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Topics: Astronaut, Astronomy, Mars, NASA, Science Fiction, Space Exploration
The Martian is a geek's dream: blogging a story, self-publishing it and seeing your creation on the big screen! Kudos to Andy Weir. I look forward to his future creations and success.
Matt Damon has had a few rough days opening his mouth and inserting his foot quite deeply. To prop up his street creds post-Bourne Trilogy, Interstellar and embarrassing serial Tourette's syndrome, he kind of needs this distraction.
Seriously though: Mr. Weir got a lot of help with the science from other experts specializing outside of his area of Computer Science that perused his prose, correcting some plot lines. There are inevitably going to be random conspiracy provocateurs that ties this movie's release to who-knows-what, though I'm sure we'll be impressed by their chutzpah and hubris - the Jade Helm 15 hysteria comes to mind.
For humanity to even try a voyage to Mars, we're going to need [from the Astronomy article] "a surge" of interest beyond our social media distractions. Ironically, the things that are the core of our distractions - integrated circuits - were developed by industry and MIT for NASA to design a new guidance system and reduce rocket payloads. First the explorers are financed by governments; then the entrepreneurs and spin offs follow. This was during the Cold War with the former Soviet Union, so the government in this case was the United States almost exclusively. As we venture forth into the "final frontier," we're going to need to cooperate beyond borders. When Apollo happened - and we actually saw a man on the moon - we started briefly (ever so briefly), seeing ourselves as a species, devoid of imagined boundaries, creeds and nationalities. It was during the sixties, near the end of the Civil Rights era; many of us reeling from the death of Dr. King. As a country; as humanity, we needed such a boost - and still do.
Astronomy: Behind the science of The Martian, Eric Betz
NPR: How 'The Martian' Became A Science Love Story, Geoff Brumfiel
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