G.O.A.T. of the week – WHY IT TOOK THE U.S. 51 YEARS TO GET BACK TO THE MOON – (BLOOMBERG)

 

(Moon Landing : Image Source: The Daily Beast) 

Never mind the fact that it took so long to go back, it was such an astonishing achievement to begin with! Our generations have grown up in the aftermath of these astounding human accomplishments but when you really think about the courage it took to launch themselves in a little, rattling, aluminum bucket to the ‘land of the gods,’ that is just completely wild! Akin to Jules Verne’s “Journey to the Center of the Earth” or “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea,” these brave cosmonauts went where no one had ever even dreamed about going before and in so doing, we beat the Soviets to the moon when we tipped our hat into the rings to win the Space Race.  

“Mystery creates wonder and wonder is the basis of man’s desire to understand.” - Neil Armstrong

('The Eye of the Universe' : Image Source: Wallpaper Abyss)

With this new achievement, the next phase of the Space Race to colonize and utilize tourism around the moon has begun. Perhaps one day in the not-too-distant future, we will all have lives paralleling George, Jane, Judy, Elroy, and Astro Jetson with our very own Rosie the Robots while we live and colonize space! Getting ahead of myself here, these kinds of once unfathomable attainments, are the very things that fuel dreams! I mention the Jetsons because while this cartoon was produced in the 1960s (it was one of the best, go back and watch it! Classic television!), they were on point of imagining a future that we will all be living in one day very soon. It is not that far away. Consider where we are technologically. A few highlights that stress my point about all of us already living in the future that SCIFI authors from back in the day could only hope for: Neuralink, successful teleportation, AI, and terraforming.  

I could wax poetic about all these things for way too long and burn your eyes and ears off in the process because of how excited I get having philosophical discussions about all the possibilities and ramifications surrounding these topics, but for the purpose of this blog, I will try to keep it short and sweet. Neuralink is an implantable chip that is inserted into the human brain that connects with a global computer interface network (Play Studio). The idea is that people will be able to control computers or mobile phones just by looking at it and thinking about it, a mechanical form of telekinesis, if you will. It is still in the beginning stages of development and if you are interested in being one of their guinea pigs, you can sign up through the “patient registry” on the Neuralink website. There are two success stories with this already. The first being that it has successfully restored eyesight in monkeys, with Elon Musk claiming that “it will be able to restore blindness with human beings” (M. Bennett). The second and perhaps most important of the two is that a chip has already successfully been implanted in a quadriplegic named Noland Arbaugh (MSN) where he is now able to play video games with his mind. This is just the beginning, and I am very excited, nervous, and curious to see how this transforms society once it successfully becomes part of the mainstream. 

(Sacred Geometry at the Nexus of Science and Spirituality: Image Source: AI Summary)

Another part of living in a future world was the announcement that “Scientists Successfully Achieved the First Ever Teleportation of Images Using Quantum Technology” (Collins). This might seem like small potatoes but just like the early astronauts who had to merely test out space travel by doing a rotation around Earth before they could land on the moon, this is the same equation. Quantum mechanics and metaphysics are CRAZY fields! It is how ‘scientists’ explain magic. Anything is possible. If you can think of it, they can create it, or in other words, it is how the spiritual community talks about “manifestation.” It is much easier to understand if you have a psychedelic awareness. Give it time to evolve to the capacity of teleporting humans and soon, we will all be saying, “Beam me up Scotty!”  

(Teleportation in Star Trek : Image Source : Dictionary.com)

Everyone should be familiar with the concept of AI. There is really no need for me to do a deep dive explanation of why this is miraculous and terrifying all at once. Really, I just want to say, that keeping Neuralink in the forefront of your minds on this discussion, with the creation of AI, will it be beneficial to humanity? Or will it enslave us? If everyone has a Neuralink because somehow that becomes more mainstream than the use of AI, will we be walking into a world where we become cyborgs? Are we even human beings anymore? Just think about it. It could be awesome; it could be horrifying but guaranteed change is on the horizon.  

While we have not done it for our own planet yet, terraforming is something that is possible for Earth and for all other planets that are seemingly uninhabitable. It is “the process whereby a hostile environment is altered to make it suitable for human life. It involves modifying the temperature, atmosphere, surface topography, ecology, or all of the above to make a planet or moon more ‘Earth-like’ (Williams). We could be doing this in areas like the sub-Saharan desert in Africa where conflicts have already broken out because of the lack of water supply, but Earth has their own Mr. Spacely’s, who are preventing this from occurring.    

