Why are we eager to explore the Universe?
Unraveling the mysteries of the Universe Yes, it is because we want to find the aliens, well it is partially true. But, the reality is beyond the books (Wait, did I said books? Oops!). I am convinced that if all the space agencies were to disappear tomorrow, if we never put up another Hubble Space Telescope, never put another human being in space, people in this world would be profoundly distraught. When Charles Lindbergh was asked why he crossed the Atlantic, he never once answered that he wanted to win the $25,000 that New York City hotel owner Raymond Orteig offered for the first nonstop aircraft flight between New York and Paris. Burt Rutan and his backer, Paul Allen, certainly didn't develop a private spacecraft to win the Ansari X-Prize for the $10 million in prize money. They spent twice as much as they made. Sergei Korolev and the team that launched Sputnik were not tasked by their government to be the first to launch an artificial satellite; they had t...