Given here is the address of NASA Administrator Daniel S. Goldin to the Association of Space Explorers. Mr. Goldin's remarks are on the topic of why we should go to Mars, a subject he approaches by first answering the question, What would it mean if we decided today not to go to Mars? After a discussion of the meaning of Columbus' voyage to America, he answers the question by saying that if we decide not to go to Mars, our generation will truly achieve a first in human history - we will be the first to stop at a frontier. After noting that the need to explore is intrinsic to life itself, Mr. Goldin presents several reasons why we should go to the Moon and go to Mars. One reason is economic, another is to increase our scientific knowledge, and yet another is to further the political evolution of humankind through the international cooperation required for building settlements on the Moon and Mars. He concludes by expanding upon the idea that this nation has never been one to shrink from a challenge

Goldin, Daniel S.

English

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NASA-TM-107985
"THE LIGHT OF A NEW AGE"
Remarks by
NASA Administrator Daniel S. Goldin
to the Association of Space Explorers
Washington, D.C.
August 24, 1992
Enclosure
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I want to welcome all of you, particularly those of you from other countries.
Welcome to the land of the Wright Brothers and the Right Stuff.
"The bravest are surely those who have the clearest vision of what is before them
-- glory and danger alike - and yet notwithstanding, go out to meet it." Those words
of Pericles most surely apply to this fellowship of space voyagers. Your contributions to
the human experience are the stuff of world history, and I am honored to speak to you
today.
I am expected to speak this morning on why we should go to Mars. So let me
begin by going in the opposite direction. What would it mean if we decided today not
to go to Mars? Or the Moon. What would it mean?
After all, there are many who say we should not go. A congressman who
opposed Space Station Freedom last month said the money should be spent filling
potholes and rebuilding our sewers. Sewers are what we need, he said. A former
Congressman once said he couldn't justify spending money to find microbes on Mars,
when he already knew there were rats in Harlem apartments.
Yes, there are problems on Earth, just as there have been ever since the first
human was eaten by a saber-toothed tiger. There were rats and sewage problems back
in Genoa when Christopher Columbus was growing up. Their muddy streets probably
even had some hellacious potholes.
Columbus' generation also had trouble getting decent health care. Scurvy was a
problem; so was the plague. They didn't have CAT scans, or laser sttrgery, or intensive
care units, which got their start -- by the way -- because of the space program.
In this 500th year of Columbus' voyage, we rightly recognize the great admiral's
vision and courage, but tend to overlook the historical significance of Queen Isabella.
Columbus tried to gain the support for his voyage from the kings of Portugal, England,
and France, but they all took a pass.
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Only Isabella was willing to look beyond the many problems on her own shores,
and see the potential reward for her investment in the future. The voyages of
Columbus set the stage for more Spanish explorers, who turned Spain into a great
world power. As a consequence, the language and culture of Spain prevail in most of
Latin America to this day.
On the other side of the world, however, in China -- the intended destination of
Columbus -- their emperors turned their back on the rest of the world. Sixty years
prior to 1492, Chinese explorers had traveled as far as Africa. But a new emperor
considered such journeys wasteful extravagances. His successors burned the boats, and
banned all Ch/nese from leaving the country. Those who tried could be executed.
That 15th century decision to not explore still reverberates in China today. For
a country with the most people on Earth, China still looks inward -- its culture hardly
the dominant force in the world that it could be.
Exploration is one of the hallmarks of a great nation. Turning inward is a sign
of a nation in decline. Engaging the world brings in new ideas, new vitality. The
waves of immigrants who came to America have always refreshed this country and
made it stronger.
Columbus, of course, was not the first to come to America. People were living in
the Washington area 10,000 years ago, and the first humans crossed the Bering Strait
into Alaska as many as 40,000 years ago. Let's forget about Columbus for a minute
and think about why these early explorers left their vast, uncrowded homelands to
journey thousands of miles into virgin territory.
Indeed, why did the first homo sapiens leave the warm comfort of Africa and
walk to Scandinavia and Siberia? Why didn't those first Americans just stop in Alaska
instead of moving through Canada and Mex/co down to Chile and Peru? What made
the Polynesians brave the m/ghty Pacific in their tiny canoes to colonize island after
island after island?
Exploration is not simply a pastime for the curious; it's a biological imperative --
wired right into our DNA. There is something intrinsic to life itself that says, "To grow
is to live; to stop is to die." Exploration is part of what we live for. It's how we grow
as intell/gent beings.
If we consciously decide not to go to Mars, our generation will truly achieve a
first in human history. We will be the first to stop at a frontier. We will be the first to
draw a line and say to our children, "This far, and no farther."
3To livewithout a frontierisconfining to the mind. Mike Collins wrote in his
book Mission to Mars: "I don't want to livewith a lidover my head ....Call itgenes,
character, culture, spirit,ethos: by whatever name, itiswithin us to look up into the
night sky and be curious, [and] within us to commit our bodies to follow our eyes."
