Space Exploration Quotes & Sayings

As I looked out at the glittering waters of the Pacific I was seeing for Carl. He knew that it's not for any one generation to see the completed picture. That's the point. The picture is never completed. There is always so much more that remains to be discovered. — Ann Druyan

By refocusing our space program on Mars for America's future, we can restore the sense of wonder and adventure in space exploration that we knew in the summer of 1969. We won the moon race; now it's time for us to live and work on Mars, first on its moons and then on its surface. — Buzz Aldrin

We should explore new ways to drive down the cost of space travel. instead of costly booster rockets, maybe we should think of laser/microwave driven rockets, or space elevators. Until then, the cost of space exploration will limit our ability to explore the universe. — Michio Kaku

Whether the Eisenhower administration has underestimated the American people's interest in space exploration or Truman never full appreciated MacArthur, the Soviet Union's Sputnik program has created a public spectacle that even Disney and von Braun might envy. — Ken Hollings

I believe space exploration is an absolute necessity for the survival of human race. — Anousheh Ansari

Across the sea of space, the stars are other suns. — Carl Sagan

He wasn't going to be able to deactivate the field, which meant there was only one choice.

He'd realized early on that his arcane, profoundly alien passenger came with a cost, possibly one too high to pay and get out the other side free and clear. He'd pay it nonetheless and without complaint if the diati would only come through for him now.

Caleb closed his eyes. — G.S. Jennsen

Just because your electronics are better than ours, you aren't necessarily superior in any way. Look, imagine that you humans are a man in LA with a brand-new Trujillo and we are a nuhp in New York with a beat-up old Ford. The two fellows start driving toward St. Louis. Now, the guy in the Trujillo is doing 120 on the interstates, and the guy in the Ford is putting along at 55; but the human in the Trujillo stops in Vegas and puts all of his gas money down the hole of a blackjack table, and the determined little nuhp cruises along for days until at last he reaches his goal. It's all a matter of superior intellect and the will to succeed.
Your people talk a lot about going to the stars, but you just keep putting your money into other projects, like war and popular music and international athletic events and resurrecting the fashions of previous decades. If you wanted to go into space, you would have. — George Alec Effinger

Chaos that closely resembled panic awaited.

Shuttles raced to the presumed safety of the planet below while fighters crisscrossed the perimeter of the station. Platoon-sized formations of frigates and several cruisers formed up and accelerated away. To where the approaching attackers were located?

She didn't give a damn what her mother said in public. This was a bona fide insurrection. — G.S. Jennsen

I have a strong feeling about interesting people in space exploration ... And the only way it's going to happen is to have some kid fantasize about getting his ray gun, jumping into his spaceship, and flying into outer space. — George Lucas

We want to know. We want to know who we are and what we are capable of.

I want to know.

And yet we were dragged into another war. Another seemingly inevitable and gruesome legacy passed down, along with soma. — Jeno Marz

Apocalyptic explosions, dead reactors, terrorists, mass murder, death-slugs, and now a blindness plague. This is a terrible planet. We should not have come here. — James S.A. Corey

I see nothing to fear in inner space. — Yeshe Tsogyal

Of course risk is part of spaceflight. We accept some of that to achieve greater goals in exploration and find out more about ourselves and the universe. — Lisa Nowak

Mia stood between the bed and the broken window, holding an active plasma blade at waist-height in front of her. A thick coat of blood stained the plasma nearly from hilt to tip, hissing as it dribbled from blade to floor.

"Are you all right?"

Mia gave her a wan, distant smile. "It's okay. I've done it before. — G.S. Jennsen

Bringing an asteroid back to Earth? What's that have to do with space exploration? If we were moving outward from there, and an asteroid is a good stopping point, then fine. But now it's turned into a whole planetary defense exercise at the cost of our outward exploration. — Buzz Aldrin

Exploration of space is worth it because humans need to explore. Knowledge is always good, and it's a really cool thing to see. — Penn Jillette

The single simplest reason why human space flight is necessary is this, stated as plainly as possible: keeping all your breeding pairs in one place is a retarded way to run a species. — Warren Ellis

Apollo has something to teach us as we enter a new century of genetic modification, artificial intelligence, nanotechnology. It's a cautionary tale about that most fundamentally human of human tragedies .. wanting something so badly that you end up destroying it. — Andrew Smith

Because we were the good guys. We were in the right. The universe looks out for people who act with honor in furtherance of an honorable cause. It must, or we never would have gotten this far as a species."

