For the first time, we’ve landed on a comet.
The European Space Agency’s Rosetta probe, called Philae, landed on comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, BBC News reported Wednesday.
Scientists in Darmstadt, Germany, where the ESA mission control is located, celebrated after the landing.
“Now we’re close enough to lick it, and see what it’s really made of,” Chris Hadfield, a Canadian astronaut, told BBC News.
Planning for this mission began 25 years ago, according to BBC.
The satellite traveled 4 billion miles within 10 years to reach the comet.
This has big potential for scientific discovery, but it also allows us to consider our future as a species.
Some might argue these kinds of scientific missions have little weight in the face of problems here on Earth.
They’re costly and shift focus away from other ?issues.
We’re fighting wars with each other and have almost no global security or general agreement.
It seems like we’d have a tough time figuring out what to do in space when we can barely make this planet work.
Maybe we should hold off until we get our act together.
But another argument can be made for such space missions.
It’s possible we’ll never get global peace down.
Maybe our safest bet is to keep funding these scientific missions and hope we advance enough to colonize somewhere else before we nuke each other back home.
Science could help explain where we come from and where we ?can go.
The faster we figure it out, the better our chances of species survival.
I think there’s more to these missions. I think they are important because discovery is in our nature.
We’ve always been pushing the limits.
We want to know more, to go farther. We travel to the farthest lands, the deepest parts of the ocean, the highest peaks.
Even when it’s dangerous, our species can’t stop searching.
These scientific missions are a manifestation of that drive. I don’t think we could stop exploring. And I don’t think we should try.
If you’re not moving forward, you’re dead in the evolutionary water.
We need to explore. Because the minute we lose our edge and become complacent is the minute we die off.
We are the top of the food chain.
Our biggest threat is ourselves.
We as a species are going to decide if we continue living or if we’re going to wipe ourselves from existence.
So these missions are important because they keep us sharp.
They remind us that the goal isn’t just some new planet or piece of data. It’s progress.
Whatever we learn from comet 67P, we can remember it as a stepping stone in mankind’s path forward and wherever that might lead.
sckroll@umail.iu.edu