Every generation has had itsworlds to explore. Human beings have never
possessed a technology for travelthat they have refused to use. First there was the
world beyond the tribalvillage. Then the continents. Then the oceans. Then the
North Pole and South Pole. Then into the air,through the sound barrier,and on to
the Moon.
Mars iswithin our grasp. Sure, itwilltake hard work, but the challenges do not
appear insurmountable. Sure, itwilltake money. More than some think. Less than
some fear.
And so, we must go. Destiny is not what calls us to Mars; our humanity does.
If all this heavy philosophy and history can't convince you that we must continue to
explore space, then maybe out of the mouths of children comes the truth. The best
reason I ever heard for exploring space was written right after the Challenger explosion
by an ll-year-old California boy. He said, "If we stop going into space, people
everywhere will die a little in their hearts."
Deciding that the human exploration of space is over is simply unthinkable. We
have not reached the end, but have barely begun to break the bonds of gravity that
have chained us to Earth. Robert Goddard once wrote to H.G. Wells: "There can be
no thoughts of finishing, for aiming at the stars, both literally and figuratively, is a
problem to occupy generations, so that no matter how much progress one makes, there
is always the thrill of just beginning."
To me, the need to explore is intrinsic to life itself. But having said that, let me
present four reasons why we should go back to the Moon and go to Mars. Each reason,
in and of itself, may be disputed, but taken as a whole, I believe the case is not only
compelling, but overwhelming.
The first reason is economic. In the first half of the 1980s, industrial R&D in the
U.S. was growing at an average annual rate of 7.5%. In the second half of the 80s, the
growth rate was almost zero. The federal government's support for civilian R&D fell off
by a similar amount. With the Cold War now over, the next to go will be' defense
R&D. Budget cutters facing record deficits look at NASA's budget like a barn full of
seed corn. The question is, will we plant it, or eat it?
4The technology generated from space exploration is one of the highest yielding
investments in our future economic growth this country can make. Every dollar spent -
on the Apollo program generated about seven dollars in economic activity. New
products, new industries, and new jobs come through NASA research.
We cannot be likethose 15th century Chinese emperors. Those who question the
cost of space should question the cost of not investing. Thirty-fiveyears ago, itwas
hard to see how badly America would need a gigantic interstatehighway system costing
tens of billionsof dollars. Today, we can't imagine lifewithout it.
The Moon has resources that Earth may need some day. Innovative thinkers
suggest that helium-3 could be mined from the soil to power as yet uninvented fusion
reactors that generate electricity with almost no radioactive byproducts. Whether this
would be economical is an open question, but consider this: Americans spend $175
billion dollars on electricity each year, most of it produced from non-renewable fossil
fuels.
We don't know exactly what resources on the Moon or Mars will be most useful,
but we do know we should start looking. Columbus went looking for gold and spices,
but instead brought back something more valuable: corn and potatoes. More valuable
than gold? Yes, because they fueled a population explosion that turned the countries of
Europe into global powers.
The Earth's resources, while bountiful, are finite. We owe it to ourselves to at
least build the infrastructure needed to access the solar system's resources.
Another reason to go to the Moon and Mars is to increase our scientific
knowledge, and apply that knowledge to how our own planet may be changing. The
lack of an atmosphere on the Moon means that 4 billion years of the sun's history has
been written into the lunar soil. We're not even sure where the Moon came from.
On the Moon, where night-time lasts for 14-days and there's no atmosphere to
cloud the view, it's the perfect place for astronomy. The Moon's seismically stable
surface will allow us to build telescopes and interferometers that are orders of
magnitude beyond what's possible on Earth or in orbit. Building these human-tended
observatories on the Moon is perhaps the most economical way to solve the vast
mysteries of the universe.
Mars appears to have been a warmer, wetter planet with a dense atmosphere like
prehistoric Earth. What happened to the water that once flowed there? What
happened to the dense atmosphere? And what can that tell us about the past and
future of Earth's own climate?
These are the questions we are smart enough to ask, but there's so much waiting
to be discovered, we don't even know what we don't know. But there's one thing I'm -
absolutely certain we'll find: the unexpected.
We are about to take the first step. In a few days, the Mars Observer mission
will be launched to examine the geology of the Red Planet. In two years, the Russians
will send their Mars-94 probe. Then NASA's MESUR, the Mars Environmental Survey,
will put a series of landers, some with micro-rovers, to study surface features, weather,
and seismic activity. These landers will head for some of the more interesting areas of
Mars - such as the polar regions and canyons - seeking possible human landing sites
where the potential for water and signs of life or fossils may be greatest.
And later this year, NASA scientists, with support from the National Science
Foundation, will head for Antarctica -- a place almost as cold and dry as Mars - to
begin field testing new technologies. In that isolated and harsh environment, they will
test water recycling equipment, self-contained power supplies, and they will remotely
control a walking robot down into a live volcano.
