Visionary Peter Diamandis' Five Best Reasons the Future is Better Than You Think

From Forbes.com: <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/netapp/2012/06/13/visionary-peter-diamandis-five-best-reasons-the-future-is-better-than-you-think/">Visionary Peter Diamandis' Five Best Reasons the Future is Better Than You Think</a>
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Peter Diamandis has always dreamed big.
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Like a lot of Baby Boomers, he became fascinated with space exploration as a child watching Neil Armstrong’s 1969 moon walk. Unlike most of them, Diamandis never abandoned his dream. After earning a medical degree from Harvard, Diamandis enrolled in the aeronautics and astronautics engineering program at MIT thinking he would become an astronaut, one of the rare few with the right stuff.
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By 1998, Diamandis was on an even more ambitious path. Convinced that the private sector – not government was best suited to to support space exploration, he established the X Foundation, a non-profit foundation, with the sole purpose of privately funding manned-space travel.  In 2004, the X Foundation awarded a $10 million prize to Microsoft cofounder Paul Allen and famed aviation designer Burt Rutan for their streamlined, three-person craft, SpaceShipOne. SpaceShipOne made 16 manned flights before being retired, becoming the first piloted spacecraft not launched by a world government.
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Today, the X Prize has expanded to reward “radical breakthroughs for the benefit of humanity.” A recent winner: Elastec/American Marine, a small environmental product firm in Carmi, Ill., for a cleanup device that can remove oil from ocean surfaces three times faster than is currently possible.
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Diamandis’ new book, <i>Abundance: The Future is Better Than You Think</i>, cowritten with Steven Kotler, acts as something of an antidote to the gloom that hangs over much of the world today. We recently spoke with Diamandis who offered five reasons the future is brighter than it’s ever been.
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    Beautiful Minds.  Nature has programmed most of us to react faster to danger than opportunity, but entrepreneurs are wired differently. Where most see problems, they see opportunities. Diamandis’ new book spotlights the work of legends like Stewart Brand, Dean Kamen and Craig Venter now focusing their prodigious creativity on some of the world’s most difficult problems. An economic system that continues to reward those who take the greatest financial risks serves as incentive for the smartest – and most daring – of us to think big.<P>
    A Better Mousetrap. Today’s PC is yesteryear’s supercomputer. A Masai warrior’s cellphone has better reach and sound quality than that of an American president only a generation ago. That means that we have greater possibilities to collaborate, to capture and store mountains of data as well as to make sense of it in real-time. Given all that, today’s innovators can make smart decisions with blinding speed.
    The DIY Revolution. Small groups of committed individuals are tackling problems that previously only large institutions could take on. Diamandis points to the Arab Spring as an example of a cluster of people who’ve pushed for and created massive change. Again, technology – in this case, social media – plays a central role allowing the few to influence the many.<P>
    The Rise of the 99%. Diamandis believes “the bottom billion” is poised to plug into the global economy and become “the rising billion.” Communication technology and microfinance will drive what promises to be the largest economic and social change since the Industrial Revolution.<P>
    Power Philanthropists. When entrepreneurs like Bill Gates turn to giving, they’re not content to sit back and write checks. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has become a powerful force for global good by applying business strategies to philanthropy. It boasts a carefully defined mission, the best minds, and a willingness to critically evaluate its work and change course when necessary. Diamandis believes other “technophilanthropists” will do the same as they devote their minds and money to the world’s thorniest problems.<P>

Big problems call for clever solutions. Many may come from a handful of – or even just one -  great mind willing to think big. Diamandis has been in the business of rewarding those intrepid souls. His book is a powerful inoculation against doomsday prophesies.

Hero’ pilot as China’s space woman?

