Last week, a student in one of my classes (I think it was Molly in advanced biology?) asked about the possibility of doing a "Science Night" project on astronomy. Unfortunately, I had to pt the kibosh on that idea. "Astronomy" I said, "is the study of space. Biology is the study of life, and living organisms".
Perhaps I was a bit rash in judgement in making that response. That thought continued to bug me during the course of the week. Thinking about the nascent field of exobiology - the study of the possible existance of extraterrestrial life - I soon remembered a public service announcement produced by NASA that I had seen recently on a website. (It's also on NASA's Facebook page, in case you would like to add a "like" to NASA). I liked this clip for several reasons, one of them being that the voiceover on the clip belonged to the great, late Cornell-based astronomer Carl Sagan.
Sagan helped fuel my love of astronomy as a younger adult (Mr. Whitaker's too) with a legendary series that aired on PBS in the 1970s called Cosmos. Starting with primitive man's quest for understanding the heavens, progressing from superstitious beliefs through scientific discoveries, Sagan presented a thoughtful, understandable, yet sophisticated way of making the unknown known. Scientific discoveries and concepts were presented in a clear and accessible manner. Sagan spoke at length about mankind's quest to gain deeper knowledge and understanding of the heavens. His narrative voice, and distinct verbal style, ("....there are mmmmmmillions and mmmmmmillions of galaxies...") became somewhat legendary - and ripe for satire on shows like Saturday Night Live.
NASA has used some of Sagan's soundtrack, and has superimposed it onto new footage to create a couple of advertisments for itself. This one is about 4 minutes long - take a look, and a listen. (Perhaps you should listen with a pencil in hand if you want to comment on a specific word or phrase used by Sagan):
As a nation we have retreated from our exploration of space. The demands here on earth seem so extreme. Poverty. Climate change. Sickness. Food shortages. And overall, the depths of a global economic recession. The needs are so many - the dollars available so few. Yet so much of the modern technology we take for granted in 2011 originated with the space program in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Our knowledge, and the tools we created to gain that knowledge, became vast and powerful. Our ability to see and better understand our universe increased exponentially. Still - the great question of all questions - "is there life out there? Or are we alone in the universe?" remains to be answered.
"Life looks for life." But the cost of looking for life is so great - and our needs on earth are so many - should we be spending the funds to search for life in the universe? Or should we be concentrating on taking care of our own - the people who inhabit this increasing crowded, and fragile, planet?
What do you think?
15 comments:
It was hard for me to decide on this one. On one hand, we need to pay attention and spend money in order to ensure that we as a species can endure. On the other hand, exploring space allows us to discover things about matter, energy, and life that we never could have discovered here. Also, as Mr. Engler noted, when we undertake daunting missions such as sending people to the moon, our best efforts are brought out, and we end up with wonderful new technology as a result.
Some people would say that it is a useless attempt to find other life, but when you look at it mathematically, the odds are overwhelming in the favor of other life out there. As noted in the video, there are over 400 billion stars in the Milky Way. There are trillions of other galaxies in the universe, and some astrophysicists agree on the possibility of there being more than one universe.
Some may also say that the technology of our time makes it impossible to find other life. After all, it took billions of dollars, several lives, and many years to get man on the moon. But look at it this way: think about technology 100 years ago and compare it to today's. Technological advances increase exponentially over time. This means that although our generation may not see man land on Mars or otherwise, future generations will see landings on more and more planets. I believe that pros of putting money into space travel heavily outweigh the cons because of the potentially vast amounts of knowledge we have to gain from it. And this knowledge can help our species in the long run.
Ben
When I first read "NASA" in this blog my mind immediately flashed back to something that I had read on facebook that made fun of NASA. It was talking about how NASA had spent a ton of money developing a special pen to work in space and high and low temperatures when they found that without gravity the ball point pen wouldn't work. Then it said the Russians used a pencil. I did laugh though I have always thought that what NASA did was important and spent at least a month of my childhood wanting to become a scientist for NASA (that was until I realized they only took super genius's). However, maybe that small piece of humor has just a grain of truth: like most things do. NASA has spent millions of dollars on things that were trivial and useless but NASA has also developed many things that are important and helpful. NASA I think is a very important resource that we have and needs to be used wisely and well in collaboration with the rest of the world.
