[BRIEF NOTE] Sputnik fifty years later

[rfmcdonald]

It's been fifty years and one day since the launch of Sputnik 1. Reuters and NASA are both quite right to point out that the satellite technology first deployed by the Soviet Union has gone on to transform the fabric of human civilization.

"I am convinced that the Sputnik accomplishment by the Russian people was responsible for the creation of the American space program that I head today," NASA administrator Michael Griffin told space veterans at Russia's Academy of Science.

The ceremony was one of a number commemorating the Sputnik anniversary in Russia. Earlier, military officials laid flowers at the Kremlin Wall grave of Sputnik mastermind Sergei Korolyov.

"Without Sputnik there would have been no Apollo. Indeed when the space race of the 1960s was over, it may be said that we in America lost some of our own momentum," said Griffin, referring to the Apollo project, which put a man on the moon in 1969.

The world would be very different today without the satellites that followed on from Sputnik and now ensure communications, help people find directions, spy on foes and track the weather across the globe.

It's worth noting that, of all of the technological marvels developed in the space age so far, it's only the satellites that have turned a net profit. Other areas--manned space travel particularly, but also unmanned robotic space probes--seem to have served more national or other collective ego than any economically rational goal. Hopefully this will change in the not-too-distant future when space tourism gets off the ground. Hopefully.