"We won - this little conflict and a thousand like it - because we were destined to win. The universe will allow no other outcome. — G.S. Jennsen

Is manned space exploration important? Yes - not least because it simply works much better than sending robots. — Henry Spencer

The question that will decide our destiny is not whether we shall expand into space. It is: shall we be one species or a million? A million species will not exhaust the ecological niches that are awaiting the arrival of intelligence. — Freeman Dyson

It's pretty hard to get to another star system. Alpha Centauri is four light years away, so if you go at 10 per cent of the speed of light, it's going to take you 40 years, and that's assuming you can instantly reach that speed, which isn't going to be the case. You have to accelerate. You have to build up to 20 or 30 per cent and then slow down, assuming you want to stay at Alpha Centauri and not go zipping past. It's just hard. With current life spans, you need generational ships. You need antimatter drives, because that's the most mass-efficient. It's doable, but it's super slow. — Elon Musk

I've always been interested in the idea of space exploration. When I was younger it was just a dream, but the theory of rockets being able to travel through space was very much alive. I found it very exciting. — Gerry Anderson

We need new medical approaches to preventing and/or curing disease. We need new scientific approaches to generating, storing, and being more efficient with energy. Maybe we need more space exploration. Maybe we need more undersea exploration. — Fred Wilson

The sky is but a looking glass into a pool of airless oceans, cast off into a dance of light and energy, leaving only a facet of guidance to navigate. Such an existence lays but within the mind man. — Indiana Lang

Before we invented civilization our ancestors lived mainly in the open out under the sky. Before we devised artificial lights and atmospheric pollution and modern forms of nocturnal entertainment we watched the stars. There were practical calendar reasons of course but there was more to it than that. Even today the most jaded city dweller can be unexpectedly moved upon encountering a clear night sky studded with thousands of twinkling stars. When it happens to me after all these years it still takes my breath away. — Carl Sagan

I believe we can do more in making the President's vision for space exploration a reality by awarding cash prizes to encourage greater participation of the private sector in the national space program. — Dana Rohrabacher

Mir astronaut Jerry Linenger writes in his memoir that he was surprised to find a bottle of cognac in one arm of his spacesuit and a bottle of whiskey in the other. (Linenger was the Frank Burns of space exploration: — Mary Roach

I've completed half of my space training at Space City in Moscow. I love adventure, and I've been training in a centrifuge and MiG Fighter with a view to going into space and being a spokesman for space exploration! — Brian Blessed

There are many places that are not made for staying," Heckleck said. "They are too harsh, too hard, and too far away from whatever you call home. You don't root where you don't have to, unless you're unluck. — Cecil Castellucci

If he ever got back to earth, he was making them list that as one of the dangers of outer space exploration, dammit. Watch out for big damn space perverts, all you earth midgets. — Twisted Hilarity

Space exploration promised us alien life, lucrative planetary mining, and fabulous lunar colonies. News flash, ladies and gents: Space is nearly empty. It's a sterile vacuum, filled mostly with the junk we put up there. — Graham Hawkes

To move forward, what's required is a unified space agenda based on exploration, science, development, commerce, and security. — Buzz Aldrin

One of the core reasons for creating 'Station to Station' was to provide a space for exploration and cultural friction between different mediums. It should be natural for mediums like music, film and art to cross over, and we wanted to empower that process. — Doug Aitken

Looking down the road, space exploration and the benefits it yields - in medicine and information technology - should not be overlooked. — Bob Barr

Semantics, Admiral. I'd appreciate an honest answer."

