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Long-term, I See Robotics Prevailing On The Moon. . . . The Most Important Decision We'll Have To Make About Space Travel Is Whether To Commit To A Permanent Human Presence On Mars. Without It, We'll Never Be A True Space-faring People.

-Buzz Aldrin

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Long-term, I See Robotics

Buzz Aldrin

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Long-term, I See Robotics Prevailing On The Moon. . . . The Most Important Decision We'll Have To Make About Space Travel Is Whether To Commit To A Permanent Human Presence On Mars. Without It, We'll Never Be A True Space-faring People.

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Pascal Lee Is A True Pioneer Of Mars Exploration.

Mars Is Far More Attractive As An Outpost Colony For Earthlings Than The Moon Is.

I Expected The Unexpected And Went [on The Moon] With An Open Mind. I Think The Visual Scene Was Described By My Words On First Landing - "magnificent Desolation." Magnificent For The Achievement Of Being There, And Desolate For The Eons Of Lifelessness.

As A Youngster, I Read Of Buck Rogers And Flash Gordon. As A Student, I Wrote English Reports On Science Fiction. And As A Fighter Pilot, I Observed The Selection Of The Mercury Astronauts. All This Was Fascinating, But I Really Didn't Think I Would Ever Be A Part Of It. It Was Only When My Good Friend Ed White Was Selected As A Gemini Astronaut That I Decided To Join Nasa As Part Of The Apollo Program.

For The Future, Primarily, We Must Educate People In Science, Engineering, Technology And Math.

Unfortunately, Kids Are Led To Believe Things Are Easier To Achieve Than They Really Are.

Monumental Achievements By Humanity Should Be Done By Major Organizations As Much Together As Possible.

Just As Mars - A Desert Planet - Gives Us Insights Into Global Climate Change On Earth, The Promise Awaits For Bringing Back To Life Portions Of The Red Planet Through The Application Of Earth Science To Its Similar Chemistry, Possibly Reawakening Its Life-bearing Potential.

Fighter Pilots Have Ice In Their Veins. They Don't Have Emotions. They Think, Anticipate. They Know That Fear And Other Concerns Cloud Your Mind From What's Going On And What You Should Be Involved In.

Climate Has Been Changing For Billions Of Years.

What Are You Going To Do With Astronauts Who First Reach The Surface Of Mars And Then Turn Around And Rocket Back Home-ward? What Are They Going To Do, Write Their Memoirs? Would They Go Again? Having Them Repeat The Voyage, In My View, Is Dim-witted. Why Don't They Stay There On Mars?

In Space, You Don't Get That Much Noise. Noise Doesn't Propagate In A Vacuum.

Training Was Very Extensive, And We Dealt With Many Recoveries From Emergencies, And Fortunately, Participating And Observing And Existing Through The Reality Of Space Was A Once-in-a-lifetime Experience And It Was Not Marred By Unexpected Hazards Or Catastrophes.

America Must Dream Again, And Have The Faith To Achieve The Dream.

When I Am Getting Ready To Cross A Street, I Look Both Ways Before Crossing. My Bones, My Muscles, Are Not What They Used To Be, So I Am Careful When I Go Up And Down Stairs, Because I've Heard Stories Of Older People Falling And Having Very Disabling Injuries. I Have Enough Things That Begin To Go A Little Bit Wrong As I Get A Little Bit Older.

To Appropriately Respond To An Emergency Requires A Very Clear Mind, To Cooly Analyze What The Observations Are And How To Fix It.

There Were About Six Years When There Was Not One American Who Went Into Space. We Shouldn't Do That Again.

Knowledge Of The Past And An Optimistic View Of The Present Give You Great Opportunities.

I Was Saddened To Learn Of The Passing Of Leonard Nimoy, A Fellow Space Traveler Because He Helped Make The Journey Into The Final Frontier Accessible To Us All.... Indeed, There Are Strange New Worlds To Explore -- To Seek Out New Life And Start New Civilizations. It Is Time To Boldly Go Where No Man -- Or Woman -- Has Gone Before. Thanks To Leonard Nimoy And His Beloved Mr. Spock, The Bar Has Been Set High For Us To Continue Humanity's Quest To Probe Outward In The Universe.

When You're In A Spacecraft, You Need To Know What Things You Can Touch And What Things You Shouldn't Touch!

Exploring Mars Is A Far Different Venture From Apollo Expeditions To The Moon; It Necessitates Leaving Our Home Planet On Lengthy Missions With A Constrained Return Capability.

There May Be Aliens In Our Milky Way Galaxy, And There Are Billions Of Other Galaxies. The Probability Is Almost Certain That There Is Life Somewhere In Space.

Everyone Who's Been In Space Would, I'm Sure, Welcome The Opportunity For A Return To The Exhilarating Experiences There.

