Wouldn’t it be great for humanity if space was more accessible? A little time thinking about the possibilities should excite all but the least imaginative. Imagine the implications of being able to mine asteroids or deploy vast solar arrays in space, for example.

So with NASA’s US$17bn budget you’d think there would be some room to do some basic work in this area. And I’m sure there is.

Doesn’t it make you proud, though, that some seriously promising work is being done in Oxfordshire and that so far it has consumed just US$7m?

Read more on Scientific American magazine’s blog.

That will not always be the case, though. Let’s hope that before humanity is wiped out, it has escaped this planet and that whatever commands the Earth when that has happened, has not lost the information we have now; let us hope, then, that the legacy of humanity is to teach those that follow, whatever they may be!

What am I on about? Well, did you miss the link above? Read about the future cosmologists on Scientific American.

If you believe that the world’s States alone cannot make the best of space (or even if you do believe that they can); if you believe that we, as a species, need to leave this planet eventually to ensure our existence; if you believe that ‘progress’ is a reason enough in itself…

… then join the Planetary Society as I did a year ago, and join in that effort. See the progress that the Planetary Society’s efforts are achieving and know, in your heart, that you are part of something great, momentous and meaningful.

Join me, join the Planetary Society

That’s one of the great things (at the moment) about ESA — it’s not an EU organisation and has no political aspirations. NASA has recently been stymied by Bush’s redirection of funds and policy and, while I support Bush’s new direction, it must be very frustrating and is very wasteful to change on a whim like this.

When we look at what is spent on other good causes I cannot see any arguments against slightly more funding. Personally, if I could, I’d pay more in by donation.

But the private ventures thing is the future. The X Prize had me so excited I couldn’t sleep. What has kept everything tame is the enormous start-up costs and the lack of a real short-term economic goal.

That short-term economic goal should be created. ESA, NASA and Russia, China and Japan (if they’re interested) should collaborate to target the mining of precious metals from asteroids. Once that has been achieved the technology used to achieve it should be made freely available so that companies can start mining asteroids themselves with fewer development costs.

The myriad other economic ventures that branch off of that would surprise us, I am sure.