China may send philosophers into space

[Kneeknocker]

China, whose first astronaut was an ace fighter pilot, may send engineers, teachers and even philosophers into space in future, a top space official said.
"Going into space is not such a big mystery," director of the China National Space Administration, Sun Laiyan said.

"There will need to be an engineer or a scientist, too. We could even have some teachers or philosophers to go up," Sun told reporters on Wednesday.

"If philosophers go up into space, perhaps they'll have a different view of the world," he said. "Especially a Chinese philosopher."

http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_942...85,00040005.htm

[om@umr.edu]

I agree, it would be interesting to have opinions from many different fields of study about space exploration - including philosophers, religious leaders, historians, and others who might bring wisdom or insight to this issue.

With kind regard,

Oliver
http://www.umr.edu/~om

[MarQ]

This Chinese propoganda is nothing new. Always keep in mind that the Chinese space program is military in structure, and determined to dominate the space frontier in a possible adverseral way.
America has had Congressmen, skilled technicians and plenty of artistic and poetic astronauts fly the Space Shuttle. And when the first teacher in space got killed, NASA assessed it is a little too risky to just send any Joe or Jane America into orbit. At one time early in the Space Shuttle program, journalists like Walter Cronkite and other liberal arts leaders were considered to be no-brainers for future space flights. Several Apollo moonwalkers abandoned their NASA jobs for philosophical journeys to seek God (the late James Irwin was obsessed with finding Noah's Ark; Charlie Duke is born again and doesn't consider walking on the Moon even in the Top Five great things in his life&#33.
So, I hope more Chinese will orbit the Earth, and if they can safely put up some intellectual types, more power to them. But the two businessmen who paid Russia $20 million for a week in space has philosophical inspirations, too. And, as one read about the NASA astronauts, many have been changed when seeing our planet from space.