Excerpt from bostonglobe.com
Decades after that first small step, space thinkers are finally getting serious about our nearest neighbor By Kevin Hartnett
This week, the European Space Agency made headlines with the first successful landing of a spacecraft on a comet, 317 million miles from Earth. It was an upbeat moment after two American crashes: the unmanned private rocket that exploded on its way to resupply the International Space Station, and the Virgin Galactic spaceplane that crashed in the Mojave Desert, killing a pilot and raising questions about whether individual businesses are up to the task of operating in space. During this same period, there was one other piece of space news, one far less widely reported in the United States: On Nov. 1, China successfully returned a moon probe to Earth. That mission follows China’s landing of the Yutu moon rover late last year, and its announcement that it will conduct a sample-return mission to the moon in 2017. With NASA and the Europeans focused on robot exploration of distant targets, a moon landing might not seem like a big deal: We’ve been there, and other countries are just catching up. But in recent years, interest in the moon has begun to percolate again, both in the United States and abroad—and it’s catalyzing a surprisingly diverse set of plans for how our nearby satellite will contribute to our space future. China, India, and Japan have all completed lunar missions in the last decade, and have more in mind. Both China and Japan want to build unmanned bases in the early part of the next decade as a prelude to returning a human to the moon. In the United States, meanwhile, entrepreneurs are hatching plans for lunar commerce; one company even promises to ferry freight for paying customers to the moon as early as next year. Scientists are hatching more far-out ideas to mine hydrogen from the poles and build colonies deep in sky-lit lunar caves. This rush of activity has been spurred in part by the Google Lunar X Prize, a $20 million award, expiring in 2015, for the first private team to land a working rover on the moon and prove it by sending back video. It is also driven by a certain understanding: If we really want to launch expeditions deeper into space, our first goal should be to travel safely to the moon—and maybe even figure out how to live there.
Entrepreneurial visions of opening the moon to commerce can seem fanciful, especially in light of the Virgin Galactic and Orbital Sciences crashes, which remind us how far we are from having a truly functional space economy. They also face an uncertain legal environment—in a sense, space belongs to everyone and to no one—whose boundaries will be tested as soon as missions start to succeed. Still, as these plans take shape, they’re a reminder that leaping blindly is sometimes a necessary step in opening any new frontier.
“All I can say is if lunar commerce is foolish,” said Columbia University astrophysicist Arlin Crotts in an e-mail, “there are a lot of industrious and dedicated fools out there!”
At its height, the Apollo program accounted for more than 4 percent of the federal budget. Today, with a mothballed shuttle and a downscaled space station, it can seem almost imaginary that humans actually walked on the moon and came back—and that we did it in the age of adding machines and rotary phones.
“In five years, we jumped into the middle of the 21st century,” says Roger Handberg, a political scientist who studies space policy at the University of Central Florida, speaking of the Apollo program. “No one thought that 40 years later we’d be in a situation where the International Space Station is the height of our ambition.”
NASA/JPL/Northwestern University
An image of Earth and the moon created from photos by Mariner 10, launched in 1973.Without a clear goal and a geopolitical rivalry to drive it, the space program had to compete with a lot of other national priorities. The dramatic moon shot became an outlier in the longer, slower story of building scientific achievements.
Now, as those achievements accumulate, the moon is coming back into the picture. For a variety of reasons, it’s pretty much guaranteed to play a central role in any meaningful excursions we take into space. It’s the nearest planetary body to our own—238,900 miles away, which the Apollo voyages covered in three days. It has low gravity, which makes it relatively easy to get onto and off of the lunar surface, and it has no atmosphere, which allows telescopes a clearer view into deep space.
The moon itself also still holds some scientific mysteries. A 2007 report on the future of lunar exploration from the National Academies called the moon a place of “profound scientific value,” pointing out that it’s a unique place to study how planets formed, including ours. The surface of the moon is incredibly stable—no tectonic plates, no active volcanoes, no wind, no rain—which means that the loose rock, or regolith, on the moon’s surface looks the way the surface of the earth might have looked billions of years ago.
