The way in which exploration of space has transformed, and the engineering by which it has done so, not only reflects the future in the industry but how new approaches appear. In contemporary times, with companies like SpaceX eclipsing even national programs, these transformations are more interesting than ever.
Whilst I have spoken previously about the setbacks and modern development in space as it is a rising field in engineering, the transition between these phases is quite unique to the field and allows us to inquire if similar transitions can be made in other areas. It is not a transition but almost as evolution, constantly adapting to developing technologies and usurping larger amounts of resources. One outstanding feature that separates space exploration from other fields in the natural sciences is the inane nature of it. With humanity developing studies on nano-technology, we have come to know most of what is there to know on the small scale. However, the study of space, a phenomenon that is literally constantly expanding provides ever-increasing material to study. Thus this poses us to ask a more philosophical question than a practical one. Is space as a field isolated? Absolutely not. This factor of the “unexplored” makes not only scientists but the general population, more curious about space. This is not to say that curiosity is caused by interest. For a lot, it is caused by fear. But the nature of something so intangible causes those to continuously demand progress in space. Thus the economics of space has an infinite demand and struggle to supply. This leads me to introduce the primary subject matter of this article: the curiosity induced demand for space.
The main way in which this can be explored is through a particular situation. That of the world’s first space tourist: Dennis Tito. Mr. Tito, an explorer in his own right spent 20 million dollars for his eight days in space in 2001. His casual spending marked the beginning of the era of commercial spaceflight. As many space fanatics have stated, Forty years to the month after Yuri Gagarin became the first person in space, Tito showed that there was money to be made in human spaceflight -- potentially lots of money, as he plunked down a reported $20 million for his flight.
"The private spaceflight industry did start with Dennis' flight," said Tom Shelley, president of Space Adventures, the Virginia-based company that brokered Tito's eight-day mission with Russia's Federal Space Agency and has sent a total of seven people on eight orbital flights since 2001. "That was the first real milestone and demonstrated to a lot of people that there was a market for private citizens to go to space."
What on the surface, might seem like stupid spending opened the door to far more monetary funding into the field of space travel, spurred by Tito’s accounts of his travels. "My dream was to fly in space before I die," Tito said. "And I basically came up with that lifelong goal around the time of Yuri Gagarin's flight."
As space.com stated, In June 2000, Tito signed a deal with a company called MirCorp to ride a Soyuz to Russia's Mir space station. However, those plans fell through in December of that year, when Russia announced that it planned to deorbit the aging station. (Mir burned up in Earth's atmosphere in March 2001.)
Undeterred, Tito soon made other arrangements. He signed on with Space Adventures, which brokered an April 2001 flight to the International Space Station, again on a Soyuz. The station was a relatively new project at the time, having just begun assembly operations in November 1998. The following appraisal of the soviet mission pushed NASA to follow through though they had initially rejected him. "To me, it was a 40-year dream," Tito said. "The thing I have taken away from it is a sense of completeness for my life -- that everything else I would do in my life would be a bonus."
The overwhelming influx of interest in the industry caused investment and development in the field to jumpstart. We see the repercussions of this event to this day, with the latest rendition being Tesla’s famous “space car” with space crafts becoming smaller and being curtailed more towards commercial markets. We see a distinct transition causing overlap between fields such as economics and space and tourism where the nearly infinite possibilities of space draw more and more attention.
Here lies the reason that the industry, in my eyes, is the most sustainable. With every industry, there is a capacity for interest which will eventually be saturated when everything that is to be seen or felt is accomplished. But with the field of astrophysics and space exploration, it will never be saturated and provides constant sources from which people can derive interest. This small sample is but an example of the alignment of tourism and space exploration and its aftershocks pushed the industry to the stage it is in. With all this uncertainty, one this is for sure, space tourism is going nowhere.
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