in 1957 the geopolitical landscape
changed forever when the Soviet Union
launched Sputnik 1 by today's standard
this primitive orbiting satellite is
certainly nothing exciting but in 1957
its impact was psychologically
devastating the launch of Sputnik made
out of space the new high ground of the
Cold War the value of space exploration
was now obviously the space race was on
for more than 10 years the space were is
thrilled and inspired people all around
the world with new and more spectacular
accomplishments then on July twentieth
nineteen sixty-nine the whole world
stopped two Watchers the United States
with the crew of Apollo 11 left the
first human footprints on the moon the
eagle had landed and in one sense the
space race was over without the
competition and fear generated by the
Cold War our reasons to explore space
have changed and our sense of purpose is
much less clear but the truth is humans
use space more now than ever before
today many benefits of space exploration
such as weather and communication and
navigation satellites are routinely
taken for granted spectacular feats go
unnoticed and the valuable products of
orbital research are really associated
with their origins down-to-earth
applications of space exploration save
people in distress at sea assess the
condition of crops guide us to remote
locations around the globe and allow us
to communicate with each other over
vast distances unfortunately without a
threat to spur us on our sense of
urgency to explore space has
significantly diminished but the future
of space exploration still keeps us
looking up and the value and potential
of our work in space is far greater
today than ever before imagined we need
only consider the possibilities
i'm joanne irene Gubru knowit's and i'm
a professor of space studies here at the
University of North Dakota and tonight
we are here to discuss what the
possibilities of space are joining me
here tonight and Clifford hall
auditorium are a number of North
Dakotans and three North Dakotans in
particular who have chosen to share
their views with us on this subject
tonight to my raft is Lonnie faladi a
farmer from attic and president of agri
images dr. Linda Grinnell a physician
from Newtown and Rick former
astronaut and native of Jamestown six
North Dakota towns grand forks hazen
Jamestown why not Mott and Newtown will
all be participating in this community
conversation tonight's topics are going
to be the economic cultural and
scientific value of space exploration
space has always been very interesting
to me and ever since I first saw them
first moonwalk I've always wanted to be
an astronaut like Rick but I guess I
never will be but the next closest thing
is to be able to see things from space
we developed a new company called agri
images that is taking the satellite
technology and bring it into agriculture
in a form that is usable for the average
farmer we're able to analyze the
patterns within a field and be able to
take them and put them into a variable
rate application spreader and analyze
the vegetation and change the fertilizer
on the go we're able to revolutionize
agriculture in a form that we never knew
would it ever happened we're all part of
this life and we're also related to all
men o mankind and womankind on the earth
in a way it's like yeah I I could
understand that you know that we're
related and sometimes some people don't
see that but I think once you get up
into space and you look back down onto
the earth you realize that you will
belong that's home and all the people
there is family tonight we're going to
talk mostly about the third of my space
shuttle flights in a lot of ways it's
the least
it was certainly the least glamorous
space shuttle mission that I was part of
because it was a Space Lab mission
although my other missions were
certainly visually more exciting I can
pretty well guarantee that when you or I
on down the road 10 years from now 15
years from now the things that will
affect your life in ways that you don't
even know about most of those
discoveries will have been made in
laboratories like this just as an
example one of the 80 experiments we
flew we had a furnace in which we had a
bunch of different samples that could be
injected into the furnace held in place
with magnetic fields so they wouldn't go
floating off and get it get about and
then another magnetic field or electric
field was applied to melt those samples
well the big deal about that was at this
particular metal they believe that they
can get this special structure would be
slippery ER than Teflon and yet a metal
well I think anybody in here can
immediately draw some rapid conclusions
if you could produce this commercially
every motor in there in the world within
a decade would have to take this stuff
into account well now we'd like to
invite all of you in all of the towns
all over North Dakota to participate in
this and use our comments as a
springboard I'm Solomon Mandel a farmer
40 miles from Grand Forks and I just
want to thank all the explorers for
everything that they've done for our
farming we run center-pivot irrigation
the resolver that tells me what degree
my irrigator is is a direct descendant
from NASA the computer that feeds my
chickens that instead of running 108
motors you run 10 motors 10 minutes at a
time you're still feeding the 60
thousand chickens without causing a
brownout in Grand Forks the energy
savings that we've seen already the
water savings that we've seen with
irrigation we've cut our water use in
half by this imaging I can see where we
build a cut it another seventy to eighty
percent in the next four or five years
it's a that technology is there already
engineer came up to visit his
brother-in-law in nebraska in the summer
and his brother-in-law said let's go
