Author: Mark Alexander

Tycho crater’s central peak complex casts a long, dark shadow near local sunrise in this spectacular view that was captured by the Lunar Reconaissance Orbiter on June 10, 2011. Shown in amazing detail (click to embiggen), boulder strewn slopes and jagged shadows appear in the highest resolution yet imaged at 5 feet per pixel. The entire complex is slightly less than a mile wide, formed in uplift by the giant impact that created the well-known ray crater 100 million years ago. The summit of its central peak reaches approximately 6500 feet above the crater floor.

Maybe it’s because I grew up the 1960s and 1970s and the manned space program left an indelible mark upon my psyche, but I look at an image like this and think, we must return to the moon. And at this point I don’t care if it’s the U.S. or the Chinese or some other country; it needs to be done.

Back in the 70s there was a loud outcry from certain sectors (and to a large degree, it remains today) that too much money was being spent on the space program; money that would be better suited to solving problems at home.

Since that time, funding for space exploration has been cut to almost nothing, and yet I see none of the social ills that plagued us in the 70s having gotten any better in the intervening years. So where did all that money go?

Keeping in mind the source of our current economic woes, do I really need to ask?

The United States currently spends over 60% of its income on the military. Can you imagine what we could do—not just in the areas of space exploration, but across the board in education, infrastructure and other areas currently so woefully underfunded—if that was cut by half? Hell, if it was cut by 20% this would be an entirely different country than it is now.

The surface area of the moon is 14.6 million square miles, roughly 3.8 times the area of the United States. C’mon folks, it’s a whole new continent out there waiting to be explored! What are we waiting for?

National will and curiosity, that’s what.

Out of national pride in what the U.S. used to be, I would naturallly like to see us be the ones to go back, but both national will and curiosity are sadly lacking in our current environment that is at best apathetic, or in the case of the Republicans and the low-information voters they rely on to get elected—downright hostile—to science and education. The recent election cycle has shown in no uncertain terms the level of intelligence that the people are sending to Congress (“A woman’s body can shut down pregnancy in the case of legitimate rape.”), and as long as teh st00pid is celebrated in society (I’m talking to you, Paris Hilton, Kim Kardashian, Honey Boo Boo, et. al.), nothing is going to change.