Introduction

Many people will agree with space being beautiful to look at, and it would be great for mankind to explore its beauty. Since I was a kid I have dreamt of people living on different planets and giant spaceships flying through space finding and exploring many unique and unknown planets and this dream could possibly become a reality in the distant future. Ever since the first successful moon landing in1996 up until present day 2021 mankind has learned a great deal of useful information from outer space in such a short amount of time, and this has been slowing down since people just don’t care about space as much anymore. I would honestly like to learn why people just don’t want anything  to do with space anymore. It confuses me why NASA are getting budget cuts or people just not wanting to invest in space exploration when the opportunities in space are just endless, and this is sad because we have been given an opportunity to feed our curiosity and answer some of our biggest questions, for example are we really alone in the universe? Is there any habitable planets for mankind to live on? How was the universe created? These are just a fragment of questions that can possibly be answered if people were more motivated about space exploration,  so they can be inspired enough to contribute a greater height for the human specie.

MLA

Kelly, Mark. “Opinion | Don’t Give Up on the International Space Station.” The New York Times, 2 Nov. 2020, www.nytimes.com/2018/02/07/opinion/international-space-station.html?searchResultPosition=8.

Don’t Give Up on the International Space Station

More than likely you have heard about the International Space Station, humanities most expensive  man-made project that has brought us a vast amount of information, and in Mark Kelly’s article on why we should not give up on the International Space Station, Kelly briefs us that in his four times visiting the space station between 2001-2011 he has always been captivated  by the beauty of the space station, and how the international coalition of 16 nations built the space station in a span of 10 years, Kelly further describes on how even if the space station was not perfect, and it’s not intended to keep going forever, the Space Station provides people and countries a chance to work together on shared logical objective. Later down the article Kelly expresses his disappointment with the Trump administration wanting to cut funding for the Space Station, this budget would  leave the station with three to four billion a year which does not give our country any benefits. Kelly wraps up this article telling us that he hopes the United States can continue to lead space exploration even if the cost is high right now, the return will be greater.

Analyses

Kelly’s article is fantastic because it brings up many great points including why the United States should still continue to invest in the space station. The article also gives the reader a different perspective on this matter because, Kelly is someone who has worked for NASA and has been on the space station a few times and understands why the investment worth it for the future. One of the most important point that Kelly brought up is how the space station is a place free area where like-minded individuals can calibrate to achieve a greater goal.

Response

I admire Kelly’s article especially because he starts the article by telling his reader the experience he has with the space station and why he treasures it, and this is great information for the reader of the article because it lets them know why Kelly loves the space station. One part that I admire about this article is when Kelly brings up the Trump administration trying to cut the budget for a space station, you can feel Kelly’s disappointment because he wants our country so to badly continue leading space exploration and this makes sense since Kelly is a former astronaut, a politician, and retired from the navy, so clearly Kelly has a lot of patriotism and wants the U.S. to keep funding NASA and the space station if the benefits are not showing now.

MLA

Billings, L. (2015, April 30). ‘Beyond: Our future IN Space,’ by Chris Impey. Retrieved April 26, 2021, from https://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/03/books/review/beyond-our-future-in-space-by-chris-impey.html?searchResultPosition=1

Beyond: Our Future in Space, by Chris Impey 

Lee Billings article starts of by taking us to1902 where H.G. Wells is giving a presentation about the future and what it might hold, especially with the advancements that were happening at the time like the Wright brothers first powered flight and Albert Einstein trying to uncover the secrets of the atom. After World War II Wells’s vision was coming to light with space exploration being at it’s peak with the space race between the U.S. and Soviet Union, but this drastically slowed then in just half a century. Billings goes on to talk about “Beyond” by Chris Impey, where it describes how it is built into us to explore and how we can’t resist the call of the cosmos. Impey understands how NASA is struggling with year-to-year budget cuts, but this could possibly change because China plans to send crews to the moon in the 2020s and may be this can start another space race. Although another space race is unlikely to happen, Impey holds hope for private companies like SpaceX and Virgin Galactic  can tackle the task of living beyond our planet. Billings wraps up this article by stating how It is inevitable that some day the earth and sun will disappear and hopefully humanity took the initiative to be more than a footnote on the Milky Way, and that “Beyond” is a book for readers who wish to explore the stars.

Analysis

This article by Lee Billings is mostly generalization about Chris Impey view of the future in space exploration, and what we can expect. Chris Impey is a British astronomer and an educator who is famous for some of his books like, The Living Cosmos, How It Began, and Beyond: Our Future in Space. This article was published to recommend a book to those  people a who have a similar dream for the future and what it can possibly become if more effort was put into exploring the starts and beyond our small solar system.

Response

This article captivated my attention a lot because it runs with my way of thinking a lot, and now I plan to eventually read the book by Chris Impey because I love seeing what others think what the future holds for mankind. I have to thank Lee Billings for this article because without them, I would not have known about Chris Impey, his achievements and the books he wrote. One great thing I took away from this article is how there is so many people who have such high my optimism for companies like SpaceX and their progress for exploring the stars.

Conclusion

In conclusion,  I came to the realization people still have an interest in space exploration but just don’t want to act on it because they can’t see all the benefits just yet. Many people concentrate on the present so much they don’t think  far ahead into the future, and they don’t realize that the earth can’t stay the way it is forever. This kind of mindset can easily change if early signs of benefits start to show up like early colonization of the moon or maybe finding a new fuel source to get rockets into space much easier.