From the Times of India: <a href="http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/china/Hero-pilot-as-Chinas-space-woman/articleshow/14040848.cms">Hero’ pilot as China’s space woman?</a>
BEIJING: Successful childbirth was one of the criteria that went into selecting female pilots, one of whom will make the journey in China's first manned flight into space in mid-June. One of the two selected astronauts is already a public heroine for having successfully handled a mid-air emergency. <P>

They were selected out of a group of 15 women, who were initially shortlisted on the basis of several qualities including natural child birth, according to Space International magazine under the China Academy of Space Technology. Other criteria include absence of scars and body odour.<P>

One of the two will be chosen for the space journey. Both are transport pilots with the People's Liberation Army Air Force. Natural childbirth is a sign that shows mature physical and mental condition, according to Xu Xianrong, a professor with the General Hospital of the PLA Air Force. The chosen pilots must also be married and living with their spouses because they need interpersonal skills to live in space with male colleagues.
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The two female astronauts, both 33, have been picked out of nine pilots who had been selected for their flying skills and psychological strength. They include Captain Wang Yaping from Shandong province and Major Liu Yang from Henan province.
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The identities of two male crew members have not been revealed. The PLA said on Saturday it will announce the names of the crew closer to the take off of Shenzhou-9 manned spacecraft, which will dock with Tiangong-1 spacecraft. Liu Yang was once caught in a dangerous situation when her plane hit 18 pigeons. The plane's windshield splattered with blood and the cockpit was filled with burning smell. She managed to stabilize the aircraft and made a successful emergency landing 11 minutes after the incident.
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Pang said candidates without scars were shortlisted because a scar might open and start bleeding in space and the cramped conditions would intensify body odour.

Is Space Getting Too Politicized?

From Wired Science: Is Space Getting Too Politicized?

Now that the 2012 Presidential field is officially set, the candidates can finally focus on the question that is on everyone’s mind: what would you, as President, do with NASA?  How would you guide the American space program?

Ok, so space exploration isn’t exactly a high salience issue for most of the country, but it does loom large for several swing state constituencies, most notably the Space Coast of Florida.  A couple of excellent articles in the current edition of Space Quarterly Magazine, excerpted on NasaWatch, contemplate the role space policy may have in the 2012 election.

Eric Sterner sees an opening for Republicans. 

“Republicans may sense vulnerability in the Administration’s handling of NASA and the civil space program. During the 2008 primaries, candidate Obama promised to cancel NASA’s flagship human exploration program, Constellation. He reversed himself for the general election, promising to increase support for it, which he did his first year in office, before finally canceling it in 2010 and then muffing the development and roll-out of a new civil space framework.”

If President Obama wins a second term, Aaron Oesterle envisions a cautious, under-the-radar approach that would expend little political capital.

“Space policy is at best a 3rd tier issue for most people (whether voters or elected officials), and having fought two very bruising battles over space policy, President Obama may want space to pass into the realm of “do no harm” to his other priorities.”

Oesterle’s characterization of Obama’s political calculus reflects a recent trend: despite widespread public support for space exploration, recent polls suggest that the issue is getting increasingly polarized.  The overall percentage of the American population supporting the enterprise remained roughly constant between 2008 and 2010 according to the National Opinion Research Center, but the groups declaring that the government spent “too little” or “too much” both grew by about 5 percentage points.

This is an alarming development, because manned spaceflight seems to work best when it’s de-politicized, or, perhaps more accurately, de-partisanized.  Space exploration is a long game: it requires long-term planning and a consistent goal-driven trajectory that builds on previous accomplishments.  It’s difficult to fold this reality into the “what have you done for me lately?” culture of Washington, where failure to hit quarterly benchmarks is grounds for cancellation.  Of course, government-sponsored space exploration also requires public support, and mobilizing enthusiasm without stoking partisanship is a fine line indeed.

If space exploration is something that we decide is worthwhile (and apparently it is), then the best policy is often to let previous plans germinate.  As administrations come and go, the long term path will rarely be exactly what current leaders had in mind, but it’s better to make some progress toward a palatable destination than to make no progress toward the ideal one.  This approach runs counter to the political impulse to exert strong opinions on every aspect of public life, the principle that if it’s possible to have an opinion, one should be had, ideally if it’s perpendicular to that of the opposition.

Ultimately, constant course corrections waste previous investments, sap institutional purpose and morale, and deliver uninspiring results.  Ironically, in order to make more sustained progress and not be subjected to micromanaging debate, space exploration might be best served by falling off the political radar.