NASA still launches regular orbital missions to the moon, but its focus is on more distant points. (In a 2010 speech, President Obama brushed off the moon, saying, “We’ve been there before.”) For emerging space powers, though, the moon is still the trophy destination that it was for the United States and the Soviet Union in the 1960s. In 2008 an Indian probe relayed the best evidence yet that there’s water on the moon, locked in ice deep in craters at the lunar poles. China landed a rover on the surface of the moon in December 2013, though it soon malfunctioned. Despite that setback, China plans a sample-return mission in 2017, which would be the first since a Soviet capsule brought back 6 ounces of lunar soil in 1976.
The moon has also drawn the attention of space-minded entrepreneurs. One of the most obvious opportunities is to deliver scientific instruments for government agencies and universities. This is an attractive, ready clientele in theory, explains Paul Spudis, a scientist at the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston, though there’s a hitch: “The basic problem with that as a market,” he says, “is scientists never have money of their own.”
One company aspiring to the delivery role is Astrobotic, a startup of young Carnegie Mellon engineers based in Pittsburgh, which is currently positioning itself to be “FedEx to the moon,” says John Thornton, the company’s CEO. Astrobotic has signed a contract with SpaceX, the commercial space firm founded by Elon Musk, to use a Falcon 9 for an inaugural delivery trip in 2015, just in time to claim the Google Lunar X Prize. Thornton says most of the technology is in place for the mission, and that the biggest remaining hurdle is figuring out how to engineer a soft, automated moon landing.
Astrobotic is charging $1.2 million per kilogram—you can, in fact, place an order on its website—and Thornton says the company has five customers so far. They include the entities you might expect, like NASA, but also less obvious ones, like a company that wants to deliver human ashes for permanent internment and a Japanese soft drink manufacturer that wants to place its signature beverage, Pocari Sweat, on the moon as a publicity stunt. Astrobotic is joined in this small sci-fi economy by Moon Express out of Mountain View, Calif., another company competing for the Google Lunar X Prize.
Plans like these are the low-hanging fruit of the lunar economy, the easiest ideas to imagine and execute. Longer-scale thinkers are envisioning ways that the moon will play a larger role in human affairs—and that, says Crotts, is where “serious resource exploitation” comes in.
If this triggers fears of a mined-out moon, be reassured: “Apollo went there and found nothing we wanted. Had we found anything we really wanted, we would have gone back and there would have been a new gold rush,” says Roger Launius, the former chief historian of NASA and now a curator at the National Air and Space Museum.
There is one possible exception: helium-3, an isotope used in nuclear fusion research. It is rare on Earth but thought to be abundant on the surface of the moon, which could make the moon an important energy source if we ever figure out how to harness fusion energy. More immediately intriguing is the billion tons of water ice the scientific community increasingly believes is stored at the poles. If it’s there, that opens the possibility of sustained lunar settlement—the water could be consumed as a liquid, or split into oxygen for breathing and hydrogen for fuel.
The presence of water could also open a potentially ripe market providing services to the multibillion dollar geosynchronous satellite industry. “We lose billions of dollars a year of geosynchronous satellites because they drift out of orbit,” says Crotts. In a new book, “The New Moon: Water, Exploration, and Future Habitation,” he outlines plans for what he calls a “cislunar tug”: a space tugboat of sorts that would commute between the moon and orbiting satellites, resupplying them with propellant, derived from the hydrogen in water, and nudging them back into the correct orbital position.
In the long term, the truly irreplaceable value of the moon may lie elsewhere, as a staging area for expeditions deeper into space. The most expensive and dangerous part of space travel is lifting cargo out of and back into the Earth’s atmosphere, and some people imagine cutting out those steps by establishing a permanent base on the moon. In this scenario, we’d build lunar colonies deep in natural caves in order to escape the micrometeorites and toxic doses of solar radiation that bombard the moon, all the while preparing for trips to more distant points.
gical hurdles is long, and there’s also a legal one, at least where commerce is concerned. The moon falls under the purview of the Outer Space Treaty, which the United States signed in 1967, and which prohibits countries from claiming any territory on the moon—or anywhere else in space—as their own.
“It is totally unclear whether a private sector entity can extract resources from the moon and gain title or property rights to it,” says Joanne Gabrynowicz, an expert on space law and currently a visiting professor at Beijing Institute of Technology School of Law. She adds that a later document, the 1979 Moon Treaty, which the United States has not signed, anticipates mining on the moon, but leaves open the question of how property rights would be determined.
