ARE SPACE JOYRIDES JUSTIFIABLE?

Courtesy of Blue Origin

Space tourism is an expensive game, the playing field of billionaires. We witnessed the proof of that in recent weeks as first Richard Branson rode his Virgin Galactic space plane VSS Unity to the edge of space, 53 miles (85 km.) above the Earth on July 11th, and then Amazon’s Jeff Bezos traveled 66 miles up (106 km.) on July 20th in the first of his Blue Origin company’s New Shepard spacecraft to carry humans. The fact that both billionaires traveled aboard the first flights of their respective craft to such heights is either an exceptional testimony to their faith in their companies’ technology or, if you’re a cynic, a powerhouse marketing ploy. Now Virgin Galactic is selling seats aboard future flights at a quarter million dollars each, while Blue Origin may send up two more tourist trips this year at an unspecified price tag (but there are reports of tickets auctioned off at $28 million).

Were Branson and Bezos hailed as heroes? Maybe by some, but there was also immediate loud and high-profile criticism of the joyrides with the predictable message that the money could be better spent helping to fight climate change or any of the other serious environmental or humanitarian crises you could name. And Bezos bombed big-time with his remark before his flight thanking Amazon customers and his (reportedly badly underpaid) Amazon employees for making his flight possible.

So, the question is, are such joyrides by the world’s wealthiest justified?

First of all, as long as capitalism remains our predominant financial system, we’ll have billionaires. In fact, the gap between the planet’s richest and poorest citizens continues to grow. And if money burns a hole in the pockets of anybody who has it, how much more true is that of those who have more than they could ever possibly need? So billionaires will blow big money on big toys and projects that many will consider foolish. If you don’t like billionaires and their lavish spending habits, you’ll have to change the system.

Having said that, is space travel a boondoggle, wasteful and worthless?

Well, the benefits of space tourism might not be immediately apparent (though its supporters hope it will inspire future generations), but it is a means to fund other, more productive, space-related efforts. Branson hopes Virgin Galactic’s spaceplanes can develop into an alternate form of high-speed business travel. Bezos is a proponent of moving polluting industries like chemical manufacturing and energy production off the planet. We already know that many manufacturing processes, including the making of pharmaceutical products, can be done with much greater efficiency in the low gravity of Earth orbit with its abundance of solar energy. That list of potential space industries will grow exponentially as the cost of lifting materiel and personnel out of Earth’s gravity well decreases. And that decrease in cost is why Blue Origin and Elon Musk’s SpaceX company have put so much effort into developing reusable rocket boosters that can land safely and reliably.

As I’ve mentioned more than once, we need to explore and exploit space beyond Earth.

We owe it to our planet: The more we can move polluting industries out of our fragile ecosystem, and the less we have to ravage the Earth’s surface for diminishing mineral and other resources, the better.

We owe it to our fellow Earth-life: Every day there’s a new story about a species extinction or an environmental disaster caused by humans’ rapacious industrial and agricultural practices. Whatever we can shift out into space, including meaningful numbers of human beings, will reduce the terrible cost being paid by wildlife and vegetation.

We owe it to our fellow humans: Wild animals aren’t the only ones who suffer when climate is altered and green spaces and clean water are depleted. If we could create attractive human habitats in orbit, in outer space, or on other planets, we could make living conditions better for every human being.

We owe it to Life itself: We still have no evidence that life exists anywhere else in the universe. Until we do, we must act as if Earth is the only cradle of life, and right now that cradle is incredibly fragile. Even if we don’t render the planet into an uninhabitable wasteland like Venus through irreversible climate warming, or irradiate the whole surface by nuclear war, life here could still be wiped out by a cosmic collision, a nearby supernova, or a catastrophic event within our own Sun. We have a responsibility to make sure that all of Life’s “eggs” don’t remain in just one basket.

Do these lofty space dreams really begin with billionaires and their expensive toys? The jury is out on that one, but let’s face it, government bureaucracies aren’t the most efficient way to get things done, whereas corporate for-profit approaches do seem to be more productive (provided that meaningful safety regulations are in place).

(If we look to science fiction, especially the so-called “Golden Era” of the early 20th Century, it’s not uncommon to find millionaires and billionaires as the driving force behind space ventures, some of which save humanity. One that springs to mind is When Worlds Collide in which millionaires fund the spacecraft that carries survivors from a doomed Earth when governments refuse to act. Of course, SF probably features an even larger number of billionaires who want to rule the world and wreck the planet, so….)

My own view is that, regrettably, government-driven space ventures can’t be counted on to save us from the threats mentioned above, not just because their bureaucracies are inefficient, but even more so because their funding (and therefore their very existence) is subject to political whims, about the most unreliable force in the universe! If that means our only alternative is to endure the grandstanding of billionaires as a step toward more meaningful progress, I can live with that.