.....their fascination on humans, through their capacities to improve their lives on Earth and through the power they provide them with.
Fascinated by Space since their origin, humans wanted to understand their surrounding universe. This fundamental quest nurtured thoughts, dreams and imagination (particularly in science fiction and arts) and stimulated research in Space, on Space and from Space. These activities impacted strongly society by providing a key clarification between science, theology and imagination that lead to a better knowledge of the universe and of its evolution and thus of the actual place of humans within it. They discovered that they are all passengers of one tiny, complex and fragile spaceship that has to be taken care of more and more seriously, impacting dramatically on their behavior.
Space activities are also impacting society by providing tools that are changing the daily life on Earth. Telecommunication and television by satellites changed our societal behavior and perception. Every human, wherever located, has the possibility to communicate with anyone anywhere in the world. It is possible to send TV images all around the world from any of its regions. More and more humans can see “life” images coming from all parts of the world, as the large increase of individual parabolas is demonstrating. Such instantaneous worldwide connections confirm humans in their feeling to live on the same finite planet. This feeling is re-enforced by the global and repetitive views of Earth provided by remote sensing satellites. Everyone will feel “at home” and secure everywhere on Earth when space navigation and positioning tools will give with a sufficient accuracy his/her position and the best way to reach any place. They are already good enough to modifying transport industry and individual travel habits. Space tools generate new relationships between humans and their home planet by changing their ways to manage it, by improving their ways to use Earth’s natural resources still preserving their environment, and by facilitating their life and its protection.
Space tools impact also society by their ability to influence the relationships between countries: They can contribute to the development of peace by facilitating international control of international treatise and by supporting the reconstruction of countries devastated by a conflict; but they can also be used to increase the military power of a country and its ability to intervene everywhere in the world, increasing thus the risk of conflicts within nations.
In conclusion, I believe that space activities impact society through their ability to increase dramatically the capacity of humans to act on their planet and on its surrounding “celestial” bodies, and to interact with each individuals or nations with an increasing strength, and therefore with increased consequences. I believe therefore that Space activities do impact society by challenging its capacity to raise the sense of responsibility and the moral strength of humans at the level reached by the power that space tools provided them with.
Prof.
François
Becker
Dean
International Space University (ISU)
http://isunet.edu
Professional Category:
Engineering
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