There are lots of reasons the moon may never realize its potential to mint the world’s first trillionaires, as some space enthusiasts have predicted. But to the most dedicated space entrepreneurs, the economic and legal arguments reflect short-sighted thinking. They point out that when European explorers set sail in the 15th and 16th centuries, they assumed they’d find a fortune in gold waiting for them on the other side of the Atlantic. The real prizes ended up being very different—and slow to materialize.
“When we settled the New World, we didn’t bring a whole lot back to Europe [at first],” Thornton says. “You have to create infrastructure to enable that kind of transfer of goods.” He believes that in the case of the moon, we’ll figure out how to do that eventually.
Roger Handberg is as clear-eyed as anyone about the reasons why the moon may never become more than an object of wonder, but he also understands why we can’t turn away from it completely. That challenge, in the end, may finally be what lures us back.
Adventures of the New Human
Iterations of Release and Giving Over Authority to the Soul
My beloved ones,
Many of you are experiencing enormous cycles of letting go.
This includes the past re-surfacing to be healed and released. The present being shifted into a more perfect alignment as you let go and let yourself re-orient to your own natural frequency and functional focus. The future being shifted as the dreams and intentions you held based on what you would term a “prior” self felt appropriate and delightful are recalibrated to support your increasingly clear sense of function. As you more and more spend time knowing yourself as unified consciousness, as you try on and get used to the power of wearing the wings of the New Human, as you spend more time with your physical, emotional, mental and spirit bodies in unity, oriented from the heart chakra, more and more--the soul IS the navigational system for your journey and this changes everything!
With an increase in your vibration, comes an increase in speed of experience and manifestation and your point of view is expanded.
If you are able to trust in yourself, you will naturally orient to these shifts simultaneously and thereby have an understanding of what transpires in your life, what shifts and creates space, what is being magnetized and drawn to you to support the fulfillment of your function—you will be able to feel and know all of this as one unified vector moving in alignment with the everything.
When, however, you doubt yourself—and depending on where this occurs—you may find your mental or emotional bodies out of alignment with your entire Lightbody and this creates much confusion, disorientation and a sense of loss.
Your Soul knows your function. It blends in at the appropriate levels to fulfill your role in the process of dimensional ascension. All-That-Is or Spirit knows itself as one-ness and in this orientation; it does nothing, it simply IS. Spirit also performs certain functions—as the Archangel Michael for example. The portion of Spirit performing the functional of the Archangel Michael changes all the time—yet this energy understands the function of the Archangel Michael and retains the appearance of consistency and continuity.
The same is true of you in your various incarnations of Spirit. You, in your various reincarnational existences (physical and non-physical) co-occur. In the gestalt of “YOU,” you recognize the “progress of your functional expression” and feel a sense of gratitude comparing “later” circumstances to “earlier” circumstances.
The people you have been and are, are like the childhood you remember—part of you entirely, and yet also having gone their own way. Pursued different expressions and yet all interconnected. You experience, unconsciously of course, the collective unfolding of all of these aspects of yourself, as well as the unified expansive perspective of All-That-Is, which guides and informs your functional role in each point of focus continually.
The immediate sharing of all of this information, and the way in which it is known, understood, integrated and shapes your sense of focus and desire is beyond comprehension in your current vessel. Simply know that it exists and it is always connected to what IS; and as such, timely, relevant knowledge about your own experience is fully available to you. You only need to ask and to learn to listen to yourself and to cultivate the way in which this communication works best for you.
For example—Meredith has been asked by many experiencing break-ups of existing relationships to comment on this seeming “trend”…
Knowing as you do, that all is shifting in to alignment, the read on breakups is an easy-one; the functions are no longer aligned. The vibrations are no longer in sync. The shared purpose has dissipated and/or the individuals involved have shifted to a new focus as a result of their own growth and no longer is the functional overlap present which made the relationship so primary in the experience.
The more one grows and expands the more continual adjustments relationships must go through. For some this ongoing stimulus and realignment is refreshing and exhilarating; to feel oneself in a never ending experience of unfolding, re-inventing, creation—a thrilling ride indeed. In some of your relationships, you continually inspire and elevate one another. Your purpose is ongoing and these shifts become a means of discovery together and a catalyst for each of you living a happier, more fulfilling life. For those, these shifts are not as difficult and not as much of a surprise.
