Space and Art - Week 9

Figure One 

Space has always been something that has interested me. Whether it's learning about what each of the individual planets surfaces look like or if there is life beyond or small planet. My interests in space became especially peaked when I took Astro 3 right here at UCLA. It was a cool class and my favorite part of it was when we visited the planetarium which is on top of the Math and Sciences building which really put all of outer space in perspective for me. After searching the internet about the different aspects of space I decided to focus my blog this week on the area of future space exploration. "The rocket will free man from his remaining chains, the chains of gravity which still ties him to this planet. It will open him to the gates of heaven." (1)

Figure Two

The first area I would like to focus on is the mining if the moon. Yup you read that correctly, NASA wants to mine the moon. When I first read about this topic my mind automatically went to NASA extracting gold and silver from the moon's surface but this wasn't the case. The reason why NASA wants to mine the moon is to provide future space explorations into deep space with the necessary resources to survive these long, stressful trips (2). Come to find out the soil on the moon provides many of the ingredients necessary to create oxygen and water while on a space ship. The reason why we would want to get our resources in space is because it costs around a million dollars to launch a pound of material into space (3) meaning that if we could get some of our material in space we would save millions and millions of dollars.

Figure Three 

As space exploration continues to develop the question has to be asked, will robots or astronauts be used in the future. After further review on this topic I found out that there is both positives and negatives associated with each. In terms of having humans in space the positives are as follows, having a human in space provides someone who can solve problems that arise and the county that the astronaut hails from will be super stoked that they can say they have a person that traveled the farthest into space. Some of the negatives that come along with humans is that they need to be fed, they need water and they can get tired. Its a long ways to deep space, this is where robots win. They don't need food and water and they won't get tired. The main problem with robot is that if the break down who is there to fix them? (4) I hope that we continue to send humans into space for the rest of time. There is just something about knowing a human has been to places that we thought couldn't possibly exist. Space exploration has unlocked many great things for us, "Planetary exploration has changed the way we think about the air we breathe and the oceans we sail" (5)

Bibliography
1.) Wernher von Braun, Rocket Engineer
2.) NASA. NASA, n.d. Web. 26 May 2015.
3.)  NASA. NASA, n.d. Web. 26 May 2015.
4.) "Are Robots or Astronauts the Future of Space Exploration?" Pegasus Magazine. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 May 2015.
5.) "The Dark Future of American Space Exploration: NASA's Golden Age Is about to Come to a Thudding Halt." Vox. N.p., 23 Feb. 2015. Web. 27 May 2015.
Pictures
Figure One: "GC Launches Space Exploration Program Titled ‘Not of the World – Not in It Either’." BarelyAdventist. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 May 2015.
Figure Two: "Almost Being There: Why the Future of Space Exploration Is Not What You Think." Wired.com. Conde Nast Digital, n.d. Web. 26 May 2015.
Figure Three: HowStuffWorks. HowStuffWorks.com, n.d. Web. 26 May 2015.