Human Space Flight Future: The Significance of Convergence of Outer Space and Cyberspace for the development of a space travel mass market.

Paper number

IAC-08.B3.5.1

Author

Dr. Alain Dupas, Collège de Polytechnique, France

Year

2008

Abstract

What are the driving forces behind the development of human space flight? The classical answers include international strategic rivalry of great powers, scientific curiosity, Darwinian evolutionary drive of the human species. The competition argument is certainly well established: the Cold War between The United States and The Soviet Union was the main cause of the space race, which lead to the first human flight by Youri Gagarin in 1961, and to the first human landing on another celestial body, the Moon, by Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin in 1969. The scientific argument is less compelling because the scientific value of human space flight has always been denied by parts of the scientific and space communities. The “cosmic destiny” argument is very philosophical, but not very compelling either: it does not provide a reason to move now into space; why not wait?

This paper explores the possibility that: 1) another force is at work and will become the major drive for human space flight in the coming decades: the general public attraction for space; 2) this phenomena will develop in cyberspace as a mass market for digital-economy space virtual products and activities, and expand into real activities in outer space for larger and larger number of people, in the framework of the infotainment industries, including tourism. 

The main rationale behind this hypothesis is the great impact of a fictional inhabited cosmos in the various media (books, magazines, movies, TV series) since the first lunar novels of Jules Verne in the 19th century. One can consider that without this impact, and its lasting incorporation in humankind deep-rooted interests, the launch of Sputnik 50 years ago would never have raised such a global enthusiasm, that convinced the Soviet and US leaders that space was indeed an incomparable arena for a peaceful competition, opposing visibly their technical capabilities. 

This period of fierce competition in space is over but the public interest is still there, augmented by the succession of space successes and the beauty of space images. And the accelerating development of the information society and of new entrepreneurial ventures to access and live in space may enable the most passionate space-lovers to travel virtually and later, for part of them, really in space. Virtual space travel is already there in videogames and on the internet (with for instance Google Earth, Moon, Mars…). But it can take a new dimension with “Web 2.0” applications, of the kind of “Second Life”, in a new “Wikinomics” framework, where mass collaboration of millions of individuals changes everything in cyberspace. This virtual experience of outer space could certainly transform itself into a real experience, with space trips offered to winners of on-line games, which may progressively number by hundreds, thousands, and much more. In some way this means that human space flight could develop at the frontier between cyberspace and outer space, leveraging the accelerating convergence between virtual and real activities. In the first phase of this process, travels would be limited to sub-orbital flights, like the one being developed today, which may find there a much larger market than the one of the “super rich”. But later, with space flight becoming a mass market, and corresponding decrease in cost of access and living in space, this mass space tourism could expand to LEO, and later the Moon, Mars and beyond… 

Abstract document

IAC-08.B3.5.1.pdf

Manuscript document

IAC-08.B3.5.1.pdf (🔒 authorized access only).

To get the manuscript, please contact IAF Secretariat.