On Apollo 11 In Route To The Moon, I Observed A Light Out The Window That Appeared To Be Moving Alongside Us. It Was Either The Rocket We Had Separated From, Or The 4 Panels That Moved Away When We Extracted The Lander From The Rocket And We Were Nose To Nose With The Two Spacecraft. So In The Close Vicinity, Moving Away, Were 4 Panels. And I Feel Absolutely Convinced That We Were Looking At The Sun Reflected Off Of One Of These Panels.

I Poured The Wine Into The Chalice Our Church Had Given Me. In The One-sixth Gravity Of The Moon The Wine Curled Slowly And Gracefully Up The Side Of The Cup. It Was Interesting To Think That The Very First Liquid Ever Poured On The Moon, And The First Food Eaten There, Were Communion Elements.

The Honor You Have Given Us Goes Not To Us As A Crew, But To ... All Americans, Who Believed, Who Persevered With Us. What Apollo Has Begun We Hope Will Spread Out In Many Directions, Not Just In Space, But Underneath The Seas, And In The Cities To Tell Us Unforgettably What We Will And Must Do. There Are Footprints On The Moon. Those Footprints Belong To Each And Every One Of You, To All Mankind. They Are There Because Of The Blood, Sweat, And Tears Of Millions Of People. Those Footprints Are The Symbol Of True Human Spirit.

The Government Needs A Role In Carrying Out Exploration. They Will Be Leading The Development Of The Engines That Are Needed, And The Private Sector Will Take Advantage Of Those.

The Decision To Go To The Moon Is Now Appreciated And Associated With President Kennedy's Speech, But Somebody Else Had Told Him It Was A Good Idea. It Turned Out To Be A Good Commitment, But It Was A Unique Situation.

I Don't Go Through Life Verbalizing What I Feel.

Everyone Who's Been In Space Would, I'm Sure, Welcome The Opportunity For A Return To The Exhilarating Experiences There. For Me, A Flight In A Shuttle, Though Most Satisfying, Would Be Anticlimactic After My Flight To The Moon. Plus, If I Pursued A Flight Myself, People Would Think That Was The Reason I Am Trying To Generate Interest In Public Spaceflight. And That's Not The Purpose - I Want To Generate Interest In Long-range Space Exploration.

Kids, Help Your Parents If They Don't Know How To Use A Smartphone.

I Really Hate To Be Put In The Position Of Trying To Justify Something, A Decision That Was Made. I'm A Military Guy: When A Decision Is Made, I Go Along With It, Whatever The Manufactured Controversy And Criticism.

We're Number One On The Runway.

If You Want To Say That The Sky Is Black, And If I'm There, Even If I Fall Back Down Again, I Will Be Weightless For A Period Of Time - Maybe That's The Definition Of Space.

It's Been One Of The Greatest Challenges That Ever Came Along In My Life; It Was One Of The More Difficult Things To Do.

We Have The Ability, At Such High Fidelity, To Simulate The Physical World Through Computers. But When The Spiritual World Or Human Behavior Comes Into Play, We Don't Have A Very Good Model For That At All.

I Came To Dedicate My Life To Opening Space To The Average Person And Crafting Designs For New Spaceships That Could Take Us Far From Home. But Since Apollo Ended, Such Travels Were Only In Our Collective Memory.

At The Core Of The Risk-free Society Is A Self-indulgent Failure Of Nerve.

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You Need Propellants To Accelerate Toward Mars, Then To Decelerate At Mars, Again To Re-accelerate From Mars To Earth, And Finally To Decelerate Back At Earth. Accordingly, The Mass Of These Required Propellants, In Short, Drives Our Need For Innovative Launch Vehicles.

Astronauts Are Not Superhuman. They Lead Ordinary Lives And Have Varied Personalities.

From The Distance Of The Moon, Earth Was Four Times The Size Of A Full Moon Seen From Earth. It Was A Brilliant Jewel In The Black Velvet Sky.

When We Get There, If We Don't Find Any Life On Mars, From That Point On There Will Be Life On Mars Because We'll Bring It There, Whether It's Germs And Leftover Urine Bags, Whatever It Is.

This Is The Lm Pilot. I'd Like To Take This Opportunity To Ask Every Person Listening In, Whoever And Wherever They May Be, To Pause For A Moment And Contemplate The Events Of The Past Few Hours And To Give Thanks In His Or Her Own Way.

I Remember It Was Hard To Believe That I Was Taking A Step Onto The Lunar Surface.

Before Deciding What To Do About National Space Policy, Obama Set Up An Outside Review Panel Of Space Experts, Headed Up By My Friend Norm Augustine, Former Head Of Lockheed Martin And A Former Government Official.

