Review: The Cosmic Revolutionary’s Handbookby Jeff Foust Monday, May 18, 2020
The Cosmic Revolutionary’s Handbook: (Or: How to Beat the Big Bang)by Luke A. Barnes and Geraint F. Lewis
Cambridge Univ. Press, 2020
hardcover, 286 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-108-48670-5
US$22.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1108486703/spaceviewsEvery astronomer has received a missive like this, not to mention those working in adjacent fields as well as science journalists. The email arrives from an unfamiliar account, and is often written in a… creative choice of fonts, and with various attachments. The gist of the message is along the lines of “The Big Bang is wrong!” (or, often, “THE BIG BANG IS WRONG!” in the belief that the emphasis that capitalization offers will somehow make it more convincing.) The author then provides his or her own alternative cosmology and a plea to review or publish that alternative approach. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3943/1Explaining China’s space ambitions and goals through the lens of strategic cultureby Namrata Goswami Monday, May 18, 2020
A Long March 5B successfully lifts off May 5 on its first flight, clearing the way for future launches of Chinese space station modules. (credit: Xinhua)We all need conceptual tools for analysis. Strategic culture is one of them. I define strategic culture as a sum of a nation’s assumptions about its reality (threats, opportunities) based on which certain policy choices are preferred over others. These policy choices are informed by the state’s political culture reflecting both continuity and change over time. Political culture is defined as “a short-hand expression for a ‘mindset’ which has the effect of
limiting attention to less than the full range of alternative behaviors, problems [emphasis added], and solutions which are logically possible.” Strategic culture flows from political culture, and is mostly applicable to the political and military leaders, whose assumptions, preferences, and choices inform their proclivity to adopt a particular military strategy over others: offense/defense, compellence/deterrence. History, myths and metaphor, and state capacity play a critical role in informing these assumptions. Colin Gray captures strategic culture well in his definition, “the persisting (though not eternal) socially transmitted ideas, attitudes, traditions, habits of mind, and preferred methods of operation that are more or less specific to
a particularly geographically based security community that has had a necessarily unique historical experience. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3944/1When Washington went to the Moon: An interview with Glen Wilsonby Dwayne A. Day Monday, May 18, 2020
https://www.forum.kosmonauta.net/index.php?topic=4125.msg145664#msg145664Can NASA land humans on the Moon by 2024?by Jeff Foust Monday, May 18, 2020
The lunar lander concept by the “national team” led by Blue Origin. (credit: Blue Origin)Nearly 14 months ago, Vice President Mike Pence spoke at a meeting of the National Space Council in Huntsville, Alabama, and changed the trajectory of NASA’s human spaceflight program. Pence directed NASA to accelerate its schedule for returning humans to the Moon, which at the time called for a landing by 2028. The new goal: land American astronauts on the Moon “within the next five years,” a goal subsequently interpreted to mean by the end of 2024 (see “
Lunar whiplash”, The Space Review, April 1, 2019.) (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3946/1Worms and wings, meatballs and swooshes: NASA insignias in popular cultureby Glen E. Swanson Monday, May 18, 2020
NASA insignias in popular culture. Kids and adults are shown sporting NASA apparel. The late comedian Bob Hope is pictured ready to kick off his 1983–84 season of NBC specials wearing the NASA worm during a gala salute to NASA in honor of their 25th anniversary. SpaceX’s Falcon 9 launch vehicle, adorning the NASA worm, is shown ready on the pad at KSC for its upcoming launch that will carry two astronauts to the ISS, the first crewed launch from US soil since the last flight of the space shuttle Atlantis in 2011. (credit: G. Swanson/NBC-TV/NASA/SpaceX)If all goes well, SpaceX will launch a Dragon spacecraft atop one of its Falcon 9 launch vehicles next week. The spacecraft will carry two humans, the first to be launched from the US since the last shuttle lifted off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in 2011. Emblazoned on the side of the rocket will appear a NASA insignia that was all but retired from the agency nearly 30 years ago. Dubbed the “NASA worm,” the retro, then-ultramodern interpretation of the agency’s logo was first created in 1975 as part of the Federal Graphic Improvement Program of the National Endowment for the Arts. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3947/1