Our Window of Opportunity
Our civilization is at its peak – we have the means today to implement The Space Option but not yet the commitment. However, if our species does not soon embrace this unique opportunity with sufficient commitment, it may miss its one and only chance to do so. In July, 2013 the International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) hosted the 8th IAA Symposium on The Future of Space Exploration – Towards The Stars in Turin, Italy. In addition to science and technology sessions several sessions were also devoted to the motivational, cultural and ethical aspects of space exploration and development. I made [...]
More Space or More War?
The main point of this article is about the use of space technologies either for peace or for war and how that choice may influence the implementation of The Space Option. Simply stated, humanity must soon make a choice between “more space” or “more war”. At a very early age I became aware of the “cosmic choice” which is inherent in space technology illustrated in this image. A Redstone mobile guided ballistic missile with a nuclear warhead is pictured in the photo on the left. In the right photo we see the lift-off of the Mercury-Redstone carrying the Alan Shepard, [...]
Making Cosmic Choices
If one believes that other technological civilizations have appeared throughout the Cosmos, then one can speculate they must have faced a similar choice that confronts humanity at this particular moment in its history. Did these distant civilizations decide to use their technology and knowledge to extend their civilization beyond their home planet in order to perpetuate their species, or did they misuse their technology and knowledge and let their civilization decline and their future be destroyed? This situation is called the Cosmic Choice – a decision which any technological species must make about its future at a critical point in [...]
The Space Option: An Alternative to War
Arthur R. Woods Here on Earth, human civilization has reached such a point in its development where it has evolved the means to leave its home planet and to begin operating in the environment beyond the atmosphere. Optimistically, this development would enable humanity to utilize this technological capability to harness the infinite resources located off Earth to improve the well-being of the population in the decades and centuries ahead – both on Earth and beyond. On the other hand, this same capability could also be used to exert tyrannical control over much of the population thereby limiting [...]
Our civilization is at its peak – we have the means today to implement The Space Option but not yet the commitment. However, if our species does not soon embrace [...]
The main point of this article is about the use of space technologies either for peace or for war and how that choice may influence the implementation of The Space [...]
If one believes that other technological civilizations have appeared throughout the Cosmos, then one can speculate they must have faced a similar choice that confronts humanity at this particular moment [...]
Arthur R. Woods Here on Earth, human civilization has reached such a point in its development where it has evolved the means to leave its home planet [...]
