Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle
Path: utzoo!henry
From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: Teacher vs Journalist in Space
Message-ID: <1989Jan19.205117.17962@utzoo.uucp>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
References: <10373@well.UUCP> <UXp5jly00XooM8aXAi@andrew.cmu.edu>
Date: Thu, 19 Jan 89 20:51:17 GMT

In article <UXp5jly00XooM8aXAi@andrew.cmu.edu> da1n+@andrew.cmu.edu (Daniel K. Appelquist) writes:
>Remember that the main point of the "Teacher In Space," "Dentist in Space"
>etc.. thing was to show that space was safe.  (ironically)  Nasa wanted
>to bring across an immage of these flights being absolutely routine, with
>no danger...

Uh, can you cite references for that?  I've never heard of that as having
anything to do with the "Citizens In Space" program (which is, if I recall
correctly, the proper term covering all those efforts).  In the accounts
I've heard, the motivation basically boils down to giving the public some
vicarious sense of participation in spaceflight, after the original
promises about "routine access to space" were quietly shelved.  The cuts
in the C-I-S program have nothing to do with the changed perception of
safety, except insofar as it offers an excuse to do what some factions
in NASA have wanted to do all along:  restrict spaceflight to career
astronauts, and ban passengers on the grounds that they're too much
trouble.
-- 
Allegedly heard aboard Mir: "A |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
toast to comrade Van Allen!!"  | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
