Modern space exploration seems to have devolved.
Once a quest of curiosity and the pursuit of expanding humanity's common knowledge and understanding of our place in the universe, it has arguably become a colossal, world-class demonstration of obscene excess and egregiously overinflated egos that are eager to engage in a shameless phallus measuring contest.
On the path we have embarked upon, we are more likely to have hotels in Earth's orbit catering to uber-wealthy space tourists who live large, sipping floating bubbles of champagne in a weightless environment and snapping selfies for their social media platforms while contributing nothing to scientific advances, before we have a new installation to replace the aging International Space Station to enable the next generation of our species' best and brightest minds to make new, ground-breaking discoveries.
The original space race, which led to NASA successfully landing man on the moon in less than a decade, stemmed largely from the world's superpowers of the day flexing their scientific and technological superiority as they strived to assert dominance over their perceived adversaries — the former Soviet regime and of course the U.S.
But the decades following the thawing of Cold War relations eventually saw collaborative developments such as the International Space Station, crewed by astronauts and cosmonauts from both friendly and rival nations working alongside one another conducting science experiments and demonstrating the true spirit and pinnacle of human potential.
When the U.S. scrapped the costly and risky shuttle program, much to many space enthusiasts' chagrin, NASA even leaned on their Russian counterparts — which would have been completely unthinkable during the days of the Iron Curtain — to deliver payloads including personnel and material into orbit on the dated yet tried-and-true Soyuz rocket.
This was arguably a real-time demonstration proving that coordinated cooperation among countries will always triumph over shortsighted and self-interested competition.
Now, however, we seem to have embraced the privatization of space.
Billionaires who have amassed unprecedented fortunes, largely through either or both the exploitation of underpaid and overworked labour as well as legal tax loopholes that benefit the uber-wealthy at humanity's collective expense, are posing as visionaries doing us all a favour.
If tens of millions of Americans weren't out in the cold, hungry and without healthcare, if the country's aging and often dilapidated infrastructure was being adequately maintained and upgraded, if meaningful action was being taken to curb climate change, and there was after all of that still enough left over for these legal tax-evaders to play space cowboy, that would be a different story.
In that fictional scenario, I could even applaud their efforts. After all, the development of reusable rockets is undeniably a crowning achievement toward making space more accessible.
Curiosity, the burning desire to learn as much as possible, is a characteristic that defines the essence of our very nature.
Otherwise, we would never have dared to embark upon the perilous journey across the once uncharted oceans, long ago erroneously thought by many to flow off of a flat planet's edges until we ventured out to see for ourselves the truth.
So, I fully and very enthusiastically support investing in space exploration, and will always defend the funding of space agencies. On a side note, the heads of critics who complain about the paltry budget NASA receives, would undoubtedly explode upon learning about the trillions of dollars unquestioningly showered upon the over-bloated and endlessly-expanding military industrial complex. With the U.S. military's budget for just one single year, the space agency could have paid for a crewed Mars mission with tens of billions still available to spend on other ventures.
That all being said, I remain exceedingly skeptical about the allegedly altruistic intentions of greedy men like Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson, and Elon Musk.
The development of space policy should be a democratically determined process guided by the input of experts as opposed to a big game that amounts to the obscenely wealthy demonstrating a world-class case of desperately compensating for something.
Imagine the progress that could be made if these billionaires pooled their resources and worked together instead of in direct competition against one another for not only bragging but also commercial rights that further benefit themselves.
Were these billionaires scientists, engineers, or pilots actually contributing something of value to the mission, there would at least be some justifiable merit to their presence in space.
But their main skill set has much less to do with science, and almost everything to do with exploiting a broken economic system that tossed the average person overboard decades ago.
If these billionaires were even a fraction as altruistic as they pretend to be, they would not hesitate to give up their seats for someone useful who could contribute more to the noble cause of space exploration than self-aggrandizing, ego-stroking photo ops.
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