shared experience.  There are those who 
feel that this is a valid goal for man, and there are others who find it about 
as nourishing as eating a printed picture of food.  

I wish the atmosphere were such that these larger issues could be discussed.
Why should the human race have any goals at all?  Why not use up all the 
consumables in our environment and die?  What does the pursuit of goals imply?
What sort of future are we creating? 

Michael Sloan MacLeod  (amdahl!drivax!macleod)