Alan Stern is a scientist at NASA, but he is not just any NASA scientist. He is the man who (literally) delivered us views of a totally different world in our system. He is head of the New Horizon’s mission to Pluto, Alan Stern brought some spectacular information and views about Pluto to humanity and he is the guy who gave us our first genuine image of everyone’s favorite former planet. The New Horizons spacecraft traveled 3 billion miles in a decade (which is more than any space mission in history) to approach its target. But why travel all that way?
Obviously, everyone likes seeing completely detailed images of space, but at 3 billion miles, and with more than 10 years of work, is it really worth the trip? This is a question that usually gets asked in relative to space exploration given all the hard problems here on Earth, would not it make logic to stay a little closer to home and contributing in things that markedly improve our Pale Blue Dot?
Lately, Alan Stern answered these questions. At the 2016 Edison Awards, he stressed exactly why humanity must carry on to project beyond Earth…to journey to the edge of the solar system and beyond. His speech is summarized in the video below:
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