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Astronomy

Are Gen Xers Lost In Space?

By Keith Cowing
NASA Watch
October 23, 2012
Filed under ,

How many Gen Xers know their cosmic address?
“Less than half of Generation X adults can identify our home in the universe, a spiral galaxy, according to a University of Michigan report. “Knowing your cosmic address is not a necessary job skill, but it is an important part of human knowledge about our universe and–to some extent–about ourselves,” said Jon D. Miller, author of “The Generation X Report” and director of the Longitudinal Study of American Youth at the U-M Institute for Social Research.”

NASA Watch founder, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA, Away Teams, Journalist, Space & Astrobiology, Lapsed climber.

39 responses to “Are Gen Xers Lost In Space?”

  1. dogstar29 says:
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     I’m reminded of the incident in “A Study in Scarlet” where Watson tries to explain the planets to Holmes, and he says that for him astronomy is irrelevant. Today’s young people may not know the planets but they know how to tweet.

    • Michael Reynolds says:
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      It depends if you consider Gen Xers young. Fo me I don’t think of 35-45 yr olds as young.
       
      Here is a tip for anyone trying to get a younger generation involved in math and science, especially when it pertains to space.
      Video Games!
      Back in May my 13 year old nephew came over and I showed him a game I was playing called Kerbal Space Program. He was hooked within minutes. Halfway through the summer I had him out helping me build model rockets and reading books on flight, physics (he really wanted to understand what apogee and perogee was), and my favorite, Robert Zubrin ( he just finished “First Landing” and is now on “How to Live on Mars”). Prior to this he only had aspirations of playing football or basketball, now he wants to be the next Burt Rutan or Wernher Von Braun.
        
      Point is, don’t expect the youth in the world to just ‘magically’ discover how amazing and fun math and science can be. In most cases it doesn’t work this way, sometimes they need a little push in the right direction with the right type of motivaation (in this case a video game).

  2. Tom Sellick says:
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    yeah and our generation dragged this country into two wars and a great recession.  Meh, going back to play nintendo.  (on my SmartPhone!)

  3. GHK1 says:
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    Walt Whitman wrote a poem “When
    I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer,”  in which he talks about going to an astronomer’s lecture and getting bored and so he wandered off to wonder at the stars. 

    However, here in Texas a couple years ago, the state Department of Education put in place requirements for Earth/Space Science and Astronomy courses (2 separate courses) in every Texas high school. They are not required courses for every student, but students can take either these or a couple other science choices (Anatomy or Aquatic Science) so about half of all students take one of these two courses. 

    More recently the National Academies put in place a similar requirement for these subjects to be taught at multiple grade levels (K-12) and identifies Earth/Space as an equal with Physical Sciences (Chemistry and Physics), Life Sciences and Engineering. In addition to the science in the course, the subjects must also tie into technology and to history.  

    Unfortunately that is kind of the level at which the requirement is written so the curriculum for these is not yet well defined, but we are working on it.

  4. bobhudson54 says:
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    This is the result of the lack of real science classes being taught in school these days.Physics,Biology,Chemistry are taking a side track to the likes of Environmental science to appease the “Global Warming”crowd.All because some stupid political hacks fall victim to Al Gore.

    • GHK1 says:
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      In TX all the students take 3 years of chemistry, physics and biology followed by a senior year elective or an advanced placement course.
      The goal is NOT to make everyone a scientist, but to at least have every graduate be able to think and talk intelligently about science.

      • Nassau Goi says:
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         The individuals often teaching these courses in TX are often unknowledgeable on the subject matter. If this were so true, it would be readily apparent.

    • AstroDork says:
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       Gosh Bobby, this is getting tired. Can you take it over the nationalreview.com so we can all take a break from the angry political bleating?

    • Michael Reynolds says:
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      Actually in most schools (all universities), the Enviromental Science classes you speak of have physics, biology, chemistry, and in some cases geology as prerequisites. So your point is moot.

