Space Exploration

"What do you want to be when you grow up?" - I'm sure we can all remember being asked this question at some point when we were kids.  For some of us we still get asked it now even as adults.  What I find interesting about this question isn't the answer itself, but how the answer changes with age.  When we are kids most reply with answers that are seen as somewhat stereotypical - fireman, doctor, policeman, astronaut, etc these are really professions children can pretend to be when playing make believe.  They won't necessarily be realistic and in almost all cases they won't be accurate in terms of what the child thinks that job actually involves.

Innocence and naïvety aside, as we grow we become more aware of the world around us, we become more aware of these professions, and we become more aware of what work they actually involve.  The more aware we become of all these things the more you start to see the answer to the question change.

I was born in 1988, and throughout my life one of my loves has been video games.  In the last 30 years they have changed a lot, in one area in particular they have made leaps and bounds, that is realism.  That's not something I play video games for personally, I play games to do things I can't do in real life, but there is one area where that realism lends itself well and that is the experience of doing things that are possible in real life which you would like to do but probably never will.

There's a game called No Man's Sky which is a game where you explore space.  You travel to planets, gather resources, build bases, upgrade your technology, and generally just mess about.  There is a story mode but it's not really worth it in the end.  The game itself is interesting, but the novelty wears off quite quickly, the grinding nature takes its toll, and the game as a whole is generally seen as being a disappointment by all but a few dedicated fans.

One of the professions children often give when asked the question above is to say astronaut - and one reason why this aspiration fades with age is the realisation of how much work is involved to actually become an astronaut, another is the somewhat cynical acceptance of the reality that where you were born, how much money you have, and what opportunities are presented to you are not things we get to choose and by the time we have influence over them it is often too late to make decisions that can have a deep and long lasting effect on our lives.  In other words most kids realise quite quickly becoming an astronaut is a pipe dream which the vast majority of people will never achieve and very few actually have the opportunity to even try to become one never mind whether you succeed or not in the end.

No Man's Sky is a game that, in a way, lets you see what it would be like to explore space and visit other planets.  Of course the game isn't life like, the realism it employs has its limits, but one of the things I find interesting about the criticism of the game is the fact that many people say there's nothing to do in it.  That makes me think about the real world and what would actually be involved in the real world profession of space exploration.  Most peoples' perceptions of such a hypothetical career are based around the depictions we have from science fiction, but being more realistic, whilst it is a mathematical certainty that alien life exists due to the size of the Universe being infinite and the statistical fact that 1 in infinity is a certainty, the likelihood you would ever encounter any such life is almost a certain impossibility - but again with both there is a chance.

If you were to explore space for real as a career, No Man's Sky isn't far wrong in one crucial point - it would probably be boring.  No matter how much you love your job, no matter how much passion you have for it, there is always a routine, and an eventual monotony that is achieved.  It might not become the entirety of the job, but it will eventually creep in.  I do not argue that these careers give you the opportunity to see and do things that nobody else ever will, and I do not argue that there will be many experiences, and sights, that will make you feel incredible and remind you why you chose to do it in the first place - but that doesn't change the fact those experiences will be a tiny part of the job you do.  That last statement contains the most pertinent point of all - "the job you do" - the keyword being, "job" - the moment anything becomes a job it becomes methodical and structured, and repetitive.