That brings me to the point of investigating space further. Sagan said: "As children we fear the dark. The unknown troubles us. Even after we're grown the darkness retains its power to frighten us and so there are those who say we should not inquire too closely into who else lives in that darkness, better not to know". Yes as children we fear the darkness but is it the actual darkness that scares us or the possibility of monsters within it. As we get older we rationalize our fear but it never leaves us. We say we can always turn on the light, but even when were scared do we? Or does the fear keep us locked in bed our eyes closed, praying for sleep? Outside, we jump at any sound-- therefore, it is reasonable that we should be afraid of life in space. But what is life without fear? Without fear there is no such thing as courage. Our species is know for its ability to brag, especially about courage. One charasmatic person will bring this country back together and convince them of the need to look into space: like the country was as they watched man land on the moon, united under one purpose, fear set aside. Every child (at least in my generation) knows the quote "this is one small step for man and one giant leap for mankind". We will one day be curious enough where our curiosity will override our fear.
Not only that but pure logic or math (as Ben said) shows the there is a high probability that there is life on at least one other planet. Afterall within millions and millions of galaxies how is it possible that our planet is the only one with life? It does not make sense. We have always, as a species, risked live in order to explore and conquer. The Romans, the Huns, Colombus. Our history is undeniable: we explore and conquer. Hopefully if we discover life on another planet, we will not feel the need to conquer them but who knows? At least we will have discovered what is in that darkness that frightens us so deeply.
Sydney
I feel like this is a really difficult subject to talk about, especially in a one sided sort of way as I sit here at the computer. Anyway, we were talking about statistics in psychology the other day, yeah we get side tracked too, and Kelly brought up an interesting statistic that I find most pertinent. Sagan said that there are 40 billion stars in the Milky way galaxy, and as Sydney said, their are millions and millions, the word for that is trillions, of galaxies in our verse, which Ben says may not be a universe. So, even if we only consider our verse, statistically, yes there is life on other planets, in fact on many planets, I did the math, there are 40,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 stars with planets revolving around them. Statics, Kelly says, say that not only is there potential for life on those 4e22 planets, but somewhere in this "universe" there is a world that is exactly like ours where exactly the same things our happening.
I'm still not convinced that this means that we have to seek out my identical twin billions of light years away. Yes, NASA has come up with some great, cool stuff, but don't you think hat we have other more important things to work on here at home. Look, Sydney says that NASA only takes "super-genius," well, good for them. Isn't there the possibility, though that those geniuses could put their minds to better use here and now. Our planet, and by our I mean every living thing's, planet is at risk of changing forever. Wouldn't it be more efficient to set the geniuses at fixing that problem, rather than stumbling upon an answer in a search for life that, quite frankly, we don't know what to do with if we do find life. I'm just saying, we have a lot of great technology that can save the planet, but we need a little more, and we need really smart people who can implement that technology and make it practical. Maybe we need help from the Russians who were smart enough to use the pencil.
I'm not saying that we shouldn't search for new life, or explore the final frontier someday. But right now, I think that maybe we should stop spending money on the possibility of doing cool things on other planets and invest in making our planet one that can sustain the life that it has, Just at thought...
Aiden - You may be interested to know that it's not only statistics that says "there is a world that is exactly like ours where exactly the same things our happening" - that is exactly what is suggested by Quantum Physics. Suppose just one of those worlds has successfully overcome hurdles similar to those we now face on our burgeoning planet. Wouldn't you be interested to find out how they managed to pull it off? Just sayin'.
Reading this article and watching that short clip made me think of two very distinct things.