I Think There Would Be No Shortage Of Applicants To The Government Astronaut Corps To Be Settlers On The Planet Mars. And I Think This Would Be Very Inspiring.

Let's Not Spend Resources That We Don't Need To Be Sending Astronauts Back To The Moon. Let's Not Spend Expensive Resources On Bringing People Who Have Reached Mars Back Again. Prepare Them To Become A Growing Colony.

When We Set Out To Land People On The Surface Of Mars, I Think We Should As A Nation, As A World, Commit Ourselves To Supporting A Growing Settlement And Colonization There. To Visit A Few Times And Then Withdraw Would Be An Unforgivable Waste Of Resources.

There's A Historical Milestone In The Fact That Our Apollo 11 Landing On The Moon Took Place A Mere 66 Years After The Wright Brothers' First Flight.

Apollo 11 Will Probably Go Down In History As One Of The Major Responses Of Two Nations Facing Each Other With Threatening Technologies - Sometimes Called Mutually Assured Destruction. It Was Also The America's Response To The Apparent Superiority Of The Russians In Putting Objects Into Space Before Usa Could.

At 10,000 Feet, The 3 Parachutes Would Come Out, A Little Lower The Pressure Of The Atmosphere Outside Was Greater Than Inside, And We Could Smell The Salt Air And It Was Very Encouraging To Return To Earth.

The First Human Beings To Land On Mars Should Not Come Back To Earth. They Should Be The Beginning Of A Build-up Of A Colony/settlement, I Call It A 'permanence'.

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I Am Excited To Think That The Development Of Commercial Capabilities To Send Humans Into Low Earth Orbit Will Likely Result In So Many More Earthlings Being Able To Experience The Transformative Power Of Space Flight.

We Need The Next Generation To Be Motivated And To Push Technological Boundaries, To Seek Out New Innovations.

Armstrong Described The Lunar Surface As 'beautiful.' I Thought To Myself, 'it's Not Really Beautiful. It's Magnificent That We're Here, But What A Desolate Place We Are Visiting.'

I Wrote 'reaching For The Moon' Because I Wanted To Tell Kids That All Of Us Have A Moon, A Dream, That We Can Strive For. Even If You Don't Attain It, You Can At Least Reach For It.

Mars Has A Bit Of Air Pressure; Maybe We Can Build Up That Atmosphere To Be A Bit More Accommodating To Humans.

The Purpose Of Going To Mars Is For Humans To First Begin To Occupy, Permanently, Another Planet In The Solar System. The Astronauts Or Pilgrims, Whatever You Might Call Them, Are Going To Be Very Historically Unique Human Beings.

The Much-hyped Ares 1-x Was Much Ado About Nothing.

Many Say Exploration Is Part Of Our Destiny, But It's Actually Our Duty To Future Generations And Their Quest To Ensure The Survival Of The Human Species.

I Think I Need To Continue To Think And Plan And Marry All Of The Different Things That We Could Do That Make Transportation In Space From The Earth To The Space Station, From The Earth To The Moon To Space Stations Around The Moon To Visiting An Asteroid.

American Greatness Was Elevated Significantly After Sputnik.

American Greatness

This Has Been Far More Than Three Men On A Mission To The Moon; More Still Than The Efforts Of A Government And Industry Team; More, Even, Than The Efforts Of One Nation. We Feel This Stands As A Symbol Of The Insatiable Curiosity Of All Mankind To Explore The Unknown.

You Are Not Going To Change The Minds Of People Who Are Looking For Attention.

The Big Companies Are The Private Industry. But They're Faced With A Short-term Need To Show A Profit In Short-term.

Space Tourism Is A Logical Outgrowth Of The Adventure Tourist Market.

Most People Never Believed In The Real Possibility Of Going To The Moon, And Neither Did I Until I Was In My Twenties.

Human Rights Problems Will Always Exist For Years To Come, But Maybe They'll Lessen Somewhat.

History Gets Reinterpreted As Time Goes On. Many Times, The Participants Are Lost In The Retelling Of The Story.

Computers Allow Us To Squeeze The Most Out Of Everything, Whether It's Google Looking Up Things, So I Guess That Tends To Make Us A Little Lazy About Reading Books And Doing Things The Hard Way To Understand How Those Things Work.

Mars Is There, Waiting To Be Reached.

Mars Is The Symbolic And Totally Stimulating Next Objective That Could So Dominate The Next Century's Exploration Efforts. From Mars, The Resources Of All The Asteroids Will Become Readily Available.

I Grew Up In A Country That I Thought Was Special. And It Was.

My First Inclination Is To Be A Bit Skeptical About The Claims That Human-produced Carbon Dioxide Is The Direct Contributor To Global Warming.