"I'd appreciate a multitude of honest answers, but I rarely expect to receive them." Miriam sighed; the verbal tete-a-tete was growing tiresome. Time to bring an end to it with, ironically, honesty. — G.S. Jennsen

Star Trek was an attempt to say that humanity will reach maturity and wisdom on the day that it begins not just to tolerate, but take a special delight in differences in ideas and differences in life forms. [ ... ] If we cannot learn to actually enjoy those small differences, to take a positive delight in those small differences between our own kind, here on this planet, then we do not deserve to go out into space and meet the diversity that is almost certainly out there. — Gene Roddenberry

The beauty of Mars exists in the human mind," he said in that dry factual tone, and everyone stared at him amazed. "Without the human presence it is just a collection of atoms, no different than any other random speck of matter in the universe. It's we who understand it, and we who give it meaning. All our centuries of looking up at the night sky and watching it wander through the stars. All those nights of watching it through the telescopes, looking at a tiny disk trying to see canals in the albedo changes. All those dumb sci-fi novels with their monsters and maidens and dying civilizations. And all the scientists who studied the data, or got us here. That's what makes Mars beautiful. Not the basalt and the oxides — Kim Stanley Robinson

Once solved, the severe handicaps imposed on space exploration by the weight and chemical limitations of rockets would no longer apply. The whole timetable of our conquest of the planets in our solar system would be tremendously speeded up, from hot Mercury all the way out to frigid Pluto. — Donald A. Wollheim

NASA is an engine of innovation and inspiration as well as the world's premier space exploration agency, and we are well served by politicians working to keep it that way, instead of turning it into a mere jobs program, or worse, cutting its budget. — Bill Nye

You can't be on the cusp of innovation and at the forefront of technology if you're wearing blinders. If you don't have an exploration program where you're exploring your world here on Earth, underwater, and in space, then you're wearing blinders and handicapping yourself. — Gwynne Shotwell

I'll ask you to look at the ships arrayed against you and consider what weaponry they might possess. Weaponry strong enough to crack your hulls? I know what weaponry you bring to bear, and I assure you it will not crack ours.

"Are you willing to risk the lives of thousands under your command to find out? Are you willing to risk your own life?"

The silence hung across space like a shroud.

"This is not over, Admiral Solovy."

"That is the first true thing you've said today. — G.S. Jennsen

It is no coincidence that a rebirth of psychedelic use is occuring as we acquire the technological capability to leave the planet. The mushroom visions and the transformation of the human image precipitated by space exploration are spun together. Nothing less is happening than the emergence of a new human order. A telepathic, humane, universalist kind of human culture is emerging that will make everything that preceded it appear like the stone age. — Terence McKenna

The choice is: the Universe ... or nothing. — H.G.Wells

A new consciousness is developing which sees the earth as a single organism and recognizes that an organism at war with itself is doomed. We are one planet. One of the great revelations of the age of space exploration is the image of the earth finite and lonely, somehow vulnerable, bearing the entire human species through the oceans of space and time. — Carl Sagan

Mars is the next frontier, what the Wild West was, what America was 500 years ago. It's time to strike out anew ... Mars is where the action is for the next thousand years ... The characteristic of human nature, and perhaps our simian branch of the family, is curiosity and exploration. When we stop doing that, we won't be humans anymore. I've seen far more in my lifetime than I ever dreamed. Many of our problems on Earth can only be solved by space technology ... The next step is in space. It's inevitable. — Arthur C. Clarke

Today, we are on a path of decay. We are seeing the book close on five decades of accomplishment as the leader in human space exploration. — Eugene Cernan

Ideally, the ISS program will just be one more incremental step on an expanding, incredible journal of exploration and understanding, taking us higher and farther. — Ron Garan

Part of what drives us to explore and discover is the intangible: expanding our horizons, feeding our curiosity, finding all those unexpected things, and trying to answer those profound questions discussed in previous chapters, like how did the universe begin? How did life begin? Are we alone? — Nancy Atkinson

