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Jun
13
Fly me to the moon
June 13, 2006 |
IN MY father’s lifetime, he went from driving a horse-and-cart to flying a spitfire. He saw space technology, the rise of the PC and the increased computerization of cars. In my lifetime, if the next lunar liftoff is successful, there will have been two moon landings, one of which I will actually remember, the internet has evolved from being for institutions to being an institution. Cars are going electric and we’re 20 years into the human genome project. This stuff all just blows the tiny brain cell I have left, away. Yes, there’s the dark side of it all — nuclear threat, pollution, hole in the ozone, cancer induced by all the impurities of our modern world, globalization, AIDS… a morbid, scary and seemingly endless list. But we’re also putting on the brakes.
If ever humans had to make a case before the Council of United Galaxies and the Universal Government as to why Earth should not be blown up to make way for an interspace wormhole, we have a few saving graces, a few heroes to justify our existence: Aung San Suu Kyi, Nelson Mandela, Stephen Hawking. We have concepts like ubuntu and a desire to surf the moon. We are capable of great generosity and innovative ways of spreading it.
Naturally, things like love and humour come up (as in “I luuuuurve him ’cause he makes me laaaarrrrrrf” whereupon an urgent need for buckets arises), but on the whole we don’t all have to submit to discussing that sort of thing live and uncut 
True, our curiosity has gotten us into trouble, but it can probably go a long way to getting us out of trouble too — Hawking’s advice is for us to start those moon colonies in the next 20 years. And we probably will. Humankind does not want to self-destruct. We have too much to look forward to; we’re waiting for the better face of science fiction to become fact. The eternal quest for a utopia.
And if I can still walk, you bet I’m going to the moon. If it flattens my retirement fund, so be it; I can’t take it with me anyway, and if I’ve been into space, I’ll die happy with a bread crust in my hand.
To infinity and beyond
Beam me up, said Scotty: a BBC report on the late James Doohan’s desire for his ashes to be sent into space
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