People seem very cross these days.

Misinformation is running rampant, they say.

Democracy is in danger.

Our liberties are in danger.

Technology is enslaving us.

Speech is being censored. Children are being indoctrinated. Everything on this view is just terrible. Cut a little deeper, however, and you'll

discover that some pretty amazing stuff is happening. There are a lot of people with dreams of

earth and sky, if I may borrow a phrase from the great physicist Freeman Dyson, who in turn

got it from the space visionary Constantine Salkovsky. It's an exciting time. And there's

more reason than ever to believe, as Dyson and Salkovsky did, that our destiny is in the stars.

Of course, there are a few steps to go between here and cosmic civilization.

Mars, for a start, is never much closer than 40 million miles away.

It has no atmosphere to speak of, and a typical nighttime

temperature is negative 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Humans don't do so well with cold or isolation or

radiation. We don't know how the first spacefarers will do in the face of what's been called the Earth Out of View phenomenon.

These are all still huge obstacles.

There's a lot to overcome.

But what we're seeing today advances in satellite technology, a proliferation of man space flights,

ambitious projects to build factories in space and to

return to the moon, these are steps on the path.

Welcome to a long overdue space episode of the Tech Policy podcast.

It's not the show's first space law episode, but it's the first one that I, your

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