    • kcowing says:
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      So, you have used analytical methods to show that Al Gore had a direct effect on the character of science classes? If so, how did he do it? Can you point to kinks with news stories and data? Or are you just making this up (again) like all of the other partisan rants you post here?

  5. Vroomfondel42 says:
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    I just wonder if, to an advanced spacefaring civilization, any way we could describe our “cosmic address” would be akin to a child saying “I live in a house.” True, we know a lot about our universe, but having a shared frame of reference with any ET civilization will be among the first challenges. I’m a librarian at a mid-sized university and I agree that most young college students  are unaware of our place in the universe. Another thing, once you back far enough away and the Milky Way becomes just a speck amid a swarm of galaxies…how can we even tell ourselves apart?

  6. Helen Simpson says:
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    I think this has to be considered in the context of how science is taught these days. “Inquiry science”, which is science by doing and observing, rather than by reading or being lectured to, has been a major goal for at least primary science in this nation for the last one or two decades. That’s actually a very smart strategy that has yielded major dividends in scientific intelligence and understanding of the scientific process. But there are things like this — the location of our Earth in a galaxy, that are fundamentally hard to convey by inquiry science. There are no manipulatives or experiments that will lead to this conclusion.

    So although our place in a galaxy is an intellectual lynchpin for a complete “world view”, and is important to astrophysical pursuits, it really doesn’t matter to the general public in any practical way that our home is around a star that is one of many arranged in a cosmic clump. From an astronomical perspective, I think the Earth-Moon relationship, which is part of everyday life, is far more important, and the diversity of planets is a crucial lesson about our own. Probably also the way a star works.

    • Todd Austin says:
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      Classroom experiments in rocketry might very well lead to discussions about the structures of our solar system and the universe. (Rockets have to go somewhere.) As noted above, it all depends on what you bring before a child. I’ve introduced our son to rockets, Mars rovers, space travel, etc. as a regular part of conversation. He loves it and is always happy to read about, watch things, play, or talk about something related to space. The other day, while playing outside, he asked me what makes the sun work and we had our first chat about stellar structure. He’s a bit more than three years old.

      • Helen Simpson says:
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        That’s nice. But we’re not talking abut “discussions”. We’re talking about education.  I can have a “discussion” with Kindergarteners and tell them that the Moon is made of green cheese, and that won’t mean anything to them. Sure, they say. Good enough for us! “Discussions” are nice, but they aren’t science education. By the way, rockets aren’t crossing our galaxy either. Not by a long shot.

        Facts like our home being in a spiral galaxy are of value to society in a curiosity-driven way. They appeal to our need to understand where we are and who we are. They appeal to our sense of pride in what our scientific process can determine. They expand our perspective on the world. But beyond that, they have little intrinsic popular or practical value. I once ran into a student who regaled me with understanding of the early universe, but was convinced that our nation could save energy if everyone used wind-up clocks. Is that person scientifically literate? Did our educational system fail that student? I think so.

        It’s a little like human space flight, no? Human space flight is an uplifting activity that gives us pride in what our nation can accomplish in engineering and technology. But beyond that, we’ve never quite figured out what it’s for.

        • Todd Austin says:
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          Pardon my late-night post with insufficient clarity, Helen. My N=1 example was meant to show that education begins with conversation, that opening a topic up for discussion is the first step in helping a child to consider the existence of X and begin to process its importance and value.

          Hands-on science that involves doing things related to space exploration, including building and launching rockets, the good-ol’ egg drop, robots (think Mars Science Lander), perhaps telescope building, all involve learning by doing and get children thinking beyond the end of their noses. I build a rocket – whoosh, cool. Where does it go? Where do real rockets go?

          Parents certainly have responsibility in that, but many parents don’t have the time or the skill set to encourage scientific curiosity. They may also have adopted some version of the current American passion for anti-science attitudes and may squash the nascent interest of their child. Schools that are forced to teach rote learning of a list of factoids are part of the problem, too. That is not the path to creative and curious thought.

