November 01, 2007 ... No space please, we’re British.

Advocating the exclusive use of of probes and robots for exploring space is akin to dispatching an acquaintance to consort with one’s partner and submit a report. Said report may be the basis for a letter of recommendation, but it really is not the same thing, at all.

Aside from simply wanting to know what is over the horizon, costly and potentially deadly exploration has been driven by the need to acquire rights on property before someone else does. Queen Isabella & Co did not dispatch Christopher Columbus to report on the wildlife of distant shores, he was dispatched to claim territory.

 

Similarly, with our Chinese counterparts declaring intentions towards the moon including the possibility of a strategic advantage in Earth’s orbit, we must now get with the ESA programme and assert our presence in space, or lose out to our competitors. And science will still be well enough served by probes and robots.

To decline manned space exploration on the basis of the cost of sending man into space is a false economy that will seriously hamper the high-tech strategy and knowledge-based industries needed for our future prosperity and ability to profitably trade. Such an assertion may be bordering on conjecture at this time. But, as per the combat poet of Foggy Bottom, D. H. Rumsfeld: “We don’t know what we don’t know.”

By 2010 the USA’s space shuttle will be de-commissioned. The Russians’ Soyuz rockets are fully booked until 2015. And the Chinese have none to spare or for hire. Hopefully the Ariane 5 and subsequent developments will be capable of filling the gap. Not improbable given that Ariane deploys in excess of two-thirds of all commercial, heavy satellite launches, and should be comparable to any Soyuz capability. More space tourists, please, to help with the payments. Works for the Russians.

 

Furthermore, with so much turmoil across the world, space exploration is simply uplifting. When we are bogged down in Afghanistan fighting a bunch of idiot ideologues with guns, RPGs, and no more foresight than the next mud-pile, at vast expense and loss of life, the sight of Discovery coming into land, does put the virtues of our western culture and its achievements into perspective.