Man And Machine The Real Legacy Of The Moon Race

From Boston.com:

For the millions who watched the grainy television feed from the moon on July 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong’s small step seemed to herald a new era. Arthur C. Clarke had already predicted that the children born during the Apollo missions would one day have their passports stamped on the moon; in the lunar spectacle, we glimpsed a brighter future in which humans would conquer the vastness of space and acknowledge their brotherhood on the pale blue dot of the home planet.

And yet, 40 years on, the Apollo program looks less like the start of a new era and more like an ancient culture that flourished briefly and then vanished, leaving only ruined towers, ritual costumes, and incomprehensible glyphs. In the decades since the last towering Saturn V tore through the night sky, NASA’s astronauts have spent their time on modest missions closer to home. The age of easy space travel that Apollo seemed to promise never materialized. And for all its technological marvels, Apollo bequeathed little to our material culture besides instant orange drink, freeze-dried ice cream, and the statuettes of the MTV video music awards.

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