"SHOULD ROBOTS EXPLORE THE UNIVERSE?"
- Paper ID
IAF-95-IAA-8.2.08
- author
- company
- country
United Kingdom
- year
1995
- abstract
Arthur C. Clarke suggested spaceflight might he expected to provide a similar challenge to change and revivify human culture as that of the 16th and 17th century voyages of discovery on European culture. For this to he me may have to admit that space exploration has a mythic as well as a factual dimension, drawing deep responses through symbolic and non-logical means as well as providing strictly logical and factual understandings Painting by its nature naturally deals in mythic images. Space, art has already influenced public expectation through such images. Voyager, Apollo and. other program mes have themselves acquired a mythic quality. Only by grasping this aspect strongly can we hope to answer the oft repeated question put to astronauts "What does it feel to be out there?" The paper explores, through the personal experience of the author, the means available to draw on Space for its mythic dimension, and as such to engage in the human exploration of the Universe.