Yesterday marked the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing, and I only wish that I could have been alive at the time- to bask in the excitement of what we as a species can accomplish. I do hope that man lands on Mars in my lifetime.
All that said, it's now time to face the facts. The moon landing was conducted by NASA, a government agency funded by taxpayer money (aka) extortion. The moon landings in essence were just a massive PR stunt by the United States to demonstrate its 'superiority' over the Soviet Union (and it surely would have been the exact same thing were it the other way around).
That's the reason for Kennedy's famous "we choose to go to the moon" speech. (Or if you prefer, the full video.) That's the reason for NASA's fervor and dedication. While there indeed were some idealists in that project, the reason why it worked so efficiently (quite uncharacteristic of a government agency) was to get the world's most expensive and glorious PR stunt in history accomplished. And they did so, making Neil Armstrong the most glorified bureaucrat to ever live and guaranteeing NASA permanence as a government agency.
Because of this, what should have been a day of triumph for all of humanity was instead riddled with nationalistic hubris (as the Apollo 11 mission logo and the famous photographs demonstrate clearly).
What was accomplished by this mission, besides the already mentioned greatest PR stunt of all time?
The cost of the Apollo program was $25.4 billion, or $145 billion in 2007 dollars. (God knows what it will be in terms of 2009 and beyond dollars, they've already printed trillions.)
The ugly truth of this matter is that that wealth could have been used in ways that would have been productive to the economy. No one in their right mind would have invested in the moon landings because the gain would not match the investment. This is why the only way the landings could have been pulled off was for the state to extort money from its population and then spend it on something people would normally not want to. No matter the triumph, it is not justified to steal money from others in order to accomplish it.
What has NASA done since the last moon landing in 1972? It's become a typical government bureaucracy, mired in inefficiency, laziness, and graft. This is made evident by the fact that NASA even erased the original footage of the Apollo 11 moon landing!
Since the bygone Apollo days, NASA has been stuck launching satellites (among them the space telescopes such as Hubble and the new Kepler, something private foundations could have easily done), and putting people in low Earth orbit for no apparent reason except to keep a permanent human presence in space, lodging them in the still incomplete International Space Station.
In addition to the bone-crunching cost of keeping people in space per day (paid for by you, of course), prolonged zero-gravity exposure has very detrimental effects on the human body. Thus we are forced to needlessly endanger people's health, even when there is no imperative scientific operation underway.
Where does this put the future of human spaceflight? Is it really something that we want to leave to states? Being somewhat of an astronomy geek and science fiction writer, there's no doubt in my mind that space exploration (culminated of course in the moon landings), is the coolest thing that the government has ever done. However, mass extortion was needed to fund it, and the ends do not justify the means. Fortunately, help is on the way!
Finally, it appears that private enterprise is entering the space market. Undoubtedly, the prohibitive cost of sending matter into space has been holding the free market back from taking off beyond Earth. However, a few brave entrepreneurs are now taking up the challenge. Richard Branson and Virgin Galactic are the most famous examples that come to mind. Indeed, Virgin Galactic has just recently broken ground on the world's first commercial spaceport! The concept art for it is below:
I'm sounding like a geek now, I know, but I can't help it. The first few years (or decades) will be very expensive, thus reserving spaceflight for the wealthy, but so then were the first cars and air travel. The free market lowered their costs quite quickly, and ought to do the same for space travel too.
What will be the obstacle for the success of such enterprises? Undoubtedly, the arch-nemesis of free markets everywhere: the state. It can do this in a number of ways: taxes that siphon off money that could be used for further investment, regulating commercial spaceflights with silly agencies like the TSA, or inflating the money supply, thus making people poor and further unable to invest or demand as much of private enterprise.
These are just a few of the barriers to entry the state may try in the future. However, even NASA's future may depend on private initiatives.
I sincerely hope that the market is allowed to work, and take space out of the hands of states and their armies of bureaucrats. Perhaps there will even be private spaceflights to the Moon and Mars. Now I sound even more far fetched, but maybe there will even be private colonization efforts on the Red Planet.
This could only happen by the end of my lifetime most probably (at the earliest), but if it means I could escape the madness of this world of states and live out my last few years in freedom, I'd be there in a heartbeat, however remote the chance.
Here's hoping that the future of space travel be taken out of the hands of states and turned over to the marketplace.
But hope isn't enough, liberty lovers and space enthusiasts alike must work toward achieving the goal, whether this be by investing, popularizing private space ventures, or by smashing the state.
To hell with the glorified bureaucrats, guys like this are my heroes!
Free on Mars? This is my greatest dream of space travel, let's work to achieve it!