It is for those who would like to experience the illusion of solidity and/or those who desire a slower pace to change and life that these shifts are either difficult and/or avoided/denied. The challenge comes when one member of the relationship aligns with a pace and a frequency or vibration, which is significantly faster or slower than the other.
And it is this differing response to life, which complicates the natural completion or shifting of priorities. One who is in sync with all-that-is will feel their priorities realign as there are significant shifts and as dimensional ascension brings them closer to their soul signature and to their innate function being embodied more directly on the earth plane. If they are “partnered” with one who is not aligned or significantly related to this emerging function and the related sense of lifestyle, and especially if the partner is not also experiencing their own shifts and realignment; then at first they will find their partner possibly feeling “abandoned”—as their energy and focus is withdrawn or diminished as it shifts to the new point of creation in experience. If this is discussed, the emotional body may become triggered and there is often an imbalance then in the vibrational frequency, as the emotional body becomes out of sync—vibrating out of harmonic ratios with the physical, mental and spirit bodies. Now orientation has been lost. Which leads to a feeling of being disconnected in the one who was connected and therefore, shifted. Then there is more emotion and confusion. Which creates further imbalance.
The solution is to let go.
Once you let go, naturally you will align with your inner sense of things. Allow the emotions to flow through you; trusting in all-that-is and knowing that all is well, even if you do not understand what is taking place. Once you are re-oriented to self and your inner connection, if the purpose which led you “apart” is still clear and present, then allow it to unfold, at the rate you desire and trust that all is well for BOTH of you, and All-That-Is.
Again, the challenge comes when one member of the relationship aligns with a pace and a frequency or vibration, which is significantly faster or slower than the other.
You have, innately, your own frequency at which you vibrate. You may not fully experience this when you are dis-allowing a full connection to your expanded self; but as blocks to clarity are removed and as the soul gains dominion in being your point of orientation, these natural frequencies appear and cannot be stifled, or adjusted significantly to keep pace with others, without significant negative experience within.
Let go and BE YOU. Trust in that way of being and all that is attracted and aligned with it. Love everything with curiosity and interest; expecting something wonderful to unfold and rejoice in your own function! Celebrate the variety of our purposes and rates of unfolding. Invite grace into your life to smooth all of this out, and simply let go.
Becoming the New Human requires you learn to live from your soul perspective, fully conscious of your innate power and connectedness, as well as clear and allowing your unique function. The wisdom as to how to blend your function with All-That-Is, moment to moment and point to point will be clear from within; much of this happens without evening needing to ask—it is simply non-verbal, non-thought knowing which leads you. You only need trust your heart and move toward peace and what feels good next to stay in sync with this natural personal power through awareness which is YOU.
Realize there is an enormous variance in our functions and frequency! Let this be. No. Go further—love this!
For some their natural frequency is so rapid that what you experience as a lifetime is known in what you would call a moment. {Can you imagine? Ha!} Since all lives are lived simultaneously, then any separation experienced is but a psychological one. Your “future” personalities are as real as your “past” ones. After a while, this will no longer concern you and you will live increasingly “in the flow” concentrated on the activity that is at each point, the perfect expression of your unique aspect blending and harmonizing with All-That-Is.
These messages, your inner sense of things, the mingling of reality and experience, these messages from one system to another occur in various ways continually, emerging in your experience in one guise or another—as inspiration of many kinds. All are doorways. The door to the soul is open, and it leads to all the dimensions of experience.
The soul stands both within and without the fabric of life as you know it. It is your point of power, peace, clarity and connection. I invite you to let go and be SOUL; be who you are.
I AM the Archangel Michael.
© 2009-2010, Meredith Murphy, Expect Wonderful | Modern Paradise Publications http://www.expectwonderful.com – You are free to share, copy, distribute and display the work under the following conditions: You must give author credit, you may not use this for commercial purposes, and you may not alter, transform or build upon this work. For any reuse or distribution, you must make clear to others the license terms of this work. Any of these conditions can be waived if you get the permission of the copyright holder. Any other purpose of use must be granted permission by the author.
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