The first artificial satellite, Sputnik I, was launched on October 4, 1957 and the race to space immediately began however. The culmination on that day is just the collective form of the man’s dreams to fly into space. This dream was termed space research and actually dates back to the second century B.C. when an art if “Ciceros Republic” entitled “Scipios Dream” appeared which presented the concept of the earth as being an insignificant part of a vast universe containing “stars which we never see from earth”.
Perhaps the first written evidence of man’s urge to fly to the moon was provided by Lucian of Greece in the second century A. D. in a story he wrote. Not until the scientific renaissance did man’s interest in space was piqued. Copernicus developed the heliocentric theory which founded the fact that we are revolving around the sun. Tycho Brahe keenly observed the movements of the planets and stars. Kepler who made use of Brahes observations to formulate the three laws of planetary motion. Galileo who actually observed the space using his invented telescope. Newton established the relation between mechanics and theoretical astronomy. With the influence of these men, the idea of space travel reached the minds of writers and correspondingly wrote many science fiction novels about lunar travelling. However, even with all these inspiring endeavors, it was still impossible to travel to outer space. It was not until 1919 when a certain Robert Goddard practically made a rocket that actually managed to lift-off. After his experiment, the developments for the rockets increased and the culmination that was Sputnik 1 came into being. To defray the expenses of launching spacecrafts, the satellites were put to commercial use and thus the taxes that people pay comes in the service brought about by technological breakthrough.
Posted 2011-01-29 and updated on Jun 07, 2011 5:30pm by crisd