Rusty Schweickart

We are going to learn how to relate to the Earth and our own natural environment here by looking seriously at space colony ecologies.

Americans who read the papers or watch Jay Leno have been aware for some time now that there is a slim but real possibility - about 1 in 45,000 - that an 850-foot-long asteroid called Apophis could strike Earth with catastrophic consequences on April 13, 2036.

The nice thing about asteroids is that once you've found them, and once you have a good solid orbit on them, you can predict a hundred years ahead of time whether there is a likelihood of an impact with Earth.

No government in the world today has explicitly assigned the responsibility for planetary protection to any of its agencies.

All of us know today the value of communications satellites, weather satellites, resources satellites, etc.

It is through science that we understand the world around us, and by understanding the world around us, we not only contribute to ourselves, our family, to our communities, etc. - you also contribute to the basic development and evolution of humanity.

When you look at the origins and evolution of life on Earth, it's been severely affected by asteroid impacts through history.