Space Exploration and the culture of innovation: an interview with Neil deGrasse Tyson
http://blog.sfgate.com/tmiller/2012/03/28/space-exploration-and-the-culture-of-innovation-an-interview-with-neil-degrasse-tyson/
Space may be the final frontier, but what if its also the wellspring of economic recovery?
In his latest book,
Space Chronicles: Facing the Ultimate Frontier, Neil deGrasse Tyson contends that Americas golden age of space exploration in the 1960s fostered a culture of innovation that helped propel its leading edge economy. While the spinoff tech industries that NASA has directly or indirectly touched are impressive in their own right, Dr. Tyson believes the greatest value of space exploration lies in its capacity to inspire a nation to embrace science. This mindset drives an economic engine of innovation that creates high-skilled jobs as opposed to an economy that merely outsources cheap labor.
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Oh, and by-the-way, now that weve gone to the moon with Apollo 8 in 1968 with the image of Earth rise over the lunar landscape now that weve been to the moon, hey, weve just taken a look at Earth for the first time.
Lets have a different attitude towards Earth. Lets create the Environmental Protection Agency 1970. Lets introduce auto emissions 1973. Lets put major changes in the Clean Air Act 1970. The Clean Water Act 1971. The Whole Earth Catalog 1968. The beginning of Doctors Without Borders 1970.
Where did the concept of without borders come from? No one had that concept until you saw Earth from space, illustrated not by a mapmaker whos color-coding political boundaries; its illustrated by nature itself and theres land, theres ocean, theres atmosphere.
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But when I look around me and see statements people make who wield resources and who wield power, and that statement exhibits some kind of profound illiteracy, then I worry for the future of the country itll be, America? Oh, thats the 20th century country, the one that really made a difference to the world in the 20th century. Oh, theyve faded since then.
And we know why we made a difference in the 20th century and we ought to be able to prevent failure in the 21st century if we just study the problem even if only so briefly. So with regard to the comments about attending college, politicians will say what they feel they need to or want to I dont even think much about politicians. I think about the people in the audience who applaud the politicians. They are your fellow countrymen and theyre the ones you live with that should be who we target for education and enlightenment.
Because they would then not accept a statement by a presidential candidate that says that urging people to go to college is an act of snobbery. Now that being said, the educated elite is not without their own actual snobbery. And I kind of an anti-elitist in that regard.
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Dr. Tyson has made the most sophisticated defense of space exploration that I've seen to date!