The first being the fact that I have always had an interent in astronomy. The stars, the skies, and the planets have always fscinated me. I'm always wonderign how far away they really are. And how weird it is to think that the star I might be staring at could not even be there. The fact that they are so far away that it takes their light a year to get here is astounding. I remember when I was younger I was in North Carolina with my family, and I remember sitting on the beach and having an argument with my father about this. I didn't understand how our planet was floating, but we weren't. The fact that we really arent on anything solid, that we are just floating in the sky that we look at everyday. Space is so vast that it feels that you could talk about it for years and still never make sense of it.
The second thing that this article and video clip made me think of was the question that I ask myself when I think about atronomy. Why our planet? Why did we get what appears to be the most developed planet? Why did we get the humans, and the trees, and the grass, and the hills, and all the animals? That is a question that I think about often, but I'm not sure that it will ever be answered.
~Marley
Wait a second, so what you're saying is that we should be spending billions of dollars on the possibility that we find that planet instead of investing the same money in what we already have and know can do what that planet might have done? Seems like an awful big gamble to me Mr. E.
“The unknown troubles us…”
If this quote isn’t true for human nature, I don’t know what is. Humans are brought up as a curious species; we seemed to be programmed in a way that enables us to always wonder. So it only makes sense that when we hear something but don’t know the complete answer, it troubles us. Whether it is a secret among friends or a secret involving the rest of the universe, humans DO NOT know all of the answers (even though at times we act as though we do), and this leads to our curiosity.
I have thought about the idea of life on other planets a lot by myself, with my family, and with other friends. I have no doubt in my mind that there IS life out there. I cannot believe that we are the only planet with life; especially when learning about how big the galaxies are out in space. But there are two things that I want to focus on in this response. The first being the question that Mr. Engler raised: “Should we be focusing more on the problems that face our earth currently, or should we be searching for this life on other planets and how it relates to us?” The second point I wanted to briefly talk about was the phrase, “Life looks for life.”
To start out, should we focus on the problems that face our earth currently, or look for answers in space? In theory I would say that focusing on both of these things is important; looking into space give us more of a perspective and different outlook on life, but focusing on the earth helps to sustain a safe environment. I believe that currently we should be focusing on the earth and all of the problems that seem to be affecting the people and planet. Although looking into space could help us and maybe even give us ideas, I believe that our time is limited and it is only so long until the life we know today will no longer be there. Before we reach out into other civilizations, I think we need to secure our own. Though it may never be secure or, “safe,” I believe that our earth needs much more attention right now in order to keep this planet going. Hopefully one day we will be able to all work together and make the earth a secure environment and at that time we may start to look out into space, but right now I think there are so many problems just in our world that it is hard to try and learn about the different worlds out there.
The second thing that I wanted to touch base on was the phrase: “Life looks for life.” This is probably one of the hardest parts of this assignment for me. Understanding this quote and deciding whether I agree or disagree is a lot harder than I initially thought it would be. If life really does look for other life, how come we have not been found yet? Have we been found and not known it? Have we been found and disregarded it? The whole idea of if we have been found or not comes to question here and it makes things, well – spooky.
To conclude, I believe that yes, humans should be looking at space for different life and different answers, but currently our own planet is not stable enough to not be spending too much time and energy on it. Making our own planet as secure as we can is probably more important and can help us in the long-run when dealing with outer space. “Life looks for life” is a puzzling statement because it brings up a separate series of questions. I believe that some life does look for life, but I do not believe we are ones to say that “all” life looks for life. It is a very general statement but if the “all” was thrown in there, I would definitely disagree. There could be planets out there that are content with just their own atmosphere and life. There could be planets that have seen us and want nothing to do with us – oh imagine that!
Sorry long response...
Well, because I am unexpectedly in NY and am on an unfamiliar computer, I could not watch the video because I couldn't find the sound button... and the owner of the computer is not home.
It's hard for me not to have a bias opinion. Astronomy is one of my many passions and I feel like anything that is out there, besides us, is incredibly important.
But yes, this is true. We have so many problems here on our own planet, why should we worry and spend the money on things that are not as important to SOME people. To me, this is not the case. I am not saying that we should stop what we're doing here on earth and spend ALL OF our funds on expeditions and technology to find extraterrestrial life. But it is incorrect to say that these things are less important. There we humans go again.... we're putting ourselves before everything. But once again, that is just human nature. It's the way we are and always will be.
