Space and Speculation

This Saturday, August 1st, two American astronauts will climb aboard a brand-new spacecraft to begin their trip home from the International Space Station. The astronauts are Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken, the spacecraft is the SpaceX Dragon capsule, and home, in this instance, is planet earth.

Bob and Doug have already made the record-setting flight from Florida to the ISS aboard the Dragon capsule, but now it is time for them to complete the final test of their new ship and return to earth.

As America watches their return on Sunday, it is interesting to reflect that only one hundred years ago, in 1920, the idea of traveling to and from space was only a dream.

If we could time travel back one hundred years, walk up to someone on the street and tell them that humans would one day be living and working in space, they would probably think we’d lost our minds.

And yet, a hundred years ago, science fiction writers were already speculating about living in space. In the 1800s Jules Verne had flung open the door to science fiction, and painted a picture of a future that was surprisingly accurate.

Since Verne’s time, other authors have speculated about the future, technology, and space travel. Oftentimes, the men and women who made these speculations come true, were inspired by these science fiction stories.

To speculate is to dream, and to dream is to take the first step. Sometimes we go no further than the first step. Other times we go beyond it, beyond earth, even to the moon.

In the latest issue of our ezine, we speculate about a great many things, including what it would be like to hunt tyrannosaurs on Venus and how Snow White would have played out if Snow met steam-punk dwarves. We even pay homage to Jules Verne in a retelling of Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea.

If you haven’t seen the latest issue of our ezine, we encourage you to try it. Until next time, keep the spirit of adventure alive.