          • Helen Simpson says:
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            You make very good points here.

            My point is just that on a scale of utility of scientific knowledge, and connection with understanding scientific process, knowing as a “factoid” our “cosmic address” in the universe by the public really isn’t as major an issue as is being made out here.

            It’s sad that people don’t know that we live in a galaxy, but it’s hair-tearingly exasperating when people don’t know that desktop clocks aren’t major factors in energy usage. Not knowing the former is forgivable. Not knowing the latter is not. I can give many many other examples.

            I think a lot of the responses here are missing this point. It’s not about getting kids interested in science, it’s what we define as high-value science. Not sure I agree with how Miller and his team are assessing high value science. What should we really be exasperated about that people don’t know?

          • Michael Reynolds says:
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            Value is a matter of perspective from indivudual to individual and society to society. I doubt humans will ever be able to rate what science is more important than another and take action on them. This impart due to the fact that values are measured qualitatively and not quantatively.

            Not to disagree with you about the lesser value of knowing we live in a galaxy vice the concept that desktop clocks are not a major factor in energy usage. But Miller and his team possibly value the location and understaning that we live in a galaxy more than you and I. We will probably never know or fully understand why because of the perspective that he has on life and pretty much everything is different than ours and reflects in his values and how he takes action with them.

        • Michael Reynolds says:
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          What is the point of human space flight beyond national pride in engineering and technology?

          To move people from one point to another just like we have with other technologies such as the wheel, sailing, planes, etc. At some point we are going to want to send our descendants to other places for the “not keeping all eggs in one basket” type of objective. To do this, it is imperative that we learn and understand the necessary technologies to move forward with this. It is in the nature of life in general to spread and increase it’s likliness of survivability. As such, in our current state of technology and understanding, it is only logical to move from our current capability of continent to continent into planet to planet and ultimately star to star colonization. Basically, unless we want nothing but robots left as humans only legacy in this universe than the capability to move humans from one point to another safely and efficietly is going to be required.

          In response to Todd:

          It doesnt have to be the parents or even classroom instructors acting as the catalysts for encouraging scientific curiosty. I believe it is scientifically literate people’s responsibility to be this catalyst for they are the ones that more than anyone know how important math and science are. They just need to understand one thing with children, especially the younger ones; they are visual creatures.

          If you take a child and place two rooms in front of them. One with a person talking at a desk (representing discusion and oral learning) and the other with a bunch of toys, games, etc (visual and hands on learning). The child will in most cases choose the table with the toys, and games.

    • Ralphy999 says:
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      I think every American child 12 years old and older should know where the iron in his blood came from, what type and size of star created it, and what kind of star created the elements greater than Iron on the periodic table of the elements. They should also know just about where we are located in our galaxy and they should know the nearest galaxy to the Milky Way. The fact that they don’t is because of the resistance of those who are politically or ideologically driven to distrust the federal government and decry the establishment of national standards of science, math and literature education that every child in the United States of America should know before they become adults.

      • Helen Simpson says:
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        I’m glad that you believe that. You’re entitled to do so. But why do you believe it? That’s what this discussion is about.

        The fact that children don’t know these things has nothing to do with your rant about politics and ideologies. Such politics and ideologies are abhorrent, but that’s largely not the reason they don’t know.

        As to Michael’s comment, “Value is a matter of perspective from indivudual to individual and society to society. I doubt humans will ever be able to rate what science is more important than another and take action on them.” — nope, not in this case. Someone has to decide what the science curriculum looks like in a school or school district. That comment just avoids the question. This isn’t about letting Miller believe what he’s entitled to believe in. The question is whether what he believes in is what is right for the nation.

  7. Citizen Ken says:
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    One word: Challenger.

    So my generation ended up coding the World Wide Web instead of building space stations and Moon bases, big whup.  And it’s not like anyone was encouraging us to go into space (and no, flogging us with Apollo! Apollo! Apollo! is not motivating no matter how much it motivated you), and there really weren’t any space jobs for youngsters in the 90s, or even into the oughts.  Somewhere in a drawer I have the not one, not two, but three rejection letters NASA sent me when I applied for a policy analyst position years ago.  I got the message.