My Expertise Is The Space Program And What It Should Be In The Future Based On My Experience Of Looking At The Transitions That We've Made Between Pre-sputnik Days And Getting To The Moon.

There's A Tremendously Satisfying Freedom Associated With Weightlessness. It's Challenging In The Absence Of Traction Or Leverage, And It Requires Thoughtful Readjustment. I Found The Experience Of Weightlessness To Be One Of The Most Fun And Enjoyable, Challenging And Rewarding, Experiences Of Spaceflight. Returning To Earth Brings With It A Great Sense Of Heaviness, And A Need For Careful Movement. In Some Ways It's Not Too Different From Returning From A Rocking Ocean Ship.

The Urge To Explore Has Propelled Evolution Since The First Water Creatures Reconnoitered The Land. Like All Living Systems, Cultures Cannot Remain Static; They Evolve Or Decline. They Explore Or Expire. . . . Beyond All Rationales, Space Flight Is A Spiritual Quest In The Broadest Sense, One Promising A Revitalization Of Humanity And A Rebirth Of Hope No Less Profound Than The Great Opening Out Of Mind And Spirit At The Dawn Of Our Modern Age.

In My Mind, Public Space Travel Will Precede Efforts Toward Exploration -- Be It Returning To The Moon, Going To Mars, Visiting Asteroids, Or Whatever Seems Appropriate. We've Got Millions And Millions Of People Who Want To Go Into Space, Who Are Willing To Pay. When You Figure In The Payload Potential Of Customers, Everything Changes.

We Should Go Boldly Where Man Has Not Gone Before. Fly By The Comets, Visit Asteroids, Visit The Moon Of Mars. There's A Monolith There. A Very Unusual Structure On This Potato Shaped Object That Goes Around Mars Once In Seven Hours. When People Find Out About That They're Going To Say 'who Put That There? Who Put That There?' The Universe Put It There. If You Choose, God Put It There.

It's Real Easy To Manufacture What You Think The People Want To Hear. But That's Not Very Honest.

You Can Tell I'm Not Too Bashful About Some Of My Feelings.

The Leader Of An Earth Organization Who Makes A Commitment To History - Of Humans Living On Earth, To Begin Permanent Settlement/occupation Of Not The Moon, But Of Another Planet - This Leader Will Have A Legacy For History That Will Supersede Columbus, Genghis Khan Or Almost Any Recognized Leader.

'anthony And The Magic Picture Frame' Tells It Like It Really Was In America's Early Space Program - The Adventure, The Risks, And The Rewards.

There Are A Lot Of Reasons For Not Doing Something. And If Humanity Had Come Up With All The Reasons For Not Doing Something We Wouldn't Have Spread Across The Earth The Way We Have. There's A Curiosity, And I Would Submit That That Curiosity Will Put Human Beings On The Surface Of Mars.

Unfortunately, Pioneers Will Always Pave The Way With Sacrifices.

We Need To Begin Thinking About Building Permanence On The Red Planet, Not Just Have Voyagers Do Some Experiments, Plant A Flag And Claim Success. Having Them Go There, Repeat This, In My View, Is Dim-witted. Why Not Stay There?

We'll Get To The Details Of What's Around Here, But It Looks Like A Collection Of Just About Every Variety Of Shape - Angularity, Granularity, About Every Variety Of Rock.... The Colors - Well.... There Doesn't Appear To Be Too Much Of A General Color At All; However, It Looks As Though Some Of The Rocks And Boulders Are Going To Have Some Interesting Colors To Them. Over.

What Comes After The Moon? I Think You Can Guess: Mars.

I Feel We Need To Remind The World About The Apollo Missions And That We Can Still Do Impossible Things.

Impossible Things

Going Back To The Moon Is Not Visionary In Restoring Space Leadership For America. Like Its Apollo Predecessor, It Will Prove To Be A Dead End Littered With Broken Spacecraft, Broken Dreams And Broken Policies.

Absolutely The United States Should Lead In Space, For The Survival Of The United States. It's Inspiring For The Next Generation. If We Lose Leadership, Then We'll Be Using Chinese Capability To Inspire Americans.

Everyone Should Take Their Hats Off To Neil Armstrong. He Is A Humble Guy Who Doesn't Wave His Own Flag.

Does It Make Sense For The U.s. To Expend Hundreds Of Billions Of Dollars To Mount A New Apollo-style Program To Return To The Moon? Or Have We Blazed That Trail? Shouldn't We Help Other Nations Achieve This Goal With Their Own Resources But With Our Help?

I Grew Up In New Jersey And Never Went Up The Statue Of Liberty.

Over The Years, I Think I've Matured In My Spiritual Evolution And Development To Understand A Bit More Than The Narrow Religious Thinking - To Move Beyond That Through A Sort Of Perfection Of The Grandiose Nature Of The Universe, And How Perfect It Is It In Its Sense And How Satisfied We Should All Be In Our Place In That.