But we need to take a step back and try to understand how maybe spending some of this money COULD BE helpful for us. We could maybe learn a few things about how to treat out planet. For all we know, there could be a much more intelligent life on one of these planets that could help us with some of these problems we have on earth.
Maybe that's a stretch saying that we'll have a nice sit-down dinner with another being. Probably will not be the case. But spending this money to explore these planets and understand its life could really broaden our minds. Yes, we have so many problems on earth that we have, in fact, gotten ourselves into. But in no way can ANYONE say that it will not be of great importance to us. We will never know that unless we try.
So I guess my answer is yes. Spending some of our funds on awesome space adventures and life hunting would be worth it. Who knows what we would find. Something that we find could completely change our world... literally. We need to open our minds to the other life (if there is any) that is out there.
Oh and Angie is my cousin. that's why it says Angie... oops.
the one above this comment is MOLLY
I hope you all had a nice week. I missed you guys.
Also, I liked Mr. E's comment back to Aiden.. That is exactly what I was trying to say. We could learn a lot from these planets.
-Molly
The thought of exploring space is so fascinating to me I don't even know why people would consider not spending the money. Even if we can't find other life, or can't go far enough to make massive discoveries there is still something really interesting about it. There's so much to see that we haven't even imagined of yet.
Watching videos like this or talking about it really doesn't make me think of statistic chances of life on another world. I don't care about the stats, it's what's out there. Whether or not it's alive. The government wastes so much money on the military while there are starving children or whatever, so why not waste it on space? We might find something cool out there. Where does the money that NASA spends go anyways? It's not like they're bringing it to space with them. Some of it must stay in the united states...
Like most people said this is a very hard question to answer. I agree with Ben on most of his post. It is ridiculous to think that we are the only life in a place with trillions of other galaxies and stars, there is no way to justify thinking we could possibly be the only ones.
There can always be something gained by learning more about the unknown, even if what is learned is not necessarily a good thing.
Although we should be spending an immense amount of time and money on our planet's problems, I do not think our search for other existing life should be forgotten.
But I do have a different concern over that search other than the money. This might sound a little too sci-fi action movie, but what would happen if we were successful in our search for other resources and life?
Obviously our planet is in peril and we are the ones to blame. Discovering another planet with resources that could be used to save ours would be hugely helpful to us, but could be disastrous for the other place. We were given a planet with more than enough to provide for us, and we managed to use them up and destroy our home.
Whos to say thats not the exact same thing we would do to another planet that offered similar things ours does?
I do think the search for life and resources is very important and should be continued. But I also strongly believe that we should work as hard as possible to repair the damage we have done with the resources we have saved up now, before we exhaust our supply and have to find somewhere else to take them from.
-Sarah
Space and astronomy has always interested me. I think that there are so many possibilities out there that it would be unbelievable if we stopped looking for them.
Maybe we could find some compromises. I do think that the problems we are dealing with on our planet are top priority and need to be dealt with immediately. We need to find a way to save our planet before we try to look for others to take from, as Sarah said.
Although our main focus should be on saving our planet, I don't see anything wrong with continuing to spend money on exploring space. I know it is a very expensive operation, but maybe we could cut down, and not make as many pointless space tools. We could focus on larger things that would work towards a main goal of something to find instead of just wasting money going out there and seeing what we can find.
-Amelia
Along the lines of what Sarah said, I think we need to focus on our own planet before we go and destroy another. Humans are naturally exploiters. I don't mean this in a bad way, I mean that we have an incredible drive for survival and personal gain. Given the shape our planet's in, if we as a global population were given the chance of a new planet, either for resources or colonization, we would take that chance, even if it meant some kind of space war(with lasers).
I don't mean to say that I think humanity is innately evil. I just don't think we can handle finding a nice new planet. We shouldn't be galavanting across space leaving our mark everywhere before we figure out how to fix the incredibly small piece of the universe we already live in.
You can't play with the neighbors if you don't pick up your room.
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