A partner's different perspective is valuable, but the very fact that it is different means that it will require work, humility, time, and resources to incorporate that perspective. At times, this will require checking one's pride at the door. — Ron Garan

Electromagnetic theory and experiment gave us the telephone, radio, TV, computers, and made the internal combustion engine practical - thus, the car and airplane, leading inevitably to the rocket and outer-space exploration. — Gregory Benford

When we explore the cosmos, we come to believe and prove that we can solve problems that have never been solved. It brings out the best in us. Space exploration imbues everyone with an optimistic view of the future. — Bill Nye

Astronauts have been stuck in low-Earth orbit, boldly going nowhere. American attempts to kick-start a new phase of lunar exploration have stalled amid the realisation that NASA's budget is too small for the job. — Paul Davies

Early SETI efforts were marked by overly optimistic estimates of the probable number of extraterrestrial civilizations in our galaxy. In light of new findings and insights, it seems appropriate to put excessive euphoria to rest and to take a more down-to-earth view. Earth may be more special, and intelligence much rarer, in the universe than previously thought.

Skeptical Inquirer Volume 30.3, May / June 2006 — Peter Schenkel

In the coming era of manned space exploration by the private sector, market forces will spur development and yield new, low-cost space technologies. If the history of private aviation is any guide, private development efforts will be safer, too. — Burt Rutan

I believe that, by taking an extreme approach, you really get the public to actively engage with a cause or a research ,and that is what motivates me with space exploration. — Nelly Ben Hayoun

That which interests most people leaves me without any interest at all. This includes a list of things such as: social dancing, riding roller coasters, going to zoos, picnics, movies, planetariums, watching tv, baseball games; going to funerals, weddings, parties, basketball games, auto races, poetry readings, museums, rallies, demonstrations, protests, children's plays, adult plays ... I am not interested in beaches, swimming, skiing, Christmas, New Year's, the 4th of July, rock music, world history, space exploration, pet dogs, soccer, cathedrals and great works of Art. How can a man who is interested in almost nothing write about anything? Well, I do. I write and I write about what's left over: a stray dog walking down the street, a wife murdering her husband, the thoughts and feelings of a rapist as he bites into a hamburger sandwich; life in the factory, life in the streets and rooms of the poor and mutilated and the insane, crap like that, I write a lot of crap like that — Charles Bukowski

Alex peered behind her to see Noah fussing over a scrape on Kennedy's cheek. "Unless someone's bleeding to death, first aid will have to wait. You'll want to strap into the jump seats.

"This could get interesting, and that's before we get clear of the station. — G.S. Jennsen

Mars looks like Vegas without the casinos. — Sam Neill

The universe is not ordered, and it will not become so simply because one wishes it. The universe is chaos made manifest. The military does a fine job of creating an illusion of structure, of dependable rules to provide an answer for every situation.

"But it is only an illusion, one which on its best days holds the chaos at bay. — G.S. Jennsen

Keep in mind our Constitution predates the Industrial Revolution. Our founders did not know about electricity, the train, telephones, radio, television, automobiles, airplanes, rockets, nuclear weapons, satellites, or space exploration. There's a lot they didn't know about. It would be interesting to see what kind of document they'd draft today. Just keeping it frozen in time won't hack it. — Ross Perot

The National Air and Space Museum is unlike any other place on this planet. If you're hosting visitors from another country and they want to know what single museum best captures what it is to be American, this is the museum you take them to. Here they can see the 1903 Wright Flyer, the 1927 Spirit of St. Louis, the 1926 Goddard rocket, and the Apollo 11 command module - silent beacons of exploration, of a few people willing to risk their lives for the sake of discovery. Without — Neil DeGrasse Tyson

NEEMO missions are a challenging and exciting aspect of astronaut training. The research we conduct during those missions allows us to test new technologies and exploration concepts in conditions similar to the ones we'll experience in space. They are a great opportunity to help me expand my knowledge and develop new tools for future space exploration. — Jeremy Hansen

Crushed sandstone sifted through Caleb's fingers, insubstantial as dust. A breeze caught the debris mid-fall and spirited it away before it could join the ashes blanketing the ground.

