The dreams of space.
Those dreams that I often don’t let myself contemplate, for fear that it will take my attention away from the practical steps that I am focused on now that may enable me to achieve those dreams in the future.
When I am contemplative, I sit back and consider the current plans of those who struggle along side me in Man’s efforts to escape Earth and what is on her.
SpaceX, Orbital, Blue Origin, Boeing, XCOR. Astronautical Engineering courses. Sweeping arcs showing Launch Vehicle Kilograms to circular orbits or escape velocity. Job postings for dynamic Loads engineer, Avionics Test Engineer, Solar Array Engineer. Rarefied Gas Dynamics, Shock Waves and dynamic pressure, nozzle expansion ratios, Melting points, rotation rates, electric discharge arc voltages, power budgets, star trackers, Nickle hydrogen batteries, redundant wiring harnesses…
This is the swarm of brushes, paints on the palate, media types, artistic methods, and implements by which Man creates the works of art that are space exploration.
These are the building blocks of the dreams of spaceflight.
In Space, Man can reinvent society. Find solitude in a nature never beheld by man, and discover alien lifeforms and landscapes. He can plunge to great depths, explode to ultimate heights, insulate himself from the deepest colds and deflect the searing heat of stars far brighter than the sun. He can blast the new knowledge that he gathers through antenna dishes across light years of space or find complete isolation from any and all who could want to communicate. He can travel at incredible speeds or swing in spiraling arcs betwixt alien moons and super-massive planets.
Finally, Man can find himself and what it is to be man when the circumstances that crowd his home of Earth have fallen away leaving him singularly alone with his consciousness and ambition.
Mankind can roll the dice again on himself, his society, and world in a billion billion different places with as many new sets of rules and society-shaping constraints.
Water Jet Operator, Turbomachinery Engineer, Planetary Scientist, Ground Control operator, Mission director, Astronaut. We are legion.
I am John Wilson Benac. I am in the midst of a structured masters degree program from the University of Southern California to learn a coherent and synergistic set of skills to enable me to shape the machines to carry man’s dreams outward. I work 8 hours a day ensuring that the life support systems hardware that launches and returns from the International Space Station supports the mission requirements. I choose, along with thousands of others, the pursuit of space exploration as my careear’s work. And God willing, I shall move mankind outward into the void in which God placed us, to find the shores of distant lands which he created for his truly ambitions and blessed children to attain.
What paintings will be created with the pallet mankind so painstakingly prepares? The Space Shuttle, Space Station, Delta, Atlas, Proton, Soyuz, GPS, Arienne machines were once concepts alongside hundreds of other ideas which never were realized. As in the 1950s, countless tabletop designs ask for our limited resources to turn them into actual dream machines.
From Konstantin Tsiolkovsky’s 1903 “The Exploration of Cosmic Space by Means of Reaction Devices” to Jules Verne’s 1865 “From the Earth to the Moon” and Hermann Oberth’s 1923 “The Rocket into Planetary Space,” all the way through the countless college students, practicing engineers, and enchanted layman, we dream and imagine together what man may do in the limitless star filled expanse that is outer space.
Perhaps I should indulge in the pleasure and wonder by conceiving of a few paintings of my own rather than focus on the palate from which the paintings are created.
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- Dual Cryogenic Capacitive Density Sensor - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Advanced Technologies Will Help Hubble Yield More Remarkable Discoveries - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Dr. Gerard Holzmann, Senior Research Scientist at the Laboratory for Reliable Software, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- NASA Research Will Help Aircraft Avoid Ocean Storms and Turbulence - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- NASA Awards 2008 Software of the Year - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Here Come The Tricorders - Update - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- China's View on Space - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
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- Ares 1-Y is Toast - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Beyond Augustine - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Analyzing LCROSS' Plume - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Live Event: NASA-Sponsored Power Beaming Challenge - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- JSC Wants To Build a Replicator - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- USA: Looking For Ways To Hang On - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Lunar Lander Challenge Prizes Awarded - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Senate Votes To Restore NASA Budget Cuts - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- New FAA Regs for Commercial Reentry - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- TEDxNASA: An Invitation-Only NASA Meeting - Unless You Are Lucky - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Close Call For Courtney Stadd - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
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- Making NASA Cool - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Engaging JSC’s Next Gen: A Leadership Analysis - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Dumpster Diving for Rockets - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- TEDx NASA - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Reflections On a Business Trip in Huntsville - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Staying the Course - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- The Economics of Space - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Ideas at Work - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Blah Blah Blah - Why We Should Care About Social Media - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Will White House Speak Soon About NASA? - December 12th, 2009 [December 12th, 2009]
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- ASDX Series of silicon pressure sensors - December 13th, 2009 [December 13th, 2009]
- Industry Update: Analysis & Simulation Software - December 13th, 2009 [December 13th, 2009]
- Battery Will Provide Backup Power for Space Shuttles - December 13th, 2009 [December 13th, 2009]
- NASA Employee Claims To Have Witnessed Hijacking Planning - December 13th, 2009 [December 13th, 2009]
- Big Party in The Mojave Tonight - December 13th, 2009 [December 13th, 2009]
- Looking at Boulders on the Moon - December 13th, 2009 [December 13th, 2009]
- SpaceBook Featured by White House - December 13th, 2009 [December 13th, 2009]
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- LaRC internal Poll Update - December 13th, 2009 [December 13th, 2009]
- Coalition for Space Exploration Does a (Much Needed) Reboot - December 13th, 2009 [December 13th, 2009]
- Lunar Orbiter: Comparing Old and New Images - December 13th, 2009 [December 13th, 2009]
- Boulder Trails On The Moon - December 13th, 2009 [December 13th, 2009]
- Vote for John Grunsfeld - National Geographic Adventurer of the YeAR - December 13th, 2009 [December 13th, 2009]
- Charlie Bolden at WIA/AIAA - December 13th, 2009 [December 13th, 2009]
- Live Webcast From The Lunar Orbiter Image Recovery Project - December 13th, 2009 [December 13th, 2009]
- Big Aerospace Warns of Job Cut Impact - December 13th, 2009 [December 13th, 2009]
- The Boulders of Copernicus - December 13th, 2009 [December 13th, 2009]
- shame on us - December 13th, 2009 [December 13th, 2009]
- 2009 Space Elevator Games - December 13th, 2009 [December 13th, 2009]
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- Bringing Home The Bacon - December 14th, 2009 [December 14th, 2009]
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- WISE Launch A Success - December 14th, 2009 [December 14th, 2009]
- Dynetics Buys Orion Propulsion - December 15th, 2009 [December 15th, 2009]
- New NASA Governance Structure Under Development - December 16th, 2009 [December 16th, 2009]
- Bolden Meets With Obama on Wednesday - December 16th, 2009 [December 16th, 2009]
- MSFC Procurement Doesn't Understand what "Open Source" Means - December 16th, 2009 [December 16th, 2009]
- Bolden Meets With Obama - December 17th, 2009 [December 17th, 2009]
- Parker Griffith AT MSFC Today - December 18th, 2009 [December 18th, 2009]
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- Waterworld Found - December 18th, 2009 [December 18th, 2009]
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