#spaceexploration – by @timescientist on Instagram
Ah, to be a human organism, subject to such rich and varied material sensory associations… For me, this is Colorado mountain forests and clear, crystal creek fishing trips as a boy with my dad and uncles. (Cigar smoke kept the mosquitoes at bay… or, at least that’s what they told me.)
It’s doubly remarkable to consider that this is the reason, and ultimately the only reason that mattered, for European settlement of this continent. An indigenous plant used holistically and discovered while exploring for gold, only to trigger a social rush of demand when brought back home.
How to make human sense desires and exploration move in concert? That is the question that preoccupies me with regard to space. History suggests that space will have to provide something that comes to appeal to everyone before we’ll be able to move into the off-world frontier to stay… but what will that be?
Platinum group metals prospecting will likely get us a little ways. And with some fusion breakthroughs here at home, heli