How to safely watch the transit of Venus on Tuesday

From Fox News: How to safely watch the transit of Venus on Tuesday
Many people are planning to watch the transit of Venus on Tuesday (June 5), but it's extremely important that prospective viewers be warned to take special precautions (as with a solar eclipse) to view the silhouette of Venus against the brilliant disk of the sun.

For the United States and Canada the transit will begin when the dark disk of Venus first touches the outer edge of the sun, an event that astronomers call Contact I. From the Eastern U.S. and Eastern Canada, Contact I should occur around 6:03 p.m. EDT (2203 GMT). From the Western U.S. and Western Canada, Contact I should occur around 3:06 p.m. PDT.

It will take about 18 minutes for the black disk of Venus to move completely onto the sun's face; ultimately bringing its black disk just inside the sun's upper left edge. If you imagine the sun's disk as the face of a clock, Contact I will occur between the 11:30 and 12 o'clock position. Venus will then progress along a track that will run diagonally from the upper left to the lower right.

If you wish to generate predictions for the transit times from where you live, the Astronomical Applications Department of the US Naval Observatory has produced an online Transit Computer at: http://www.usno.navy.mil/USNO/astronomical-applications/data-services/transit-us

Unlike transits of the sun involving the planet Mercury, those of Venus are readily visible with the unaided eye; the planet appears as a distinct — albeit tiny — black spot with a diameter just 1/32 that of the sun. This size is large enough to readily perceive with the naked eye.

But Again . . . Be Careful!

Eye safety is always a prime concern when dealing with the sun. Observing a transit is a lot like studying sunspots because, after all, you are looking at a dark spot on the sun.

But trying to see a transit is also like trying to view a solar eclipse. You have to be ready at a particular time, and you may have to travel far from home. For the transit of Venus, however, your exact location is much less critical than it is for a total solar eclipse.

In particular, observers in Eastern North America, where the transit will happen in the early evening, your observing site should have a low horizon to the east-northeast. It is a good precaution to check the sun's setting point, to verify that trees or buildings do not block your view. As Venus moves across the face of the sun, it will appear absolutely jet black in contrast to the lighter gray of any sunspots that may also be present on the solar disk.

By far, the safest way to view the transit is to construct a so-called pinhole camera. A pinhole, or small opening, is used to form an image of the sun on a screen that is placed about three feet behind the opening.

Binoculars or a small telescope mounted on a tripod can also be used to project a magnified image of the sun onto a white card. Just be sure not to look through the binoculars or telescope when they are pointed directly at the sun! Venus should appear as a distinct, albeit tiny dot on the projected image.

A variation of the pinhole theme is the "pinhole mirror." To make one, cover a pocket mirror with a piece of paper that has a quarter-inch hole punched in it. Open a sun-facing window and place the covered mirror on the sunlit sill so that it reflects a disk of light onto the far wall inside.

The disk of light is an image of the sun's face. The farther away from the wall you place it the better; the image will be only one inch across for every 9 feet (2.7 meters) from the mirror. Modeling clay works well to hold the mirror in place.

Experiment with different-size holes in the paper. Again, a large hole makes the image bright, but fuzzy, and a small one makes it dim but sharp. Darken the room as much as possible for the best effect. Be sure to try this out beforehand to make sure the mirror's optical quality is good enough to project a clean, round image. Of course, don't let anyone look at the sun in the mirror.

Acceptable filters for unaided visual solar observations include aluminized Mylar. Some astronomy dealers carry Mylar filter material specially designed for solar observing. Also acceptable is shade 13 or 14 arc-welder's glass, which is available for just a few of dollars at welding supply shops.

Unacceptable filters include sunglasses, old color film negatives, photographic neutral-density filters, and polarizing filters. Although these materials have very low visible-light transmittance levels, they transmit an unacceptably high level of near-infrared radiation that can cause a thermal retinal burn. The fact that the sun appears dim, or that you feel no discomfort when looking at the sun through the filter, is no guarantee that your eyes are safe.

Using a Telescope

Projecting the sun’s magnified image through binoculars, or better yet a telescope, on to a white card or screen is relatively safe and can be used for group viewing. For serious transit observing, a telescope with a full-aperture solar filter is much better. These filters are attached to the side of the telescope that faces the sun, not the side facing your eye. This will cause most of the sunlight to be filtered out before entering your telescope.