Certainly, I've Never Wanted To Live On Past Achievements.

As Time Goes By, I'm Increasingly Impressed By How Very Special And Timely It Was That We Got The Degree Of National Commitment Needed To Put People On The Moon. For The First Time, This Nation Was United In Trying To Develop An Interplanetary Capability. We've Been Trying To Repeat That Situation Ever Since.

The View From Space Is Like Having A Globe On Your Desk -- It's A Broadening Experience.

The G-forces Increased And I Wasn't Able To Continue To Hold The Camera Against The Window, So I Had To Lay It Back Against My Chest, But Still Continued To Photograph The Re-entry Until There Was No More Unusual Visual Effects Of The Energy In The Atmosphere. And It Was Very Comforting To Understand That The People In Houston, The Controllers, Had Very High Confidence That We Were On The Right Path.

Any Observations From The Moon Or A Sense Of Realising This Or That About The Greater Meaning Of Things Wasn't As Influential For Me As The Experience Of Coming Back And Dealing With Being A Person Who's Been To The Moon.

Long-term, I See Robotics Prevailing On The Moon. . . . The Most Important Decision We'll Have To Make About Space Travel Is Whether To Commit To A Permanent Human Presence On Mars. Without It, We'll Never Be A True Space-faring People.

As We Begin To Have Landings On The Moon, We Can Alternate Those With Vertical Launch Of Similar Crew Modules On Similar Launch Vehicles For Vertical-launch Tourism In Space, If You Want To Call It That Adventure Travel.

I Have No Intention Of Selling Any More Of The Historical Apollo 11 Items In My Possession For The Remainder Of My Life. I Intend To Pass A Portion Of These Items On To My Children And To Loan The Most Important Items For Permanent Display In Suitable Museums Around The Country.

Only A Large-volume Market Like Space Travel Can Attack The Barrier Of High Costs.

I've Been To The Titanic In A Yellow Submarine And The North Pole In A Russian Nuclear Ice Breaker.

All The Chinese Have To Do Is Fly Around The Moon And Back, And They'll Appear To Have Won The Return To The Moon With Humans. They Could Put One Person On The Surface Of The Moon For One Day And He'd Be A National Hero.

Ray Bradbury Is One Who Is Contributing To The Understanding Of The Imagination And The Curiosity Of The Human Race.

By Venturing Into Space, We Improve Life For Everyone Here On Earth - Scientific Advances And Innovations That Come From This Kind Of Research Create Products We Use In Our Daily Lives.

I Think We Need To Move To The Moons Of Mars And Learn How To Control Robots That Are On The Surface. It's Not The Impatient Way Of Getting There, But Mars Has Been There A Long Time.

I Realize That My Life Is Not The Common Ordinary Person.

Weve Got To Go [back To The Moon]. But We Dont Want To Stay Too Long. ... The Ultimate Goal Is Mars.

The Life Expectancy Of People Going To Mars May Be Decreased By The Higher Level Of Radiation That They Receive.

As A Student, I Wrote English Reports On Science Fiction.

Science Fiction

Sending A Couple Of Guys To The Moon And Bringing Them Back Safely? That's A Stunt! That's Not Historic.

Standing On The Moon Looking Back At Earth - This Lovely Place You Just Came From - You See All The Colours, And You Know What They Represent. Having Left The Water Planet, With All That Water Brings To Earth In Terms Of Colour And Abudance Life, The Absence Of Water And Atmosphere On The Desolate Surface Of The Moon Gives Rise To A Stark Contrast.

We Can't Start Over And Develop A Saturn 5-type Vehicle From Scratch.

Look At What Silicon Valley Has Done - The Advance Of Computers.

We Really Didn't Devote A Lot Of Time To Investigating The Scariest Aspects Of Our Flight. It Was More Challenging And Productive To Concentrate On The Remedies, And Leave Things That Couldn't Be Solved To Happen Without Thinking About Them. There Is A Morbid Human Curiosity Associated With Tragic Death-producing Events. Though Naturally, This Needs To Be Kept In Perspective.

As Someone Who Flew Two Space Capsules And Twice Landed In The Ocean, I Can Attest From Personal Experience How Much Logistics Work Is Needed To Get You Home.

The Way I See It, What Is Going To Come Out Of The Moon Activities Is A Respect For U.s. Leadership.

There Should Be An International Lunar Base. That Is Certainly Doable.

You Can Never Tell When A Commercial Space Venture Will Suddenly Become Viable.

Program Alarm, It's A 1202.

We Need To Have People Up There Who Can Communicate What It Feels Like, Not Just Pilots And Engineers.

