Loren Grush has probably the most comprehensive story to date on what happened, and its implications.
I’m concerned with statements like this:
While the Arch Mission Foundation didn’t violate any official international regulations for space contamination, the nonprofit may have put Israel and the US in a vulnerable position by not explicitly asking for permission first. And the tardigrades are part of a growing trend of companies that are sending things into space that don’t have any scientific value without prior approval.
…”What’s the point?” Linda Billings, a former consultant to NASA’s Planetary Protection Office and a current consultant to NASA’s astrobiology and planetary defense programs, tells The Verge. “To me, it’s just the height of arrogance to say this is what I want to do and I’m going to do it even though it serves no public purpose. There’s no benefit to humankind.” The Arch Mission Foundation claims they are making a backup of human history, but Billings notes that other organizations, like the Lifeboat Foundation, are already taking on this endeavor, too.
The US has been fairly relaxed about people sending things into space that do not serve a scientific purpose. Numerous art projects — such as Rocket Lab’s disco ball-like satellite, the Humanity Star, or Trevor Paglen’s Orbital Reflector, a giant inflatable balloon connected to a satellite — have gone up into orbit. Those have irked astronomers, who fear these reflective objects will mess up their sensitive images of the night sky. Most notably, SpaceX launched its CEO’s sports car into deep space during the inaugural launch of the Falcon Heavy, sending the vehicle on an orbit around the Sun that crosses paths with the orbit of Mars. [Emphasis added]
There is an implication here that there is no purpose to civil space activities other than science and “exploration” (“space exploration” is a phrase that I hate, because it implies that it is an end, rather than a means.) The late great Tom Rogers used to tartly reply, when asked why he wanted to go into space, “None of your goddamned business!” But the OST was written in an era in which space = science was the prevailing view. Fortunately, it has sufficient ambiguity that we can probably still develop space while remaining compliant. I may write an essay somewhere about this topic (I sort of did three years ago, but not in the context of the OST). I think that, in light of this incident, we need to broaden the conversation of why we do the space activities that are “the province of all mankind,” because we’re going to be getting a lot of pushback from people like Linda and the other “anti-colonialists” about space.
[Afternoon update]
I have some more thoughts over on Twitter.
[Monday-morning update]
Glenn Reynolds has an op-ed on this at USA Today, with commentary from Yours Truly.
[Bumped]
I’m going to start a movement for prohibiting people from doing things that “don’t have any scientific value” or “don’t benefit all mankind“, especially regarding online shopping at Amazon and trips to the convenient store, and see how many hours it lasts. I can’t think of anything that would be as effective in reducing mankind to sub-neolithic levels of productivity and living standards. I suspect the only survivors of such a system would be the clever ones who claimed they were conducting a research study to see how long a human being can survive by eating food, since otherwise eating doesn’t have any scientific value.
How charmingly… totalitarian …of her.
I assume she thinks she gets to decide what constitutes “public benefit”.
Thanks for drawing my attention to this. I care a lot about going out into space. It’s what we need to do. It’s a solution to all the problems people keep yipping about – we will revitalize the economy and save the environment when people start voluntarily leaving to find adventure and fortune. We can be the viral-like life forms we want to be, instead of devolving into a hive. And it may be the only way we’ve got to get teenagers off their @%#$ phones and get them excited about something.
Just tell them that they can take their phones to space.
The first thing I wonder is wouldn’t the finer regolith act as a kind of diatomaceous earth and shred the little guys if they did somehow, some way start moving around?
As for busybodies trying to boss everyone around – well, they’re entitled to their opinion, but they’re not the boss of me, so whatever.
So Linda “it serves no public purpose. There’s no benefit to humankind” Billings, PhD’s bio is available at http://www.planetary.org/connect/our-experts/profiles/linda-billings.html – that page also includes a link to her formal c.v.
“Her research has focused on the role that journalists play in constructing the cultural authority of scientists, the rhetorical strategies that scientists and journalists employ in communicating about science, and the rhetoric of space exploration.”
Doc Linda’s pretty much a Journalist with a PhD who was at NASA in various communications roles and subsequently has been on a lot of commissions.
I’m just trying to dig a bit and figure out why the public should consider Doc Linda to be a reference authority for “public purpose” and “benefit to humankind”.
But I can certainly see why another journalist would think she’s an authority – she’s basically got the education credentials of a J-school prof.
What makes scientists a cultural authority? Who died and made them kings?
Glancing through the story, it’s probably because she was one of the few sources the author could find to confirm the bias of the article. Where’s the rebuttal that this is an idiotic storm in a tea cup? There’s not even a single sane point of view in that whole thing.
Deciding what’s good.
It’s an old, old lie.
Whiners. Not everything we do in space has to be For All Mankind. Now, if it actually endangers the public, that’s another matter.