He stopped in the middle of what had once been a street, his arms pulled in at his sides, his fists balled in barely restrained fury. — G.S. Jennsen

What do you want me to do? Arrest them all?"

"When you can, absolutely."

"And when I can't?"

"Do whatever is necessary to remove their ability to act against us - against humanity."

"You mean kill them."

Her expression darkened in what he sensed was sorrow, but her shoulders rose. "If that's what it takes. — G.S. Jennsen

Had (President) Kennedy turned to his advisers and wailed, "What can we beat the Russians at?" and if someone had cried "Backgammon!" at that point, Apollo would never have happened. — Andrew Smith

The dinosaurs became extinct because they didn't have a space program. And if we become extinct because we don't have a space program, it'll serve us right! — Larry Niven

We collectively have a special place in our heart for the manned space flight program - Apollo nostalgia is one element, but that is only part of it. American culture worships explorers - look at the fame of Lewis and Clark, for example. The American people want to think of themselves as supporting exploration. — Nathan Myhrvold

To venture into space we must be strong-willed and determined. We must be fully committed to its exploration and discovery; space permits no half measures and is unforgiving of mistakes. — Henry Joy McCracken

Mythology, science and space exploration are subjects that have fascinated me since my early childhood. And they were always connected somehow with the music I write. — Vangelis

This was exactly what I experienced in space: immense gratitude for the opportunity to see Earth from this vantage, and for the gift of the planet we've been given. — Ron Garan

Space exploration and experimentation are critically valuable to our nation. I know of no better way to honor those seven who sacrificed their lives than to recommit ourselves to defend and enhance America's important strategies in space. — Rob Bishop

An eerie, chilling voice interrupted him to reverberate through the house.

"You believe you are safe, but you will never be safe from me. My reach is limitless, my capabilities legion. Sleep fitfully and avoid the shadows, for know that I am coming for you. When I arrive, you will pay for what you did. — G.S. Jennsen

If you want a nation to have space exploration ambitions, you've got to send humans. — Neil DeGrasse Tyson

While civilization is more than a high material living standard it is nevertheless based on material abundance. It does not thrive on abject poverty or in an atmosphere of resignation and hopelessness. Therefore, the end objectives of solar system exploration are social objectives, in the sense that they relate to or are dictated by present and future human needs. — Krafft Arnold Ehricke

So how can we improve the educational system? We should probably first rethink school curricula, and link them in more obvious ways to social goals (elimination of poverty and crime, elevation of human rights, etc.), technological goals (boosting energy conservation, space exploration, nanotechnology, etc.), and medical goals (cures for cancer, diabetes, obesity, etc.) that we care about as a society. — Dan Ariely

The woman's gaze sent chills racing down his spine. The diabolical, aberrantly predatory arch of her lips curdled his blood. Seriously, his blood must be curdling back at the lab right now.

"Nice illusion. I'm definitely feeling the evil vibe here."

She stood and rounded the desk with perfect grace. "There is no illusion. Explain yourself quickly now, before I grow bored by your presence and dispense with it. — G.S. Jennsen

In 1980, during my sophomore year at MIT, I realized that the school didn't have a student space organization. I made posters for a group I called Students for the Exploration and Development of Space and put them up all over campus. Thirty-five people showed up. It was the first thing I ever organized, and it took off! — Peter Diamandis

On Titan the molecules that have been raining down like manna from heaven for the last 4 billion years might still be there largely unaltered deep-frozen awaiting the chemists from Earth — Carl Sagan

You have business and pleasure to attend to. As an expert in both, allow me to advise you to put them aside for the next ten minutes. Why?

"Because the world is about to transform, and you will want to be able to say you saw it happen. The axes of our little universe are about to flip, and you'll want to get your magboots set. — G.S. Jennsen

India has no dearth of brave young men and women and if they get the opportunity and help then we can compete with other nations in space exploration and one of them will fulfil her dreams, — Atal Bihari Vajpayee

She skidded around a corner, slamming her shoulder into the wall and bouncing off of it without slowing.