Humans on Earth can't remotely control robots on Mars because the
communications would take too long. But humans and robots on Mars together would
make a potent combination. Imagine an astronaut sitting in a Martian base camp,
exploring some ancient river bed with an intelligent robotic rover. Astronauts can use
robots to search for the most promising areas for their own visits, and could also use
robots to collect samples far beyond the astronaut's own range from camp.
Putting interferometers on the Moon and searching for water on Mars leads us to
the next reason to go: the search for possible extra-terrestrial life. For as long as
shepherds and suburbanites alike have lain in the grass and gazed into the nlght-time
sky, we've wondered if we're alone in the universe. Despite centuries of wild
speculation, it's only during the last 25 years that we've been able to disprove the belief
that there are civilizations on the Moon and Mars. But some finding some lower form
of life, or fossilized life, on Mars would alter our perception of the universe far beyond
anything Copernicus or Columbus ever dreamed.
In the same league would be an interferometer on the Moon capable of seeing
planets in other solar systems. Imagine if spectroscopic analysis revealed a blue planet
with an oxygen atmosphere just 4 light years away orbiting Alpha Centauri. The
demand to build a warp drive would start right away!
Before we envision a United Federation of Planets, however, we must first do
more to unite our own planet. The most important reason for missions to the Moon
and Mars, I believe, is the political evolution of humankind.
6Throughout all of human history, in ever increasing tribes, we have warred with
each other. The 20th century has been at once the most advanced and the most
savage. During the last four years, we have witnessed the end of imperial communism
and erased the threat of global nuclear war. Now we must consolidate those gains.
During the Cold War, there was a popular notion that if the Earth was
threatened by space invaders, all of the nations of the world would drop their fear of
each other and unite to confront the common enemy. Today we don't face a threat.
We face an opportunity.
Instead of building weapons of war, we can pursue projects of peace. What
better way to soak up the excess energies of the world's military-industrial complex
than to channel that vast expertise and talent into the peaceful exploration of space.
The large scale of international cooperation required for building settlements on
the Moon and Mars would inspire the peoples and governments of the entire planet to
see what can be accomplished if they lay down their ancient fears and hatreds.
As this tired, old millennium draws to a close, one that began in what is known
as the Dark Ages, the nations of the world now have the chance to leave the sad history
of warfare behind and head towards the light of a new age. Humanity can finally
evolve to a higher order of living, one in which "nation shall not lift sword against
nation; neither shall they learn war any more."
Despite all these reasons to extend human presence in the solar system, some will
still say, "Not now. It's not worth it. We can't afford it."
This is nothing new. Back in 1848, Daniel Webster stood on the floor of the
Senate and declared that New Mexico and California were "not worth a dollar." A few
years later, Alaska was denounced as Seward's folly -- a worthless icebox. Five hundred
years ago today, Columbus was in the middle of the Atlantic, and I'm sure some of his
sailors were saying, "Turn back."
This nation has never been one to shrink from a challenge. The spirit that
brought the pilgrims to Plymouth Rock, that wrote a democratic constitution, that
tamed the West, and put a man on the Moon must carry forward into space, or
America will cease to be recognizable to the world.
The first outpost on this stellar frontier will be Space Station Freedom. That's
the place where the studies of the human body will take place that will enable us to live
and work in space. Dual use laboratories will give Earth's scientists routine access to
microgravity. Debates over its configuration miss the point. The space station is not a
destination itself, but a stepping stone on the trail toward the planets.
7President Bush has led the space program forward with his call for going back to
the Moon and on to Mars. Now it is up to us to make that vision a reality. .
When I moved into the Administrator's office five months ago, I found this
plaque in a display case - covered with dust. It is the Apollo 11 patch, and bears the
signatures of Nell Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Mike Collins. On the top, it's written,
"Carried to the Moon aboard Apollo 11. Presented to the Mars 1 crew."
Ladies and gentlemen, it is time to take this plaque to Mars.
The ultimate legacy of Apollo sits in a special vault in Houston. Under the
harsh glare of fluorescent lights, encased in stainless steel and bathed in pure nitrogen
sits 800 pounds of another world. But there's something else in that vault: more room.
In the coming years, we can send orbiters to the planets. We have it within our
power to bring back samples from the comets, asteroids, moons, and planets of our solar
system, and fill up that vault. We can extend human presence in the solar system,
breaking the bonds of gravity to spread our species to the Moon, Mars, and beyond.
The science we'll gain from these robotic and human missions to other planets
will ultimately support Mission to Planet Earth. For it is by comparing the data of
what's happening to Earth right now to what has already happened throughout the
solar system that we can hope to fully understand our own planet. This quest for
knowledge inspired T.S. Eliot to write, "We shall not cease from exploration and the
end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the
first time."
Is there life on Mars? Maybe not now. But there will be.
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The light of a new age

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