Insurance

“We’re talking about an insurance policy—a backup plan in case something does happen to the Earth. I once talked to Carl Sagan about this, who said, “We live in the middle of a shooting gallery with thousands of asteroids in our path that we haven’t even discovered yet. So, let’s be at least a two-planet species, as a backup plan.””

https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2018/02/there-s-only-one-way-for-humanity-to-survive–go-to-mars-/

Intelligent Life

Not directly relevant to Mars or children’s books about Mars, but this got me staring at the wall and thinking for a while.

In all likelihood, the shortest psst’s never got off their planet.

Among the Stars

“If the future does not include being out there among the stars and being a multi-planet species, I find that incredibly depressing.” — Elon Musk

Me too.

(The link should take you to 34:43 in the video. If it doesn’t, skip to there.)

Cities

“Inhabiting off-planet space offers the chance to experiment with new social and environmental arrangements that incorporate lessons we’ve learned from mistakes on Earth. “If you want to go to Mars, let’s live, and live happily, and live better than here on Earth,” says Vera Mulyani, an architect and founder of the Mars City Design competition. “Let’s design a better place for humanity.””

Space Program

“The situation is truly ironic. With the success of Falcon Heavy, America could be poised right now for a breakthrough into space. The cash available is adequate. What is lacking is intelligent direction. We will never get to Mars if we allow our human-spaceflight program to be run as a random walk.”

Margaret Hamilton

Here’s a short video on Margaret Hamilton, whose software got Apollo to the Moon.

Margaret Hamilton who wrote Apollo spacecraft guidance software

Introducing Margaret Hamilton, Computer Scientist & Systems Engineer #WomenInSTEM

Posted by Stemettes on Monday, February 19, 2018