As it heads out of the solar system never to return, the deep space probe Voyager 1 is headed for yet another cosmic milestone. In late 2026, it will become the first spacecraft to travel so far that a radio signal from Earth takes 24 hours, or one light day, to reach it.
We certainly make plenty that will stand the test of time still. It’s just we also mass produce junk now. We haven’t forgotten the science of making things that last. I guarantee NASA could if they had the money and freedom.
And therein lies the rub.
Although with some technologies, NASA has already fully closed down the projects and so would be starting from notes for the next round, having to figure out the implementation all over again.
Thankfully in the case of the Voyager program, there’s still a skeleton of it that’s fully operational, so replicating it would be astronomically simpler.
It’s that very last one that concerns me. It feels like the drive that got us to the moon, and put Voyager out there deep into the cosmos, is nearing gone for one reason or another.
It’s because stupidity is winning.
The most pressing problem we have in the world right now is stupidity.