    • hikingmike says:
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       Need more Gen Y!

    • becky says:
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      I have to agree.  A lot of this thread seems to equate lack of exposure to or interest in astronomy with complete ignorance of all math and science or even a choice to lead an overall uninformed lifestyle.  I have a strong interest in mathematics & some sciences, especially physics, but not astronomy.  That’s all just about my personality and what interests me.  Which things one remembers from his or her schoolwork doesn’t necessarily indicate anything more general. A person’s level of interest in the sciences is of no more or less intrinsic value than another’s in, say, the arts, politics or finance.  That’s how we each make different contributions to a society.  My leaning has always been more toward engineering/application than scientific inquiry.  I don’t think that reflects ignorance or lack of curiosity about the world around me, so much as the way I am wired and where my talents lie.  BTW I did know what galaxy I live in before reading the article, but can’t recall when I came across that or why I remember.

      More interesting to me is the things being described by some here as simple things every small child should know.  Maybe so…now, but this is not what classrooms were like 25-35 years ago.  People referring to Gen-X as “young” may be forgetting that we had no Internet, no pretty pics from Hubble, no Mars rovers, no myriad of cable TV channels covering science topics 24/7, etc.  I know now that the Viking and Voyager missions were launched while I was in grade school, but I didn’t learn much about them at the time.  I went to decent schools, but teachers still relied on mostly what was in the textbooks, plus their local libraries.  They would have loved to get the kinds of educational materials now at every teacher’s fingertips, but that was just not available.  The only exciting space stuff was shuttles and I learned about that mostly on TV.  Did I see pictures of galaxies in a textbook, hear stories of a few ancient astronomers and learn the names of our then 9 planets? Probably.  Did I go to a planetarium once? Yep.  Did that get my attention enough to deem it critical information I should retain?  Apaprently not.

      The flip side, of course, is that as human knowldege grows and our ability to disseminate it is overwhelming, an increasingly smaller fraction of this will have to be deemed “essential knowledge” because people just can’t keep up.  We can’t start judging others for selecting a different subset of this vast knowledge to retain.  Who gets to decide what is essential to deem a person “scientifically literate” or even the associated criteria?  Definitely above my pay grade.

      • Adarious ✓ᵀᴿᵁᴹᴾ says:
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        very well said.  This was the same when I was going to school as well: 
        “The only exciting space stuff was shuttles and I learned about that mostly on TV.  Did I see pictures of galaxies in a textbook, hear stories of a few ancient astronomers and learn the names of our then 9 planets? Probably.  Did I go to a planetarium once? Yep.”

  8. Anonymous says:
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    Certainly it’s always good to review how science is taught in schools today, but doesn’t this reflect how science was taught 20+ years ago?  As Keith stated, the survey was of Gen X (defined as those 37-40 years old in the report).  It is nice to almost be considered a “young adult” at my age, though.  Maybe Henry Hyde wasn’t that far off in defining the age of “youthful indiscretions,” after all. 🙂

  9. Russell says:
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    sorry, but what has being able to identify that picture as “a galaxy like ours” got to do with anything ? particularly “knowing our cosmic address” ?

    at least the comments here are relevent to learning science and engaging the next generation in science.

    • Anonymous says:
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      I would say if you are unable to recognize a photo of a spiral galaxy and do not know we live in one, your scientific literacy is close to zero.  Also given that taxpayer dollars fund much more arcane astrophysics research, such ignorance does not bode well for future funding.  

  10. GHK1 says:
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    Actually astronomy was a required subject in the first secondary level schools in America in the late 1700’s, the Academies and through most of the 19th century.  Of course it was pretty important stuff to know navigation(back before GPS), when to plant crops, etc. In 1892 an education committee eliminated Astronomy from secondary schools and as a college entry requirement. Astronomy enjoyed a brief resurgence after Sputnik until the 1970s and early 80s, though it was still usually just an elective.