cornfield and check the irrigator that
went out and said my mechanical water
meters broke down and the engineer said
that's nothing everything we do at NASA
we check the flow he said I'll send you
one of it's just uh it's a magnetic
thing it runs and there's no there are
no moving parts and today all our water
meters are a direct descendant from NASA
and the potential is so great it's just
incredible at this time in southwest
North Dakota there's an emerging
strategy for small town economic
development that involves identifying
relocatable companies buying them moving
their operations to small towns in North
Dakota and in this area our preference
would be to buy a small high-tech space
related type company or manufacturing
come no content in und space or NASA
help in the following area identify
companies for sale that can be relocated
provide technical expertise to assist
relocating help evaluate and relocation
candidates products or services and as
an alternative can you suggest ideas for
startups derive from some spin-offs in
the aerospace industry really NASA
probably can't do that for you because
it from an economic point of viewers no
way you could argue that that's part of
NASA's Charter but it seems to be
clearly part of you know what's your
state delegation your congressional
bodies that is part of what they should
be doing I think I've always lived in
Maddock North Dakota small town of 600
people and when everything located the
company there they asked me local people
why do you want to be here in Maddock I
said why not I said we're we're
connected everywhere I can hook onto the
internet and and be anywhere in the
world probably the most dramatic thing
that space technology is doing right now
is enabling people to engage in
commercial activities that at least for
the last few hundred years have
primarily been angry
in large urban areas I mean you can
operate a business out of your home no
matter where it is now you have modem
fax communications pagers whatever you
need dr. grinnell how do you think we
might encourage not only cultural
diversity but discussion of cultural
questions as you alluded to to be a part
of future space exploration and the
space program in general and what is the
value of including such questions and
diversity I don't know I've heard
somewhere before that for every action
there's a reaction and and that that's
going to happen with whatever they're
doing in space and I think it's so
important to consider all the cultures
of the world because we're all in this
together but I think everyone should be
allowed to have a voice to contribute to
what's happening to them because it's
their future in their children's future
I feel that to some extent the planetary
research programs of NASA have been
sacrificed to keep the space station
afloat and strikes me that the planetary
probes were very cost-effective as you
know the voyagers were reprogrammed to
do things for which they were not really
designed to do and it bothers me that
that money is being slept up by the
space station for a number of reasons
and first let me state I would like to
see man on the moon and go to Mars my
wife and I would be the first to to
volunteer I've tables to rick's mission
and I very much see man going into space
I'm just not good think that the space
station is really the way to do it
certainly I agree that the space station
has an enormous amount of politics
involved but then again based on my
observation political system is that
canceling Space Station wouldn't would
not of itself guarantee you the
planetary probes that money would not be
dedicated we would Congress would not
say we're going to take out this two
billion a year or whatever and we're
going to spend that 2 billion on the
space program they take the two billion
away and probably would put anything in
its place Linda give any final comments
like you sure yes I was
consider this a lot of my relatives I
guess culturally Native Americans a lot
of our legends have star stories or
stories about the space there's also
some tribes down in the southwest who
have these cave drawings they were aware
of all the interplanetary happenings in
space long time ago way before we were
even aware at this point now and there's
even stories about different worlds like
I said before I never wasn't asked and
never was going to be able to be an
astronaut like Rick but boy I can see a
lot of things just as he did and a
little different perspective but I feel
like I'm up there right now so go with
your dreams and let's move this
technology to the next level I'd like to
invite you all to join us here again
tomorrow night when we continue this
community conversation about what is the
value of space exploration
hello good evening and welcome to the
second half of a symposium titled what
is the value of space exploration a
prairie symposium we're glad to have you
with us tonight and hope that we're
going to have as much fun and as much
information as we did last night joining
me here in Clifford Hall Auditorium this
evening in our part of local Lords of
Colton communities and along with us
will be Tim folk editor and reporter of
the Grand Forks Herald Vivian Myers a
teacher from Bismarck North Dakota and
father William Sherman a sociologist and
pastor of st. Michael's Catholic Church
here in Grand Forks tonight's topics
will be the political value of space
exploration the educational value of
space exploration and the sociological
value of space exploration the question
at hand is what is the political value
of space exploration and i must confess
that that i'm going to throw a lot of
cold water on on on things tonight i
think the evidence at hand suggests that
there isn't much political value to
space exploration but that's not to
suggest that there couldn't be and i