To Send Humans Back To The Moon Would Not Be Advancing. It Would Be More Than 50 Years After The First Moon Landing When We Got There, And We'd Probably Be Welcomed By The Chinese. But We Should Return To The Moon Without Astronauts And Build, With Robots, An International Lunar Base, So That We Know How To Build A Base On Mars Robotically.

The Energy Varies With The Square Of The Velocity, So If You Need Five Times The Velocity, That's 25 Times The Energy.

I Was Motivated To Improve The U.s. Strategy Of Going Back To The Moon In 1985. That's A Long Time Ago. Going Back To The Moon Would Be A Great Achievement For Tourism Adventure Flights.

Retain The Vision For Space Exploration. If We Turn Our Backs On The Vision Again, We're Going To Have To Live In A Secondary Position In Human Space Flight For The Rest Of The Century.

I Was Given Permission To Serve Myself Communion, With Wine And A Wafer, On The Surface On The Moon. But I Was Advised Not To Say Anything About It At The Time. Someone Had Strongly Objected To The Apollo 8 Crew Reading From The Bible. We Didn't Want To Get Into Any Further Trouble With The Religious Critics.

I Was Lucky Enough To Have Been Born On This Planet Earth, In This Admirable Country Of The United States Of America.

Fear And Worry Are Emotions That Cloud The Mind From Being Able To Think Clearly, To Remember What The Procedures Are To Deal With That Emergency.

To Move Forward, What's Required Is A Unified Space Agenda Based On Exploration, Science, Development, Commerce, And Security.

Did The Pilgrims On The Mayflower Sit Around Plymouth Rock Waiting For A Return Trip? They Came Here To Settle. And That's What We Should Be Doing On Mars. When You Go To Mars, You Need To Have Made The Decision That You're There Permanently. The More People We Have There, The More It Can Become A Sustaining Environment. Except For Very Rare Exceptions, The People Who Go To Mars Shouldn't Be Coming Back. Once You Get On The Surface, You're There.

Not Everyone Can Be An Astronaut And Go Into Space, Some People With Sufficient Resources Can Purchase And Fly Sub-orbitally Thanks To Various Companies And For More Money (considerably) Fly Into Orbit.

If We Go Back To The Moon, We're Guaranteed Second, Maybe Third Place Because While We Are Spending All That Money, Russia Has Its Eye On Mars. Landing People On The Moon Will Be Terribly Consuming Of Resources We Don't Have. It Sounds Great - 'let's Go Back. This Time We're Going To Stay.' I Don't Know Why You Would Want To Stay On The Moon.

I Believe That Space Travel Will One Day Become As Common As Airline Travel Is Today. I'm Convinced, However, That The True Future Of Space Travel Does Not Lie With Government Agencies -- Nasa Is Still Obsessed With The Idea That The Primary Purpose Of The Space Program Is Science -- But Real Progress Will Come From Private Companies Competing To Provide The Ultimate Adventure Ride, And Nasa Will Receive The Trickle-down Benefits.

The Society Of Life On Mars, Or The Challenge Of Making Mars More Livable, Will Have Significant Benefits On Our Attempts To Modify And Change In Some Ways The Environment Here On Earth.

I Didn't Start Skiing Until I Was 50. My Wife Lois Taught Me How To Ski. I'm Proficiently Conservative.

Space Architectures Capable Of Supporting A Permanent Human Presence On Mars Are Extraordinarily Complex, With Many Different Interdependent Systems.

Neil Armstrong Was The First Man To Walk On The Moon. I Am The First Man To Piss His Pants On The Moon.

Exploration Is Wired Into Our Brains. If We Can See The Horizon, We Want To Know What's Beyond.

I'm Sure That There Are Places In The Deserts In Australia That Could Be Similar To Where We Might Want To Go On Mars.

Six Out Of Seven Times We Landed Successfully [on The Moon]. I Wanted To Be A Part Of That And I Was A Part Of That, So My Personal Feeling Is Of Great Gratefulness For Having Somehow Been In A Position To Have Been Given The Opportunity To Be On That First Landing. That's A Marvelous Experience For A Little Kid That Grew Up In New Jersey. So I'm Very Thankful, And I Asked The Whole World To Give Thanks Once We Successfully Landed.

A Mind Concerned About Danger Is A Clouded Mind. It's Paralyzing.

The First Footfalls On Mars Will Mark A Historic Milestone, An Enterprise That Requires Human Tenacity Matched With Technology To Anchor Ourselves On Another World.

There Is Very Little Doubt, In My Mind, That What The Next Monumental Achievement Of Humanity Will Be The First Landing By An Earthling, A Human Being, On The Planet Mars.

Mars Has Been Flown By, Orbited, Smacked Into, Radar Examined, And Rocketed Onto, As Well As Bounced Upon, Rolled Over, Shoveled, Drilled Into, Baked And Even Blasted. Still To Come: Mars Being Stepped On.