Apollo left bags of waste, including poop.
Anyone annoyed by this littering is welcome to get there and remove it. Personally.
The issue here isn’t that they did it, but that they did it without informing anyone.
Houston, Tranquility Base. The bolus is extruded,,,
She points out that NASA cannot enforce a treaty, so why should anyone follow it? If the only effect of it is a fine, you just add those dollars to the cost of the mission and tell NASA to pound sand.
This has nothing to do with NASA. NASA has no constabulary role, or anything to do with enforcing the OST. That is currently the responsibility of the FAA.
Same government, different address in D.C. to deliver it to.
I was confused by this consultant tied to NASA.
More poop, more potatoes.
I think it is the height of arrogance that she thinks she gets to decide what the point of anything is, and what possibly could be beneficial to humankind (which I seem to recall is traditionally shortened to mankind for simplicity, not necessarily sexism).
I remain puzzled why we can’t say “humanity.” It ticks the gender neutral box. And it’s a real word.
I use it all the time. But maybe some will demand that it be changed to huwomanity.
Rent seeking, Mother-may-I? freaks.
I would have fun writing up the complex chain of future events that explains why a frivolous mission component is vital to mankind.
“If the advance location crew for Planetary Pickers is not in that particular region of space in 2235 CE trying to locate a known piece of antique restaurant kitsch for season 18, episode 21, they won’t be in the right position to affect a successful divert of interstellar asteroid SB9172135B, an 8 km hunk of nickel-iron traveling at 180,000 km/hr that will impact the Earth with ten times the impact energy of the Chicxulub event that ended the Mesozoic era. Thus it is of critical importance that we launch a transgendered teddy bear in a MAGA hat on the proposed trajectory.”
Government is best thought of as a loose confederation of criminal gangs. See CIA, DoJ, FBI etc.
I think this phrase sums it up:
That plus the irrelevance of the change in question (“contamination” of the Moon) makes it a nonstory. Now, if we want to hamstring many generations of future space activity because someone put waterbears on the Moon without the approval of anyone, which was quite legal and harmless I might add, I suppose that is our prerogative. But it looks to me like that obstruction is only supported by a few professional busybodies. Here’s another example of that.
It’s quite remarkable how poor justified this all is. For example, nobody thinks of the obvious. Get out of the Outer Space Treaty (one year notification) and your governments have a lot more control over what their international obligations are in space.
That or just ignore the OST – it has no enforcement clause, penalties, or anything of the sort. Pure jaw-jaw for Cold War purposes, which is fair … but can be safely ignored today*.
(I just refreshed myself on the text, and it’s not at all clear that private space launches are even covered by it, since they’re not “State Parties”; the OST didn’t even include the concept of private space access and usage.
The US government is liable for its stuff – it’s not *obviously* liable for, say, SpaceX’s non-government-paid launches or equipment.)
(* I mean, the “no claiming entire planetary bodies just by landing a flag” thing is still pretty good, because that just leads to … problems between nations. Nobody gets to “own” the moon that easy.
But equally, claiming a small asteroid, well, “try and stop someone”.)
The US government is liable for its stuff – it’s not *obviously* liable for, say, SpaceX’s non-government-paid launches or equipment.)
It is considered to be under Article VI.
Other space lawyers (not me) argue that the part of Article VI that says that States parties are responsible “for assuring that national activities are carried out in conformity with the provisions set forth in the present Treaty” somehow makes obligations and responsibilities of states apply to private actors, too.
It could also be read less restrictively.
In any event, Article IX’s avoidance of harmful contamination is neither planetary protection nor self-executing.
companies that are sending things into space that don’t have any scientific value without prior approval
Oh, f#@$ these people.
“Science” doesn’t own “space”, and nobody needs your busybody permission.
The human race will die on this rock if people like that are in charge. (And we might deserve to if we let them.)
” The human race will die on this rock if people like that are in charge.”
This is, of course the intention for many of them. They hate humans and want us dead before we can interfere with the glorious Gaiain ecosystems of… barren rocks.
It’s just the inevitable end result of ‘environmentalism’.
Congress has told NASA that the agency’s long-term goals must enable the extension of a human presence beyond low-Earth orbit and into the solar system, “including potential human habitation on another celestial body and a thriving space economy in the 21st Century.” 42 U.S.C. § 18312. More explicitly, Congress told NASA to work toward eventual “human habitation on the surface of Mars.” 51 U.S.C. §70504(b).
I’m figuring I have more bacteria on a square inch of skin than the tardigrades do. And I get to go.
Well, not after telling us that. You should at least take a shower first. #Eewwwwwww
Hey. We’re all covered in the stuff.
And as long as I don’t have cooties I’m good.