Projects: Space Information
The Planetary Report
Volume XXVII, Number 1, January/February 2007
Credit: StockTrek, Getty Images |
On the Cover
The Moon -- its surface is cold, stark, dry, and lifeless. Yet,
since the dawn of recorded history, humans have treated Earth’s companion
as an entity with power to affect life on Earth. From the beginning, our luminous
satellite has inspired myths, stories, songs, poetry, art, and romance. Now
the spacefaring nations of Earth are looking at the Moon as our stepping-stone
to the future, a place to prepare for our explorations of Mars and worlds beyond.
From The Editor
Why go back to the Moon? That question lacks a simple, direct answer. In this
issue of The Planetary Report, various authors approach the question
from different directions, arriving at different answers. All their answers
may be correct, for no single reason can justify the expense, complexity, and
focused effort that must be sustained for decades if humans are to return to
the Moon to stay.
The Vision for Space Exploration (VSE) set out by President George W. Bush
is now funneling most of NASA’s energy and resources toward the Moon.
The agency’s priorities are to finish the International Space Station,
to build rockets to replace the space shuttle and take astronauts to the Moon,
and to construct a lunar base. Mars remains a distant goal for human explorers,
waiting for the groundwork first to be laid through work on the Moon.
Scientific exploration has taken a back seat in NASA because the modest budget
increases the space agency expected, and that were stated in the original VSE,
have not materialized. To return to the Moon on the VSE timetable, something
has to be cut. In large part, science is what has absorbed the cuts—hence
The Planetary Society’s Save Our Science! campaign.
The choices are hard. To make wise ones, we must understand the issues. In
these pages, we grapple with the lunar question and hope we advance some little
way toward resolving it.
—Charlene M. Anderson
This special issue of The Planetary Report was sponsored in part by the International
Lunar Observatory Association and Space Age Publishing Company.
Features
Why Return to the Moon?
by Buzz Aldrin
Lunar Mysteries Beckon
by Dave Stevenson
Destination Moon: An International Effort
by Louis D. Friedman
To Mars by Way of the Moon
by Christopher P. McKay
Departments
World Watch
We Make It Happen!
Members’ Dialogue
Questions and Answers
Society News
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