    Now with the publication of the new National Academies Frameworks for Science Education 
    http://www7.nationalacademi… 
    which could be a landmark in changing school curricula back to what space supporters would like to see, if we would all get behind it, we could get astronomy and space science back into the schools.  

  11. Kevin Parkin says:
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    And how many people know where the Milky Way is?

  12. Anonymous says:
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    Thats what happens when many believe the the earth is not billions of years old 🙁

  13. Steve Whitfield says:
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    One thing that I think is being overlooked here is that we don’t all have the same opportunities and environments.  Even with television and the internet, there’s a big difference between growing up in New York City, growing up in a small town somewhere, or growing up in a city of, say, 50,00 to 100,000 people.

    A very significant portion of the US population grew up in, and often still lives in, small rural towns of a few thousand, or even a few hundred people.  And these people don’t have the same caliber of schools, libraries, or professionals working in these fields as the big cities do, so kids simply don’t necessarily have the necessary resources a their disposal to learn about, or even be introduced to STEM education and experience.

    At the other end of the scale, where you have cities with populations in the millions, you’ve got all the high-end colleges and universities, but the public school systems in those cities which are, theoretically, funneling students into those colleges and universities, are not of a uniform nature in either what they offer or the quality of material taught.  It’s almost a US cliché that kids from small town USA “go off to university” in a big city in order to get a high-end education.  And it’s been this way for a very long time.  (And once they graduate, they stay in the big cities, or at least the suburbs, in order to get work.)

    Where I’m headed with this is the realization that we can’t talk about teaching kids, or Gen Xers, or any demographic group with a single, universal technique.  Clem, who grew up on the farm, had a very different set of childhood experiences than a kid who went to public school a couple of miles down the road from JPL.  As an example of demographic factors affecting a STEM education (whether as part or all of a person’s education), many people have pointed out how video games can be a powerful tool in connecting kids with STEM, but the validity of that claim is not independent of the environment they grow/grew up in.  In a Bible Belt or Mormon community, where video games are often painted with the same brush as other “demoralizing” pastimes, a negative association exists.  For all that America is thought of as being a leading nation in the world, a large part of the population lives in rural communities, experiences poor communications with the rest of the planet (compared to the big cities), has maybe only a handful of TV stations, and generally doesn’t enjoy the same level of opportunities as city folks.  These cultural differences are a major challenge, and so Clem has to work a lot harder than his city cousin to succeed at college or university.

    Whatever technique one chooses to employ, I think it is absolutely essential that it be based on two-way, face-to-face conversation as much as possible.  The ability to ask questions and get them answered in timely manner is the most important and effective factor in “spreading the word.”  All men were, supposedly, created equal — but they diverge and begin to differ from one another on the day they are born.

    Steve

    • Anonymous says:
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      I’ve not run the numbers but I think most USA population lives in cities. What also needs to be addressed is what part of the city are children growing up in? There is a big difference between growing up in Pasadena and growing up in Compton particularly looking at quality of education in the public schools.

    • Anonymous says:
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      I’d say your stereotypical references to farm and rural people (Clem? city cousins?) are patronizing and offensive.  In one sentence you condemn the ‘caliber’ and environment of people who apparently lack the good sense to be city folks.  Why not attack mindsets and prejudices wherever they occur instead of broad-brushing a particular demographic?  

      • Steve Whitfield says:
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        lcs1956,

        I was not trying broad brush anyone; nor was I trying to judge anyone, or their good sense, based on where they live.  I was simply trying to make the point that everybody does not have the same opportunities in life.  I’m sorry if you took it the wrong way; perhaps I should have worded it more carefully.

        I may be wrong, but I think that there are significant differences between big city and small town living — not as much as there used to be, but still significant.