"My view of our planet was a glimpse at divinity." - Edgar Mitchell

Getting back to the Space Race, other countries besides America have also had successful missions to the moon. These include Russia, Japan, India, China, Luxembourg, Israel, South Korea, Italy, United Arab Emirates, and The European Space Agency (Wikipedia contributors). Mexico has a planned launch that was rescheduled for later this year. Isn’t that incredible? Space and the universe do not belong to one country, one people, one species. It belongs to all life, everywhere, including yet unknown.  

(Rocket Launch at Kennedy Space Center : Image Source : The Japan Times)

Keeping that in mind, every country has a preponderance toward planting their flags in unknown terrain as if to lay a claim that “we were here first, therefore, we are entitled to make the decisions concerning this area.” Think about how many flags are planted every year in the Himalayas and how many Sherpas must continually risk themselves to take down all the human garbage. Here is a fun fact: Canada and Denmark had a 50-year whiskey war over a small island in Greenland. It was not really a war, more like an ongoing joke between the two countries. They were serious about maintaining their territorial claims but because of the good-natured and comedic back and forth that happened, it frequently made the news from a jovial sense. Beginning in the 1980’s, each country “staked their claim by planting flags and leaving bottles of liquor for the other side – Whisky from Canada and Schnapps from Denmark” (Blakemore). They finally ended their ‘friendly war’ in 2022 but this is the kind of convivial pleasantness I hope more countries follow in exploring the universe. If one country stakes a claim, the least they can do is leave a bottle of liquor behind for the other ones to enjoy! Leave it to the happy Danish and Canadian sweethearts to set the standard of how each country should be engaging with each other in the Space Race going forward.  

“The cosmos is within us. We are made of star-stuff. We are a way for the universe to know itself.” - Carl Sagan 

Sources: 

Bennett, Max. “Elon Musk’s Brain Chip Could Restore Vision and Mobility but Has a Long Way to Go.” Discover Magazine, 29 Mar. 2024, www.discovermagazine.com/technology/elon-musks-brain-chip-could-restore-vision-and-mobility-but-has-a-long-way. 

Blakemore, Erin. “The Barren Arctic Island That Sparked Canada and Denmark’s Whisky War.” History, 14 June 2022, www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/how-hans-island-sparked-whisky-war-between-canada-denmark. 

Bloomberg. ---. www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/why-it-took-the-us-51-years-to-get-back-on-the-moon/ar-BB1iJXFs. 

Carl Sagan Quote: “The Cosmos Is Within Us. We Are Made of Star-stuff. We Are a Way for the Universe to Know Itself.” quotefancy.com/quote/30586/Carl-Sagan-The-cosmos-is-within-us-We-are-made-of-star-stuff-We-are-a-way-for-the. 

Collins, Colin. “Quantum Breakthrough: Record-Breaking Quantum Teleportation Achieved Over Metropolitan Range.” SciTechDaily, 22 Oct. 2023, scitechdaily.com/quantum-breakthrough-record-breaking-quantum-teleportation-achieved-over-metropolitan-range. 

Margolis, Lauren. “96 Space Quotes and Inspirational Quotes About the Universe.” YourTango, 11 Jan. 2021, www.yourtango.com/2019321879/inspirational-quotes-about-space-famous-astronauts-space-engineers. 

MSN. www.msn.com/en-us/health/other/elon-musk-s-neuralink-claims-the-first-human-to-have-a-chip-implanted-in-his-brain-is-a-quadriplegic-now-able-to-play-video-games-using-his-mind/ar-BB1kiazJ. 

Play Studio. “Neuralink.” Neuralink, neuralink.com. 

Wikipedia contributors. “List of Missions to the Moon.” Wikipedia, 29 Mar. 2024, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_missions_to_the_Moon. 

Williams, Matt. “The Definitive Guide to Terraforming - Universe Today.” Universe Today, 30 Oct. 2022, www.universetoday.com/127311/guide-to-terraforming. 

Image Sources: 

AI Summary. “AI Summary.” AI Summary, www.ai-summary.com. 

“Beam Me up, Scotty.” Dictionary.com, 19 Jan. 2021, www.dictionary.com/e/slang/beam-me-up-scotty. 

Jones, Justin. “Secrets of the Space Race: Rare NASA Photos Hit the Auction Block.” The Daily Beast, 12 July 2017, www.thedailybeast.com/secrets-of-the-space-race-rare-nasa-photos-hit-the-auction-block. 

Roulette, Joey, and Steve Gorman. “NASA’s Artemis Rocket Ship on Course for Moon After Epic Launch.” The Japan Times, 16 Nov. 2022, www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2022/11/16/world/nasa-moon-mission. 

Touches, Maxime Des, et al. “Sci Fi Space Station HD Wallpaper by Maxime Des TOUCHES.” Wallpaper Abyss, wall.alphacoders.com/big.php?i=435794.