the invitation to come down Arctica I
thought that was pretty cool I come down
and see some glaciers and feel the wind
in my face maybe snap a few penguin pics
be fun right and so that’s the way I
arrived not passionate but but excited
and interested and looking for a good
time and then one of the first people
our group meets is rose and Rose is
introduced as the medic feeling sexy
rose fine so the rest of the day every
time I went around a corner there’s rose
she’s mopping the floor fixing the wall
preparing the door rose and as I got to
be here a little longer
I realize this place is full of roses
his father and that brought me home
because NASA is full of roses people who
have the passion people who will do
anything for the mission people who
spend their nights weekends holidays
whatever it takes to get this thing done
for the mission and at NASA at one point
a very small part of that mission was to
put me off the planet and people asked
me were you scared
we’re just scared on the launchpad was
that frightening and I can honestly say
it was not it was not scared
I had address the risks and that sort of
thing before I went I wasn’t scared but
I was terrified that I would get there
and disappoint the roses that I would
not be able to justify the effort and
and trust that they put in me to get the
job done so another day goes by and I’m
at the bar and I make Pierre now Pierre
is a soil scientist he’s a fellow who
has a gleam in his eye when he
it’s about dirt and in about 20 minutes
taught me more about dirt than I ever
thought I would know and Pierre is also
a very frustrated soil scientist because
he’s here at Scott Base and not where he
needs to be which is out in the dry
valleys through the issues with weather
or logistics or whatever beers stuck
here so he’s trying to be a good rose
while he’s here but you know that that
is not where his heart is and as we’re
talking and I understand the passion of
Pierre he says to me you know one of the
reasons I have to get out there is and
I’m paraphrasing here a bit this is
because the roses have put so much
effort into making this possible for me
I have an obligation to go out and do
the science that will justify the
investment that they’ve made in me and I
was like holy Toledo this guy is just
like me I’m a Pierre nASA has a bunch of
Pierre’s too so how’d I get to be a
Pierre how’d that happen I wanted to fly
in space my whole life ever since I
literally as long as I can remember I
was the kid hanging on the fence out at
the airfield and watching the plane’s
take off it’s all I wanted to do and in
first grade that was great because
pretty much everybody else that’s all
they wanted to do and everybody was an
astronaut and all the adults were
wonderful psych yeah good good yeah
you’re gonna go to space my sixth grade
maybe five or six friends still wanted
to do it by high school I was the only
one I knew they wanted to be an
astronaut but that’s okay I go see the
guidance counselor for my big day she’s
gonna tell me how to how to do it I’m
sure she’s gonna tell me what I need to
do to become an astronaut and we get in
there and she’s flipping through the
pages and she says I see you want to be
an astronaut that’s gonna be your job
like yeah how do I do it and she gets
this cold look in her eye and she says I
have some reality for
people like you don’t become astronauts
you are never gonna be an astronaut what
she said you’re not smart enough to be
she actually said that to me and I
realized at that moment that people
thought it was a joke that they thought
that I was in this fantasy world that I
was a first grader still and they were
laughing at me for my dream so stop
telling people I didn’t tell anybody
probably for well a few people but very
few for about 20 years but I wanted to
fly in space that that was going to be
my job because I was embarrassed about
my dream and I figured that people would
just laugh at me and they wouldn’t take
me seriously so as a result I never met
anybody for 20 years that also wanted to
be an astronaut but I was embarrassed
and not daunted age 23 I finally met the
minimum requirements sent the
application and will show that guidance
counselor right and the letter comes
back nine months there you’ve got the
thin out envelope the one that you know
from school you know we regret to inform
you that you know a lot of qualified
candidates it up it up rejected fine 23
send it in 24 reject 25 rejected 26
rejected 27 28 29 rejected when I was 30
they didn’t take an application that was
a pretty good year I’m in my 30s I’m a
professor at the University of Michigan
I’m embarrassed to tell people don’t be
an astronaut have to go to my boss a
chairman of the department and say I
need you to write me a letter of
recommendation be an astronaut and I
pretty much got the same lecture that I
had from my guidance counselor in 12th
grade concentrate on what’s real Dress
for Success buckle down and get tenure
and stop this ridiculous fantasy
yes sir but could you still write me
this letter 31 rejected 32 rejected 33
you’re going back to the boss that was a
lousy letter last year I need a better
one 34 35 36 and in at age 37 I got a
phone call
instead of a letter and I was in and I
was gonna go to start so I went down
there I found out all these people are
just like me were all Pierre’s and we’re
surrounded and supported by all the
roses and this dream coming true was
incredible and now I want to show you
what it’s like to have your dream come
true I got to fly three times on the
space shuttle
I did four spacewalks that was the real
deal getting outside I had two trips to
the Space Station I built that doggone
thing and Here I am saying we’re going
tonight it’s the coldest night since the
Challenger accident I don’t care we are
lifting off tonight 40 years this
so we call a first two minutes shake and
bake if you had rattled around pretty
good
but then after two minutes these big
boosters drop off and you have six
minutes of riding on the main engine as
you can see the three of them lit up
there and it’s like electric car it’s
just smooth the g’s built up you get
about three g’s in your chest and eight
minutes you’re going 25,000 kilometers
an hour you’re seeing the earth from
above the sky and it’s just absolutely
beautiful and here’s the real dream
going outdoors because inside the Space
Shuttle the windows are small and your
field of view is framed by them even if
you put your nose in the glass there’s
still a frame but when you go outside
your visor fills the whole view and you
can stretch out over the earth over the
so shuttle and see the earth and all its
glory and you are a satellite unto
yourself then you get to work and and we
built the Space Station and what is that
it’s not rocket science it’s unbolting
stuff from the Space Shuttle and taking
a dogger pillar or whatever sticking it
on the space station bolting it on every
single spacewalk something goes wrong
but we deal with it cuz we’re trained
and then of course they’re stupid
astronaut tricks so here I am starting
to spin up this is what astronauts do in
their spare time and as we go faster and
faster you see ol Rick husbands like my
eyeballs are gonna pop out of here you
can dance in three dimensions you can
dance with point and counterpoint in one
in the other
we brought a ballerina with us to space
the freedom to fly it feels like you
have magic powers you’re Superman and
one of the favorite things I like to do
in space is play with my juice so you
see me taking to juice balls here and
with a bit of string I I get them to
push together and just I mean I think
that fluids are so interesting space
look at how the surface tension causes
that thing to just look different oh and
then of course you have to drink your
experiment which by the way tasted
terrible but I pretend it was good
because it was TV yeah right now Landing
is just as dynamic I mean there’s
there’s balls of fire popping off the
the tail nobody even told me that was
gonna have it’s like like tons of
paparazzi outside and the flashes are
going off and then then shuttle hits the
density waves of the atmosphere the
whole thing BAM shuttle shakes
feel the wings and the whole thing feels
like it’s gonna come apart and is that
supposed to happen and everybody’s like
yeah yeah density shares and then st.