        An important example (to my mind) is the size of the schools and the level of funding made available for the schools.  The waste in the budget for a big city school is probably more than the total budget for schooling in a town of 1,000 people.  The same goes for libraries.  And I know from talking to people over the years that the curricula offered at different schools, and different sized schools, varies widely.  In an ideal world, we’d all have the same facilities and the same opportunities, but unfortunately it doesn’t work out that way.

        A city’s institutions are generally near by (you can hop on a bus every 15 minutes), not in the next town or the county center.  Cities and their suburbs are more likely to have industrial and commercial facilities adjacent to them, whereas small towns rarely do, and where there is local industry (fishing, mining, manufacturing, etc.) it tends to dominate the town’s economy and therefore the people’s perspective on what’s important.  And so on.  It makes for more and different nearby opportunities to learn and work for city dwellers.

        Although more Americans live in cities than in small towns, there are more towns than there are cities, therefore there are a large number of instances where people don’t have the same resources and opportunities as big city dwellers.  There’s no good or bad in any of this, but it needs to be taken into account when trying to communicate with people from different places.  What a person knows well, and what a person cares about, can be very much a matter of where they grew up and where they live.  Like I said, it’s not a matter of good and bad, simply different.

        I’m sorry you find my post “patronizing and offensive.”  It was not in any way intended to be.  As for Clem, regular readers of NASA Watch will recognize Clem as a name used by another regular poster for a fictitious character who’s writings are used to present the perspective of someone who is not overly familiar with space issues and/or politics.  I think “Clem’s” viewpoint is important, so I “borrowed” him.  I’m sure his creator won’t mind, since we converse via NASA Watch regularly.

        I think the simple fact that you and I interpreted my post so differently helps to make my point.  People from different places have different perspectives and ideas, no one’s perspectives and ideas being any more right or valuable than anyone else’s.  And this needs to be taken into account when attempting to communicate with people.  We talk a lot about things like inspiring STEM education and informing/motivating people about the space program.  In order to succeed at that (or any other communication) we must be using a common “language,” a common set of definitions, and have an awareness of the other party’s goals and priorities.  We should each assume nothing about the lives and ideas of a target audience if we hope to effectively communicate new ideas, and instead assume that there will be differences in understanding, opinion and interests.

        Steve

  14. Ralphy999 says:
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    Yes, Edwin Hubble first published his theory that galaxies existed on November 23, 1924 in the NYTimes. Until then astronomers had resisted such theories about “galaxies”. This is according to the all knowing, all seeing Wiki.

    • hikingmike says:
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       Speaking of wikipedia…. I used to troll through my family’s encyclopedias quite a bit, finding one interesting thing to look up, and then another. I especially liked everything geography related. If I had wikipedia back then, with its great breadth and easy linking of entries, I probably would have spent even more time trolling for knowledge.

  15. Nassau Goi says:
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    Some of the same people who complain about this issue of scientific public knowledge are the same people who promote dis-proven scientific facts. I’m talking to you JSC, MSFC and KSC employees.

    You don’t need college to know what the Milky Way is, that is taught to elementary aged children.

    The earth is older than 5000 yrs old and evolution is scientific fact. The Greenhouse effect, which global warming is based upon is pretty much indisputable at this point.

    If people can’t get these widely proven concepts down, it’s no wonder why space exploration is having problems. Let’s be honest, the good ole boys many of then GenX (and Baby Boomers) running Constellation had a lot more trouble than just a few periodic technical oversights.

    We’re essentially talking about generations that were given everything and seem entitled to everything, including a NASA Job and desire “small govt and low taxes”. George Carlin said that the motto of Baby boomers is “give it to me it’s mine”.

    It’s simply unsustainable in every aspect

    The good news is that Gen Y is likely going to break this pattern.

  16. DTARS says:
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    Steve

    I have been spending some time with steel riggers (future tick pilots) lolol
    Many of them Gen xers. 

    When I talk to them about space its as if I’m from another planet!!!

    They work a 68 hour week off hard balls to the wall work.

    The right stuff to build our future in Space!

    We just have to show them the Way.

    Assistant rigger