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From the Executive Director2007 - You Are Part of Everything We Do
December 26 , 2007 Dear Planetary Society Member, The year 2007 has been a rich and rewarding one for us space explorers. It is breathtaking to consider the pace of solar system exploration -- 20 spacecraft are now beyond Earth orbit sending back data from all over the solar system. You, as a member of The Planetary Society, are part of humanity's move off Earth and out into the solar system. Right now, the names of Planetary Society members are flying around the rings of Saturn on Cassini, on the Red Planet with Spirit and Opportunity, traveling to the asteroid belt with Dawn, cruising around the Moon on Kaguya, heading toward the north pole of Mars on Phoenix, and journeying to Pluto on New Horizons. The past year we took an important new step: We added the Earth to our mission. Our mission statement now reads: "To inspire the people of Earth to explore other worlds, understand our own, and seek life elsewhere." The argument about whether Pluto is a planet may have a lot of hairsplitting, but understanding Earth as a planet, and the role of space exploration in that understanding, is crucial. Consider this: Earth sits between two examples of planets gone bad -- at least, as far as life is concerned. Venus was overtaken by a runaway greenhouse effect, which boiled away its oceans and raised the surface temperature to the point it would melt lead. Mars lost its once thick and protective atmosphere, and now it's a world where any liquid water that happened to appear on its surface would immediately transform to a gas. Planetary science has taught us these lessons, but we have much more to learn. We explore other worlds to understand this one. Only by seeing Earth as one planet among many can we truly understand our own pale blue dot of a world. Philosophically and scientifically, we always treated Earth as a planet, but we didn't trumpet that fact, out of concern that some people might think The Planetary Society was weakening our stance that exploring other worlds is a human imperative. But after more than a quarter-century of being the world's largest and most effective space advocacy group, surely no one can now seriously believe we're backing down. We've added to our mission statement, while taking nothing away. We'll be doing all this while continuing to campaign to keep planetary exploration robust. While we advance the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence. While we support research into the threat posed by near-Earth comets and asteroids. And while we lead the International Lunar Decade to maximize the scientific return from the many missions now targeting Earth's Moon. This means that, in the coming year, we're going to need your help and support even more. You know how active The Planetary Society is. You are part of everything we do. I look forward to exploring the future in space -- and on Earth -- with you. With best wishes for the coming year, Louis Friedman P.S. We land on Mars this coming May 25 -- and I mean "we" literally. The Planetary Society's "Visions of Mars" is riding on the Phoenix spacecraft, carrying the first library to another planet. It's just one more thing we've accomplished together. Thank you. Comments? We welcome your opinions on this subject. Send us email! |
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