Rick Tumlinson: On "Interstellar" and the Virgin Galactic Accident

Rick Tumlinson, one of the founders of the Space Frontier Foundation wrote a brilliant piece in Huffington Post about both the risks and the hopes of space exploration and colonization, highlighted using the disasters of Cygnus/Antares launch failure and the Virgin Galactic accident and a glowing review of the movie "Interstellar".

Rick oozes the spirit of the space advocacy movement. His review of Interstellar is practically poetry. His passion for space advocacy is infectious:

"That is the inherent and divine irony of the frontier movement. Our cause, while built and riding on the same technologies that may yet kill this world, the harnessing of fire and energy and electrons and blatant challenging of the skies themselves on pillars of flame and fire, is based on the most beautiful of dreams.

We in this movement believe in life. We love this world. We love humanity and believe that far from a ravaging blight, we are indeed the seed carriers of this precious planet. "

I'm not sure I'm completely in agreement with Rick on everything. Sometimes I think humanity is far more blight-like than planetary life-savior-like. But I don't blame humanity for this. Any apex species would do the same, unless a strong inner sense of "noblesse oblige" prevented it. But I agree with Rick that humanity is more than capable of being a force for good.

At any rate, read Rick's article. I enjoyed it and found it most satisfying.