Elmo’s fire starts running around the
inside of the windowpanes he’s blue and
green and red balls of fire inside the
cabin I didn’t even ask if that was
supposed to happen because nobody else
is getting upset so what the heck and
this thing is a glider from 8,000 miles
away we stop putting engine inputs in
and we glide from 8,000 miles all the
way to a runway you have to hit that
thing about plus or minus 100 feet and
guess what the guy that’s flying this
thing most of the time has never flown
that vehicle before because how many
chances you had to practice the base
huddle first time flying the the coming
in 21 degrees 7 times steeper than an
airliner
twice as fast as an airliner with no
option to go around with a guy whose
head is spun up after 10 days in space
flying the doggone thing for the very
first time it’s a testament to training
and you all i’ve already found out that
you all do this you were gonna out for a
helicopter flight and the training takes
over and you get the job done you get
the job done not just ok but nearly
perfect everybody makes mistakes but the
missions accomplished and and you didn’t
disappoint the roses you did it so I
just want to take five on behalf of all
the peers all around the world to the
roses thank you from the bottom of my
heart thank you so very much for taking
me to the stars so I got to do this I
got to go what should we do now I put to
you that the place we need to go now is
Mars say why Mars there’s so many places
why Mars there’s lots of reasons to go
to Mars one not the least of which is
how did a warm wet world for millions of
years become a dry barren desert but to
me there’s two compelling reasons to go
to Mars
the first reason is because I want to
know if we’re alone I’d like to know if
we’re the only life because right now as
think it’s fundamental to sort of human
nature to understand whether or not
there’s somebody else out there and if
we go to Mars and we find the slightest
little bit of evidence that there is or
ever was life that’s fundamentally
different than that on earth doesn’t use
RNA or DNA doesn’t use amino acids
whatever it is if it arose independently
on Mars and we can establish that life
started in two places independently
question answered
we know there’s there’s a hundred
billion star systems in this galaxy
Kepler has shown us there are billions
and billions of Earth and Mars ETS out
there we just don’t know how to talk to
him yet suppose we go and it’s sterile
we look everywhere and we find no life
it’s like a surgical instrument dead
well that raises an interesting question
could it be that we’re it we are truly
unique the only beings in this galaxy
well if that’s true then the second
reason to go is ever more important
because the second reason to go well
first let me say every astronaut has had
the Carl Sagan experience of looking
down at the earth from above the sky and
understanding you all you understand an
intellectual we don’t talk about a
visceral understanding that everyone who
has ever lived every bit of life that we
know about is there and then there’s you
know the six of us here and that life is
so fragile you look at the atmosphere it
is a skin on an apple nothing and one
event asteroid impact nuclear winter
ecologic runaway bioterrorism one event
could kill us all and that’s it but if
we go to Mars and we used to
a truly independent colony on Mars that
doesn’t require earth we become a
multi-planet species we have ensured the
immortality of humans we will then go
because no one event can wipe us out we
will populate the solar system we will
go to the stars humans will be all over
this galaxy Jim Kirk will be born one
day it will happen and we have the
ability and the technology to do it
right now and since I’ve been here I
realized you are the crew you have the
culture you have the environment you
have the experience to do this thing we
can go to Mars we can be a multi-planet
species there’s no technology to
stopping us let me show this last you
know when you’re when you’re in orbit
and you and you’re looking down at the
earth during the day it’s beautiful oh
my gosh the Amazonian jungle and the
Tanana Vivian desert and the white of
the Himalayas are just incredible but
it’s night that shows you that human
beings exist because cities are little
blotches in the daylight didn’t really
see them but at night the city lights
come out and we light up this planet in
a way that no other planet in the galaxy
is lit as far as we know and we can take
these lights we can take this
sign of intelligence from just being on
the earth to moving out we can transform
Mars to look like that at night we can
transform the moons of Jupiter to look
like that at night we can change this
entire galaxy we as a species if we will
get together and bring the roses and
Pierre’s together we have the capability
of not only being immortal and being
able to say we existed forever but to
profoundly change every aspect of our
worlds our solar systems our galaxy the
universe we can bring intelligence to
the universe let’s get off this rock
thank you [Applause]