Life Beyond Earth

Top 10 Learning Moments

1. The origins of space commercialization and the space travel program started and stopped with The Challenger disaster in 1986.
2. The push for business-backed space travel was brought about by Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Richard Branson, all who were competing on reusable rocket technology.
3. Though visions for the commercialization of space differ from company to company, the overarching goal is to lower the cost of access to space, and to do so more reliably and safely.
4. There is “always an asterisk” when talking about space travel and safety but it could have a profound impact on how humanity views life.
5. The thing about the Shuttle was that it held a promise, it was supposed to fly frequently. — Christian Davenport
6. It occurred to me that if some of the richest men in the world were plowing big parts of their fortunes into space and trying to develop new technologies and new ways of doing things – that that was something we should be paying attention to; because, frankly, a lot of the mainstream media were not paying attention to it at the time. — Christian Davenport
7. The quickest way to become a millionaire in space is to start out as a billionaire. — Christian Davenport
8. There’s only been about 600 people or so who have ever been to space. If you’ve ever talked to an astronaut…they’ll talk about seeing earth from a distance, and the curvature of it, and the thin line of the atmosphere, and the dark, vast, inky blackness of space and realizing that this pale blue dot is in orbit around the sun. The transformative effect that this has had on society. — Christian Davenport