We Can Continue To Try And Clean Up The Gutters All Over The World And Spend All Of Our Resources Looking At Just The Dirty Spots And Trying To Make Them Clean. Or We Can Lift Our Eyes Up And Look Into The Skies And Move Forward In An Evolutionary Way.

The Moon I See Now Is The Same Moon I Saw Before. Except That Before, When I Looked At It, It Was In Anticipation Of What It Would Be Like When I Got There. That's Behind Me Now.

I Don't Think We're Going To Build A 50-person Spacecraft Or A 100-person Spacecraft.

I Shot Down Two Airplanes In Korea, So I Wasn't A Slouch.

Don't Waste Your Time On Beaming People Up Or Down. Instead, Consider Gravity Waves As Advanced Physics Of The Universe That Could Be Used To Travel Interstellar Distances.

Do We Really Need These Big, Gigantic, Heavy Rockets? What If We Launch A Rocket That's Empty, And Its Sole Purpose Is To Act As A Source Of Fuel On The Moon? Who Should Build That? Well, I Think The U.s. Should Build That.

I've Led A Life Of Such Structured Discipline And Always Had A Goal In Mind Of Knowing What I Was Doing, From West Point To The Air Force Combat, Mit, Looking For New Things To Study And Get Involved In. And Then I Got Into The Space Program, And How Disciplined Can You Get?

There Are Always Door Openings. And Gradually, It Accumulates. The Opportunities Open Up In Front Of You.

Dwelling On An Engine Failure For A Pilot As He Rolls Down The Runway Is Not What He Should Be Thinking About - It's Obtaining A Smooth Liftoff! But In The Back Of His Mind, He Knows Exactly What To Do (or Pretty Much) And In Many Cases, If He's Alone In The Fighter Aircraft, He Has To Leave That Aircraft In An Ejection Seat In A Big Hurry!

Astronauts Working For The Government Will Always Need To Be Either Pilots Or Mission Specialists. Those Who Want To Be Pilots Should Have Military Experience - Ideally, A Test Pilot Background.

When The Time Comes To Start Building Deep Space Transports And Refueling Rocket Tankers, It Will Be The Commercial Industry That Steps Up, Not Another Government-owned, Government-managed Enterprise.

I Have No Doubt That Humans Will Go To Mars. And I Feel That America Has Led So Many Things In Space - We Have Invested So Much, And We Have A Lot To Gain - That America Could And Should Be The Nation That Should Lead The Settlement Of Mars.

I Think The People Who Experienced The Apollo Missions Came Away From That Experience Wondering To Themselves, 'when Can We Get A Chance To Experience Spaceflight?' I've Heard That Many, Many Times: That People Got Into A New Career Field Hoping That They Would Be Able To Experience Spaceflight.

When I Was A Little Kid, We Only Knew About Our Nine Planets. Since Then, We've Downgraded Pluto But Have Discovered That Other Solar Systems And Stars Are Common. So Life Is Probably Quite Prevalent.

Once You've Been First, It Cannot Be Done Again. Not By You, Not By Anyone Else.

Globalisation Means Many Other Countries Are Asserting Themselves And Trying To Take Over Leadership. Please Don't Ask Americans To Let Others Assume The Leadership Of Human Exploration. We Can Do Wonderful Science On The Moon, And Wonderful Commercial Things. Then We Can Pack Up And Move On To Mars.

We Must Still Think Of Ourselves As Pioneers To Understand The Importance Of Space.

I Don't Watch 'american Idol,' But I Wouldn't Call It 'undignified.'

I Think Humans Will Reach Mars, And I Would Like To See It Happen In My Lifetime.

Returning To The Moon With Nasa Astronauts Is Not The Best Usage Of Our Resources. Because Our Resources Should Be Directed To Outward, Beyond-the-moon, To Establishing Habitation And Laboratories On The Surface Of Mars That Can Be Built, Assembled, From The Close-by Moons Of Mars.

Unless We Are Able To Commit To A Permanent Growing Settlement [on Mars], Then I Don't Think Just Going There With Humans And Coming Back Is Worth Doing. The Expense Of Planning To Come Back Is Like The People Who Left Europe To Come To America And Then To Turn Around And Go Back To Europe, It Really Doesn't Make Any Sense At All.

I'm Convinced That Sending People To Mars Is So Expensive That If You Go Once And Bring The People Back And Then Go Again And Bring The People Back, We're Eventually Going To Run Out Of Money. But What If We Send People The First Time And They Don't Come Back? What If They Stay There?

Heavy Lifting Doesn't Need To Be Heavy Spending If We Do The Job Right.