The transit should be watched only with an appropriate solar filter — a solar filter that is sold by a reputable outlet of astronomical equipment. If your telescope comes with a filter that screws into the eyepiece, discard it immediately! These filters have been known to crack under the intense heat of the sun's magnified image.

Lastly, never look at the sun directly through your telescope, even through your finder scope. It is strongly advisable to cover the finder before the transit, so as to avoid looking through it accidentally.

Somebody recently asked me if they could look at the sun through their telescope while wearing a pair of "eclipse glasses" – special filters mounted on cardboard eyeglass frames. The answer is absolutely not! Such a filter is for naked-eye use only! If you try looking through the eyepiece of binoculars or a telescope while wearing these glasses, the concentrated heat from the sun will almost certainly melt a hole through the filtering material, allowing a sudden burst of dazzling sunlight to reach your eye.

Next Time?

Should poor weather hinder or completely obscure your view of the Venus transit, the next opportunity will not come until Dec. 10, 2117. Unfortunately, most who are now reading these words are not likely to be around when that date finally comes around.

Furthermore, much of North America will miss out on the 2117 event, as the transit will not begin until the sun has set. Only observers in the far west will be able to see the very beginning of Venus’s march across the sun before sunset.

The Venus transit of Dec. 8, 2125, however, will be kinder to North America. Venus will begin its passage across the sun soon after sunrise for the East Coast. For the rest of the continent, Venus will already be on the sun as it rises. The final two or three hours of the transit will be visible from the west coasts of Canada and the U.S.

Launching a for- profit space race

From Star Democrat, an op-ed: Launching a for- profit space race

Chin up, space buffs. Stop mourning the end of America's shuttle program and start celebrating the beginning of the next great adventure a for-profit space race led by young entrepreneurs who want to hurl rockets skyward more efficiently than the federal government ever did.

Last week, a capsule built by the private company SpaceX was launched into orbit from Cape Canaveral and later docked with the International Space Station, where its cargo of supplies was unloaded. The capsule, called Dragon, was scheduled to be packed with science gear and sent home today for a splashdown in the Pacific.

SpaceX is short for Space Exploration Technologies Corp. Its boss is billionaire Elon Musk, who's 40. The average age of its employees is 30. And they've made history.

"Although cargo hauls have become routine," The Associated Press reported after the Dragon docked with the space station, "Friday's linkup was significant in that an individual company pulled it off. That chore was previously reserved for a small, elite group of government agencies."

In fact, SpaceX could be a blessing for those formerly "elite" agencies. The company is contracted to make a dozen delivery runs. In three or four years, it could start ferrying astronauts into orbit so they won't have to keep flying with the Russians.

Meanwhile, other private companies are designing and testing spacecraft, hoping to go into business with orbital supply flights and even space tourism. NASA is encouraging these ventures it gave $381 million in seed money, for instance, to SpaceX while setting its own sights higher, on future trips to the asteroids and Mars.

The romanticism of space exploration never ended. But from this point forward, it will be shared by private firms whose CEOs and investors believe they can make money in orbit.

Successful SpaceX flight may open new era for researchers

Boston.com: Successful SpaceX flight may open new era for researchers
Early in the 20th Century, cars and airplanes were awe-inspiring. Today both modes of transport have been domesticated — one can build either a car or a small aircraft from a kit. The successful launch of the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket last month, along with parallel advances in commercially operated spacecraft, puts us on the hopeful path of domesticating space exploration and making it far easier to conduct important space research.

The oft-uttered lament of university-based experimentalists like me has been the lack of access to space. Every time NASA releases an “Announcement of Opportunity” for space-based science missions of any size, there are 30 to 50 responses from which typically one or two are selected for the flight. Even if one assumes that only a third of these proposals are of the highest quality, the still means each launch leaves a lot of high-quality projects on the ground.

According to a 2000 report by the Space Studies Board of the National Academy of Sciences, high launch cost has been a primary impediment to placing more payloads in orbit. The argument has been that putting a not-so-expensive experiment aboard a high-cost launcher is not prudent. Those cost concerns are why university space specialists should welcome the new Falcon 9, and the Minotaur built by the Orbital Sciences, which now offer competitive low-cost launch options.