think that that what i'd like to do is
take a couple minutes to to think about
the circumstances under which there
could be one thing that might happen is
that there might be a resurgence of
economic nationalism another set of
circumstances might be a resurgence of
redistributed economics space might be
considered a sort of grand public work
that would employ people and finally
grimly there might be a resurgence of
political interest in space as a result
of military threats but I don't think
that that over the long run those of us
who believe that space is a noble thing
and that we ought to be going further
and without to be going period I don't
think that in the long run we're going
to be satisfied with these circumstances
space education and exploration is a
perfect Avenue for the students of the
90s for they have before them a world of
unknowns there are in unpredictable
hazards and occupations yet to be
discovered these kids have to be
equipped with higher level thinking
skills more so than ever before space
exploration is a unique opportunity for
this avenue of learning think for a
minute students trying to project into
the future trying to visualize what it
would be like to live in space to create
a space camp or to solve problems of
garbage in space these are the kinds of
questions that we go through when we go
through units of space exploration kids
are turned on about about these ideas
and they are futuristic in their
thinking maybe that's what space can do
is remind us as people who sort of fall
into easy habits but God is beyond us
God is the god of the universe we see
the pictures of the earth floating
around as sort of a little part of a
vast universe maybe that's why the good
Lord looking at it from a perspective of
faith brought aerospace into our world
the reminders of that other dimension of
God God isn't something to be discarded
to be set aside to be ignored the power
and the majesty of it all and some of
you remember that in the Holy Scripture
it says something like this the fear of
God the awesomeness of God before the
presence of God is the beginning of
wisdom if you were the director of NASA
what would your priorities in future for
NASA what would that be I'd say that
that the strategy ought to be survival I
think that the tactics ought to be too
get rid of as many missions that involve
exploitation consolidation and filling
in what's left behind and try to find a
single mission that that could have a
fairly broad constituency economically
and that could could be as inspiring as
possible I think I do the public
relations job I don't know how it is
maybe enlist the hollywood and get them
on their side they seem to have a
spokesman for everything out there and
just dramatize it I think they do a good
job maybe even a great job but one of
the things that I would change would be
to get to advertise themselves more and
maybe what the father here was talking
about to enlist Holly which isn't such a
bad idea it seems as though whatever the
media presses we get question for the
entire panel I would like to answer them
their opinion about the potential for
access to space by ordinary citizens and
depending on what your opinion is how
does that how's that reflect on the
value of space exploration as perceived
by the general populace it just seems
that it that that the cost would be so
great that it's hard to imagine that in
my lifetime people of my generation will
get to fly in great numbers so I think
that you'd have to look elsewhere to
find the value in space exploration
other than
and you're not going to get it from the
kick of flying but somehow if we could
capture the imagination of the nation
with spectacular things maybe what was
Tim was talking about a fix on something
that has all sorts of ramifications and
we'll go along and will support it I
have a question for Vivian should there
be a teacher in space especially after
the Challenger problem and Christa was
on board yes I do I think that if there
is someone that once is willing is
prepared as much as anyone else out
there that would have to go through you
know all the preparation that it would
take if they feel that that they would
like to and that it would be
advantageous to both sectors of society
I think that that they should Tim do you
think the news media has
responsibilities associated with selling
space to the masses I think a lot more a
lot more newspapers and journalists
ought to be eager about space there not
to be more information about space but
I'm not sure that that I'd assigned the
press a responsibility well our concept
of God change at all when we get an
outer space and we're not no we're not
down here on mother earth anymore and we
look you know when we look to these to
the to the universe is our idea of God
going to be any different you can't look
at those those pictures of the earth and
see this horse thing is about as a bunch
of fragmented human beings in a whole
business of race and a national conflict
and so it becomes so petty when we see
what a one world it is that's one aspect
it tells us something about man and
women but the other I'm convinced is
that it tells us something about the
divine my experience with this has been
an affirmation of why I have become a
space professional i think my gut my
instinct my intuition tells me that the
value of space and space exploration
is its ability to connect and its
ability to bring us together and there
is nothing i think more dramatic than
the last two nights that proves that
here we are spread around an entire
state and its space technology that has
brought us together over time and
distance this is two time zones and an
entire state and yet it's one experience
and I want to thank you all and I hope
we get to do it again so thank you and
good night