Lost in Space: The Fall of NASA and the Dream of a New Space Age
In Lost in Space: The Fall of NASA and the Dream of a New Space Age, Greg Klerkx argues that ever since the triumphant Apollo missions, the Space Age has been stuck in the wrong orbit… and that NASA, the agency whose daring once fuelled the world’s space-faring vision, has been largely responsible for keeping it there. Down the years, NASA has ignored, belittled and actively quashed the one concept that could change the equation for the future of humans in space: human spaceflight as a free market activity.
Despite this, a new Space Age is in the making led by dreamers, investors, inventors and even renegades from NASA itself. In his talk on September 9, Klerkx will explain why NASA is struggling to hold onto the space shuttle even in the face of two disasters, what it felt like to sit inside the history-making SpaceShipOne, and whether or not President Bush’s new mandate to go back to the moon is likely to succeed. He will also update us on the activities of the SETI Institute, an organization he was part of for more than five years, and the critical role that Microsoft has had in SETI’s post-NASA revival.
Speaker Details
Greg Klerkx is the author of Lost in Space: The Fall of NASA and the Dream of a New Space Age, published in January 2004 by Pantheon Books.In 1997, Klerkx was selected as the first resource development director for the SETI (Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence) Institute, a private space research institution based in California’s Silicon Valley, and served in that capacity until 2002. Before joining the SETI Institute, he worked for the University of California at Berkeley building research and business partnerships between the university and Silicon Valley companies and entrepreneurs. In the early 1990s, he was a senior manager with the California Academy of Mathematics and Science, a widely lauded experimental high school based in Los Angeles.Trained as a journalist, Klerkx is a frequent contributor to New Scientist Magazine and has written for the New York Times, American Heritage Magazine, and the Sunday Telegraph Magazine. He has been interviewed on the future of space exploration by NPR’s Science Friday, NPR’s Weekend Edition, Failure Magazine, Newsweek, and numerous other media organizations. Born and raised in the U.S., Klerkx currently lives in London with his partner, Marina Benjamin, and their daughter, Soren.
- Date:
- Speakers:
- Greg Klerkx
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Jeff Running
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