18 replies on “Doesn't Anyone Remember Space History?”

  1. Sadly the modern generation seems to have very little knowledge or appreciation of it. Indeed, I have added a class in business history so business students in my university understand how today’s business world was created so the have that as a foundation to learn the principles of business.

    1. I do the same for telecommunications cabling. Understanding early telegraph systems (particularly understanding th challenges they faced) is a surprisingly useful foundation.

    2. That’s true of a long list of fields. I’ve seen computer science majors who never heard of a stack or just about anything else about how computers actually work. (And electrical engineering majors who didn’t know that logic gates are just a whole bunch of transistors.) I know that’s largely irrelevant modern software and hardware work, but still… Astronomy tends to do better for some reason. Intro textbooks, for example, typically devote a chapter to history.

  2. Perhaps the mean the timelapse, rather than just a photo? Regardless, that’s been done by other rovers before too, and all only a quick Google search away. So not only do they not remember space history (that’s arguably acceptable) but they don’t do simple research on space history either (which is way more disappointing).

  3. It is blatantly obvious that NO ONE in NASA Public Relations (*cough, Marketing*) has any real passion or investment in the historical science and pioneering history of NASA. In fact, they might as easily work for some mindless social media company or internet startup.

    1. This wasn’t published by NASA PR.

      Ironically it was a “science educational website” that posted this. They need to educate themselves first.

        1. You didn’t…but other people just assumed it was NASA’s fault….cus everything is always NASA’s fault.

    2. I’m not supporting forgetting history, but for a moment playing devils advocate: NASA gets chastised for being stuck in the past and clutching their glory days at the same time. Hard to please everyone

      1. There is a very big difference between respecting the past and living in it. What NASA did with the technology it had available during the Apollo era was amazing. But there is no need to repeat Apollo as NASA is doing today with the SLS/Orion. There are far better architectures based on today’s technological base.

        Isaac Newton saw further because as he stated he stood on the shoulders. NASA by contrast chooses to hang on to their ankles.

    1. The problem is that folks assume that if you are just able to look up information online at anytime you don’t need to learn about it. But if you have never learned anything about a subject you won’t know what to search for or even the right questions to ask about it. It also makes you an easy target for fake news.

  5. I’m afraid even professional planetary scientists forget things. With years, or sometimes decades, between missions to the same planet, things do get forgotten. If the original measurements were a bit ambiguous (which they often are), one of two things tends to happen. The results may not don’t get much attention and get forgotten, only to be “discovered” by a future mission. Or someone may put together an exciting theory to explain them, it gets lots of attention, and people forget how iffy the actually measurements are. That gets embarrassing when a subsequent mission discovers the idea is all wrong. Also, negative results are rarely published. Who was the first astronomer to be clouded out on another planet? I think I know, and it was a Pathfinder attempt to image one of the moons of Mars. But I’m not sure.

  6. You actually see a similar problem even in the peer-reviewed science journals: anything that happened more than 20 years ago is outside the younger people’s personal event horizons. Seminal works are never cited, and things get “re-discovered” all the time.

  7. IMO, any claim to be first should be discounted and discarded unless and until a party other than the claimant assesses the historical order of events for the record.

    1. It’s worse than that. The first person to reach the North pole is an example. It’s still debated, and if it wasn’t Peary, then many people used to think it was Fletcher (1952). Then some Soviet records came to light after the Soviet Union came unglued, and it looks like they had parties there in 1948 and 1949.

      One thing I like about the journal, Nature, is one of their editorial policies. They don’t (or didn’t, last time I checked) publish anything claiming “firsts.” That’s the sort of debate they just don’t want any part of.

  8. Now even CNN is doing it – there is a page today about Insight there claiming that Insight is the first probe to ever record sounds on Mars?! Excuse me – but didn’t Pathfinder or an earlier lander do that?

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