Tyson criticizes common views on space exploration

Astrophysicist, former University lecturer and TV personality Neil deGrasse Tyson launched into a passionate criticism of public attitudes toward space exploration and the dominant myth that America was a pioneer in the field in a lecture on American space exploration to a packed audience in McCosh Hall on Tuesday night.

Citing Wilbur Wright’s 1901 assertion that “man will not fly for 50 years,” Tyson noted that scientists had joined the public in its skepticism about the pace of technological progress for much of the 20th century. The nation remained unwilling to predict rapid scientific advances until the launch of Sputnik by the Soviet Union in 1957, when Americans realized that “all the sudden, space is accessible to us,” he explained.

The 1960s witnessed the creation of NASA as well as novel plans to journey to the Moon and to Mars, and gave rise to the notion that America was a pioneer in the field of space exploration.

But in reality, Tyson said, the Soviet Union was the true space pioneer.

Ticking off a list of all of the space feats first accomplished by so-called Evil Empire, Tyson compared the relatively few, though significant, U.S. space-related accomplishmentsin the same period. The United States was not motivated to further space science by a sense of wonderment or human curiosity about the unknown, but rather by its desire to technologically outdo the Soviet Union during the Cold War.

“We were not pioneers,” Tyson said. “We were reactors to forces on the geopolitical landscape.”

American participation in the space race represented the beginning of the “militarization of space,” Tyson said. Likening this struggle for celestial turf to the games that schoolchildren play in sandboxes, he further criticized modern reverence for the Apollo program because it leads to the glorification of antiquated technology rather than to the acknowledgement of improvements made since then.

This appreciation for outdated technology has led to a modern cultural apathy for space exploration, Tyson explained. NASA’s budget has remained about the same for the duration of its existence while its operations have become less efficient over time— but this diminished performance hasn’t perturbed post-Kennedy administrations, Tyson said, because “NASA has never been about science” and was originally created in response to geopolitical pressures.

America’s contributions to space exploration and development have also diminished in recent years in part because the country has made it difficult for foreign nationals to attain residency and to work in U.S. labs. Furthermore, poor math and science education have contributed to a scientifically illiterate and apathetic public, he said.

To solve these problems, Tyson proposed a multi-faceted approach that involves increased funding for NASA and better math and science education. In time, this approach would encourage a change in the American cultural zeitgeist and the creation of new, profitable space-related industries.

A transformation in the American cultural attitude toward space exploration could provide a driving force “bigger than any single program could possibly put into place,” and finally enable America to live up to its dream of pioneering space research and development, he said.

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The lecture, titled “Delusions of Space Enthusiasts,” was sponsored by the Department of Astrophysical Sciences and the Princeton University Public Lectures Series’ Louis Clark Vanuxem Fund.