2 October 2008

Happy Birthday NASA!

Posted by Ryan Anderson


Today marks the 50th birthday of NASA! Nancy Atkinson over at Universe Today has a very nice post reflecting on the past five decades of space exploration. Rather than repeat what she wrote, I’ll just provide you with these space-exploration-related quotes:

“To confine our attention to terrestrial matters would be to limit the human spirit.” -Stephen Hawking

“We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.” ~T.S. Eliot

It’s human nature to stretch, to go, to see, to understand. Exploration is not a choice, really; it’s an imperative. — Michael Collins

“It suddenly struck me that that tiny pea, pretty and blue, was the Earth. I put up my thumb and shut one eye, and my thumb blotted out the planet Earth. I didn’t feel like a giant. I felt very, very small.” -Neil Armstrong

There is hopeful symbolism in the fact that flags do not wave in a vacuum.
Arthur C. Clarke
English physicist & science fiction author (1917 – 2008)