Caleb?

Silence. Forty-six meters. A long stretch of hallway. She pushed faster, harder. Twenty meters.

She burst into the room in unison with a deafening crash of metal shearing metal. — G.S. Jennsen

A few generations living and dying without a sky, and enclosed spaces lost the atavistic terror of premature burial. — James S.A. Corey

When you read as many books as Klaus Baudelaire, you are going to learn a great deal of information that might not become useful for a long time. You might read a book that would teach you all about the exploration of outer space, even if you do not become an astronaut until you are eighty years old. You might read a book about how to preform tricks on ice skates, and then not be forced to preform these tricks for a few weeks. You might read a book on how to have a successful marriage, when the only women you will ever love has married someone else and then perished one terrible afternoon. — Lemony Snicket

The universe is probably littered with the one-planet graves of cultures which made the sensible economic decision that there's no good reason to go into space - each discovered, studied, and remembered by the ones who made the irrational decision. — Randall Munroe

NASA's next urgent mission should be to send good poets into space so they can describe what it's really like.
Dangerous by Shannon Hale — Shannon Hale

Google the name Prometheus, and see how often it has been given to innovations in many different fields, notably science, medicine and space exploration. The fire he stole can be seen, too, as the spark generating all artistic creativity. — Neil MacGregor

...It wasn't only the color that suggested war to the ancients - it was the strange motion of Mars and the other visible disks that did not behave like the stars, seemingly fixed in the firmament, but advanced and retreated and advanced again along their paths. These disks were given the name planets, meaning wanderers. — Meg Howrey

Space exploration is inherently dangerous. If my focus ever wavers in the classroom or during an eight-hour simulation, I remind myself of one simple fact: space flight might kill me. — Chris Hadfield

In the 19th Century people were looking for the Northwest Passage. Ships were lost and brave people were killed, but that doesn't mean we never went back to that part of the world again, and I consider it the same in space exploration. — John L. Phillips

For decades, people have known the chemical-propulsion approach to space travel is really not going to get us that far. Chemical propulsion is essentially like the horse-and-cart approach to the exploration of the American West, instead of the steamboat or the railroad. — Franklin Chang Diaz

The moon and other celestial bodies should be free for exploration and use by all countries. No country should be permitted to advance a claim of sovereignty. — Lyndon B. Johnson

Man has gone out to explore other worlds and other civilizations without having explored his own labyrinth of dark passages and secret chambers, and without finding what lies behind doorways that he himself has sealed. — Stanislaw Lem

It was a subversive notion, the idea that she was free. Free to choose where to go and what to do with her time. — G.S. Jennsen

Souls spread over the planet and leave no mountain unclimbed, no valley undiscovered, no sea unsailed, ventured even into outer space.
Souls mingle and leave no relationship unattempted, no emotion unfelt, no pleasure and pain unexplored.
Souls plunge into their minds and leave no tale untold, no image unpainted, no melody unheard.
Souls transcend their fantasies and leave no idea unthought, no natural law undescribed, no wisdom undefined.
Souls even pass over the thinkeable and witness ineffable realms of other worlds and their inhabitants.
Curiosity, the drive to experience, the urge of urges, the world's innermost desire. We, souls, are its foremost scouts. We are the embodiment of the purpose of existence. — Stefan Emunds

Reluctantly, we had already accepted every challenge at the moment we were born. And as long as we live, we have no right to give up. For we, or at least someone very similar to us, already died once, long ago in a faraway place. — Jeno Marz

Sailors on a becalmed sea, we sense the stirring of a breeze. — Carl Sagan

I hope that China will continue with space exploration. It would be logical to have international co-operation. I hope that it will come about and that I can be involved in it. — Leroy Chiao

One of the big things about space exploration is that it is as expensive as it is complicated, and you need all the countries of the world to help if you want to accomplish big goals. — Ellen Stofan