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ShareThe Russians too --and even when they were Soviets -- have restricted themselves to orbiting the Earth. Yes, spacecrafts are orbiting somewhere in the galaxy and beaming back stupendous pictures and adding to our meagre knowledge of whatever's out there, but nothing has been as exciting as men landing on the moon.
But, I'm neither blasé nor sophisticated when it comes to space exploration. This is, truly, the next (to say final is surely to tempt fate) frontier. I'm not very tech-savvy with today's stuff -- that is I neither own an iPod nor a Blackberry. But when teleportation is no longer science fiction, that's when technology gets exciting.
In 1995, Neil Armstrong came down to Mumbai to talk about his experiences. Much is
already known about that, but this much seemed clear: the experience was so profound that it changed those men in ways that we who have not crossed the earth's atmosphere cannot begin to fathom.
There has been much science fiction about the space travel, meeting other life forms and the wonders of the Universe but for most of us, no matter how advanced we think we are to be in outer space looking down on earth is still largely impossible.
Who knows what exists out there or even whether anyone does or not. But surely, regardless, we have to move forward and onward? That is what being human has been about. We have made ourselves -- or have become or someone has made us -- different from other living beings on this planet. We have courage and we have curiosity, amongst our other attributes.
Yes, we have faults but that is not reason enough to despair or hold ourselves back.
Currently of course, we don't have the science to take us much further. And some might say the money. The science though has to be developed and it will be, and lack of the money certainly never stalled human progress. What we need to get back is imagination. It is that alone which will take us boldly where no one has gone before and lead us to the truth that is out there and all the rest of those science fiction telly and movie clichés.
Be honest, when those opening credits to Star Wars rolls on the screen, taking us to a galaxy far far away, isn't it a thrill?
The science fiction writers and dreamers are our guides here. They have demonstrated how science and imagination can work together and almost everyone has shown how the dark and the good side of the human nature will work in unfamiliar situations.
As a three-year-old, according to my parents, I hid behind the sofa to watch the famous British TV series, Dr Who. I was terrified of the Daleks -- who wasn't --but I never missed an episode. I watch it now again, thanks to the glory that is satellite television, and sitting on the sofa this time, I am teleported back to being a bedazzled three-year-old. Other worlds, other creatures, same old humans, what a story!
Since Dr Who, many books and TV serials and movies later, the thrill remains. All those greats who have showed us the way -- Arthur C Clarke, Isaac Asimov, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Gene Rodenberry, Jules Verne, HG Wells, Carl Sagan, George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, Ray Bradbury, Kurt Vonnegut, I cannot possibly name them all nor do I know them all -- also opened our minds to new possibilities.
On the 40th anniversary of our boldest journey as humans, isn't it time to go back out there and find out what's happening? Hell, maybe it's way, way better out there than it is down here?