However, even more than 50 years after the Soviet launch of Sputnik 1 started the space race, space missions remain custom-built projects, slow to develop and expensive to produce. In scientific exploration, the current rate of about one $100-300 million mission per year, along with an occasional $1-5 billion project, cannot support a broad range of experiments or accept the risk inherent in the more speculative — and thus more interesting — explorations. This has led to the “too large to fail” mindset, that only flies flight-proven, not state-of-the-art, technology. To make the next leap, companies like SpaceX and Orbital Sciences must turn space missions into a volume commodity.

Unfortunately, the work force capable of making this transformation happen remains remarkably small. The engineering and scientific infrastructure for aerospace is still in its adolescence due mainly to independently set goals for each NASA mission that have resulted in case-by-case designs. But there are some hopeful signs this is changing.

The NASA rocket and balloon programs, collectively called the suborbital program, have become the national leaders for hands-on training for developing a scientifically and technically competent workforce. CubeSats, the approximately one kilogram, self-contained satellites championed in the US by the National Science Foundation, have now seen worldwide acceptance. The Air Force-sponsored University NanoSat program is similarly stimulating technical creativity among university students. These are the programs that deliberately involve students in meaningful roles and encourage experimentation and innovation where failure is an acceptable option.

They are also a template of standardization and workforce development that the space industry should follow. The development of open standard for spacecraft, infusion of state-of-the-art technology, and a blueprint for low-cost satellite missions for science exploration would open up a new era. Such steps could revitalize the enthusiasm for scientific space exploration that has suffered in recent decades and make space accessible to a broad community. That could be the legacy of the commercial space age.

Houston: NASA Joins Community In Shuttlebration Weekend Celebration

From Sacramento Bee: NASA Joins Community In Shuttlebration Weekend Celebration

HOUSTON, May 30, 2012 -- /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Houston has been with NASA's Space Shuttle Program for 30 years and 135 missions, and this weekend, Houston and NASA will celebrate together as a souvenir of the program arrives in Clear Lake.

A full-scale shuttle replica will be arriving by barge in Clear Lake on Friday, June 1, destined for a permanent home as a space shuttle visitor experience at Space Center Houston, the official visitor's center of NASA's Johnson Space Center. To commemorate its arrival, Space Center Houston has a full weekend of activities planned, where attendees can not only witness the attraction's arrival, but learn more about space exploration – past, present and future.

The Shuttlebration Weekend, as the event is being called, will begin Friday afternoon June 1, as the new attraction arrives at the Johnson Space Center dock at the intersection of NASA Parkway and Space Center Blvd. – the same dock that saw the arrival of the Saturn V rocket in 1977.

Along with this unique and historic site, the public is invited to take a look at some of the hardware NASA is developing for future exploration, including its Space Exploration Vehicle rovers. Attendees will also have a chance to see a spacesuit demonstration, meet an astronaut and even touch a moon rock in the Driven to Explore exhibit. Food and entertainment will also be available at the street party, which will open at 2 p.m.

On Saturday, June 2, the Space Shuttle attraction will be loaded onto a mobile transfer vehicle for transport to Space Center Houston. The lakeside load-out will take a full day to complete. No public events are planned.

Early in the morning on Sunday, June 3, the attraction will make a three-hour trek down NASA Parkway from the Hilton to its permanent home at Space Center Houston. It will be escorted by the Space Exploration Vehicle rovers, local scout troops and marching bands. Upon arrival at Space Center Houston, the public will have another chance to see the new attraction up close, along with a full-scale mockup of NASA's new Orion spacecraft. And attendees can again meet an astronaut and touch a real moon rock during the free public celebration, which will be held in the Space Center Houston parking lot from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.

For more information on the Shuttlebration activities, visit the Space Center Houston website at:

http://www.spacecenter.org/shuttlebration.html

For information on how traffic will be affected in the area throughout the weekend, visit:

http://www.shuttlevolunteer.com/content/traffic/traffic.asp

For more information on NASA programs – past, present and future – visit:

http://www.nasa.gov

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2012/05/30/4526423/nasa-joins-community-in-shuttlebration.html#storylink=cpy