Trips To Mars, The Moon, Even Orbit, Will Require That We Provide Astrotourists With As Many Comforts From Home As Possible, Including Paying Each Other.

I Participated With Great Honor In Becoming One Of The First To Land On The Moon, And Now I Am Devoting And Have Devoted Many Years Of My Life To Enabling Americans To Lead International Nations To Permanence On The Planet Mars.

Some Things Just Can't Be Described. And Stepping Onto The Moon Was One Of Them.

The Best Way To Study Mars Is With Two Hands, Eyes And Ears Of A Geologist, First At A Moon Orbiting Mars... And Then On The Surface.

The Future Is About Wings And Wheels And New Forms Of Space Transportation, Along With Our Deep-space Ambition To Set Foot On Another World In Our Solar System: Mars. I Firmly Believe We Will Establish Permanence On That Planet. And In Reaching For That Goal, We Can Cultivate Commercial Development Of The Moon, The Asteroid Belt, The Red Planet Itself And Beyond.

I Inherited Depression From My Mother's Side Of The Family.

I Suggest That Going To Mars Means Permanence On The Planet - A Mission By Which We Are Building Up A Confidence Level To Become A Two-planet Species.

I Would Rather People Understand That There Is A Very, Very Fortunate American Who Was Given The Opportunity, And Was In The Right Place At The Right Time To Have The Moment Of A Lifetime. My Mother Was Born - Her Name Was Marianne Moon. And She Was Born In 1903, The Year That The Wright Brothers First Flew.

Somebody Would Think I Was Trying To Get Favored Treatment Because My Ancestors Had The Name Moon. And That's A Joke.

Space Is Not Just Going Up And Coming Back Down Again. Space Is Getting Into Orbit And Being There, Living There, Establishing A Presence, A Permanence.

My Own American Dream Was To Serve My Country As Best I Could And Make A Difference In America - And In The World.

Russia Perhaps Is Still Entertaining The Possibility That The Moons Of Mars Might Have Access To Ice Or Water.

I Was The First Navy, Marine Or Air Force Person Who Had Been An Astronaut To Return Back To The Air Force. I Had Certain Expectations About What Would Be A Reasonable And Desirable Position To Be Assigned To After My Years Of Service.

When President Kennedy Took Office, I Was In The Midst Of My Education.

President Kennedy

I Still Say, 'shoot For The Moon; You Might Get There.'

Shoot For The Moon

No Dream Is Too High For Those With Their Eyes In The Sky!

Because Of His Military Service, Dad Was Buried In Arlington National Cemetery.

My First Biography Written In '73 Was Not 'journey To The Moon.' It Was 'return To Earth.' Because For Me, That Was The More Difficult Task - Disappointment.

For A Million Dollars, The Russians Would Take Two People, A Million Apiece, Around The Moon And Back. However, Stories, Videos That Come From The Space Station, And Other People, Are A Great Inspiration To Young People For An Exciting Career Field.

I Think It's Inevitable That There Will Be Earthlings Establishing A Presence On Mars. And I Would Say That It Would Certainly Take Place By 2050 Or Shortly Thereafter.

The Surface Of The Moon Is Like Nothing Here On Earth! It's Totally Lacking Any Evidence Of Life. It Has Lots Of Fine, Talcum-powderlike Dust Mixed With A Complete Variety Of Pebbles, Rocks, And Boulders. Many Pebbles, Fewer Rocks, And Even Fewer Boulders Naturally Make Up Its Surface. The Dust Is A Very Fine, Overall Dark Gray. And With No Air Molecules To Separate The Dust, It Clings Together Like Cement.

I'm Not In Favor Of Just Taking Short-term Isolated Situations And Depleting Our Resources To Keep Our Climate Just The Way It Is Today.

Instead Of Planning The Retirement Of The Space Shuttle Program, America Should Be Preparing The Shuttles For Their Next Step In Space: Evolving, Not Shutting Them Down And Laying Off Thousands Of People.

Going To Mars Would Evolve Humankind Into A Two-planet Species.

It's Not Easy To Get Human Beings Into Orbit. So Far Only Three Nations Have Been Able To Do That, With All The Resources That They Put Together. And I'm Just A Little Skeptical That That's Going To Be Done By The Private Sector Without Making Use Of What Has Been Done By The Government.

Exploring And Colonizing Mars Can Bring Us New Scientific Understanding Of Climate Change, Of How Planet-wide Processes Can Make A Warm And Wet World Into A Barren Landscape. By Exploring And Understanding Mars, We May Gain Key Insights Into The Past And Future Of Our Own World.

To Me, Money Is A Commodity That A Person Must Have To Function, Not A Goal In Itself.

The Biggest Benefit Of Apollo Was The Inspiration It Gave To A Growing Generation To Get Into Science And Aerospace.

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