Space exploration demands extraordinary technologies, and has helped to produce some of them. While proper space exploration remains the preserve of governments, commercial exploration of the near-Earth orbit is cracking on. More immediately, space exploration has become a fashion among the unfathomably rich, such as Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk, who are running rival private space programmes. It speaks of a dream that they can leave the Earth and all its messy problems far behind. It is a negation of the message of that first great picture from space – Earthrise – which showed us all sharing one planet.

Source: The Guardian January 02, 2019 18:22 UTC