This guy at Wired.
Tl;dr version: "Okay, the right kind of space travel is grudgingly okay, but it is bad and wrong and icky if it's for rich people." --By his logic, we'd've never had private airplanes, celphones or personal computers -- or, come to think of it, Wired magazine.
(Off topic, or maybe not: a creature of my generation, when I hear "one-percenter," I do not think "millionaire bigshot," I think, "dangerous biker." OTOH, in either case the real deal has little to prove; it's the pretenders and wannabees you've got to be wary of.)
BUILDING A 1:1 BALUN
4 years ago
7 comments:
How is getting killed in the pursuit of money for an individual any different than getting killed so the Russians don't do it first?
Or in members of the 101st airborne getting Ebola to boost the reelection campaign hopes of the Democratic party?
The prospect of space tourism doesn't appeal to me. When I was younger, I might have given it a shot, but age brings a trepidation of being flung at a speed of 20,000 mph to escape the Earth's gravity...in a glorified beer can.
Still, it's something to explore; a step into what can only be considered an endless frontier. For those willing to take the chance, I can only admire their bravery. We've never progressed gathering about the fire, and fearing what's beyond the shadows.
If it weren't for the traveling habits of the "filthy rich" back in the early days of aviation us common folk probably still wouldn't know what it's like to be felt up by TSA agents at airports!
To hell with that, if it wasn't for rich guys playing with expensive toys, we wouldn't have private cars. Ford didn't invent the car, he just made it cheap.
(Rich guys hired chauffeurs back in the day, not because it was hard to drive, but because the cars needed someone full-time to look after them.)
You don't think a test pilot ever died? Or is it your take that no one ever did or should die doing anything? No one died building the Brooklyn Bridge, or the Empire State Building, or the Golden Gate. Farmers never got caught in their machinery, and miners never died in the mines. No one ever died in Europe when a cathedral collapsed during construction. None of the people fishing for tuna, or sword fish, or salmon ever die.
As for the pure pursuit of money... How many people died in the Yukon territory during their gold rush?
And how about NOT the pursuit of money? How many people died testing new vaccines? How many people have died in drug-trials, or while connected to artificial hearts? (though maybe they didn't have a 2nd choice...)
People die on construction sites even today with regularity. Accidents involving road-crews or utility crews working in the road are not unheard of. Electricians and electrical linemen get electrocuted with frightening regularity.
People die driving to work, for that matter. Or driving home from work.
The world is not a safe place. Some of us jump out of airplanes (not me), or strap pieces of wood to our feet and hurtle down mountains (not in a long time), or get into small boats and sail out of sight of land. Life isn't about being safe. Life is about living while your alive, not staying alive at all costs.
"The frightening thing is not dying.
The frightening thing is not living."
- T-Bone Burnett, "Primitives"
As far as that goes (and the bulk of the rant was in answer to Divemedic and Jess)
Commercial aviation isn't completely safe. Aside from the events of 911, and the possible most recent disappearance... airliners have lost engines, been shot out of the sky by armed militia groups, crashed on landing, crashed due to poor loading of cargo, hit mountains, and probably a handful of other means of demise. General aviation is even worse.
So given all of that (and everything in the prior comment...) should we stop all of these activities?
No one would go skydiving, or scuba diving, no one eat any fish -except farm-raised. No buildings would be built, no one would drive, or eat - you know you can choke to death on that stuff! - if everything had to be SAFE.
Amen Wheelgun. Trickle down economics may not be speedy, but trickle up economics has never happened....ever
Rich people take all the risks by insisting on bloody cutting edge goodies.
Bet he ponies up for his ticket when space is as safe as a carnival amusement ride.
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