The JustSpace Alliance February 2023 Newsletter
An exciting announcement (and gift for you) inside!
Hello, friends, fans, followers (and possibly… frenemies?) of JustSpace! This quarter we’re celebrating some particularly exciting news, so buckle up!
Drumroll, please…
We are delighted to announce that JustSpace co-founder Erika Nesvold has a book coming out on March 7. Off-Earth: Ethical Questions and Quandaries for Living in Outer Space explores the ethical and human rights challenges that humanity would face in a space settlement. The book includes interviews with experts in history, sociology, anthropology, philosophy, law, and social justice to ask: what can we learn from the mistakes of our past and present on Earth to build better futures in space?
If you’re a member of the JustSpace Alliance or just a supporter of our mission to advocate for a more inclusive and ethical future in space, we think you’ll enjoy Off-Earth! So we’re offering a special preorder discount code for 20% off and free shipping: Just preorder from Penguin Random House and use the code PREORDER15 (see terms and conditions at this link).
We’d also like to share a sneak peak of the book with you: You can read a sample chapter here! This chapter asks, how do we choose who gets to go live in a space settlement? And how will those choices shape the future of the community there?
The JustSpace Alliance is also hosting a live virtual Q&A event on March 16 at 8pm EDT (midnight UTC). Britt Duffy Adkins of Celestial Citizen will moderate a conversation with author Erika Nesvold about the book and the questions it poses. We’re excited to be working with Celestial Citizen, , a space urban planning company that is on a mission to build sustainable space communities by bringing together people, systems, and technology (we especially recommend the Celestial Citizen podcast and their newsletter). This event is free for anyone who preorders Off-Earth before the publication date of March 7. To reserve your spot, just fill out this registration form and provide a screenshot of your preorder receipt.
To Listen/Watch
Equitable Science and Dark Matter
Just this past week on Adam Conover’s Factually! podcast, theoretical physicist and feminist theorist Dr. Chanda Prescod-Weinstein has a wide-ranging conversation with Conover about “what the hell dark matter actually IS and how much we know about it, why being a particle physicist is not just about making things up, and how much better not just science, but human life would be if everyone had equal access to the beautiful project of understanding the natural world”. Listen here!
Catch the Mars-Moon conjunction
Have you noticed the planets shining bright in the night sky lately? Last week, Venus, Jupiter, and the Moon gathered together in the night sky in an arrangement known as a conjunction. Tonight, the Moon and Mars come within a degree or two of one another (and if by some chance you’re reading this from the Arctic, the Moon will actually occult Mars! Just make sure you bundle up for stargazing). You can see a sky chart for the Moon-Mars conjunction (and all this week’s skywatching notables) here at Sky and Telescope.
To Read
Turns out, not everyone reads the Terms of Service
Over at The Smoke Eater, journalist Dominic Gwinn has a detailed breakdown of recent developments on Starlink’s use in Ukraine, specifically SpaceX being somewhat… miffed that Starlink had been weaponized, in violation of the Starlink Terms of Service (the Starlink TOS also contain a clause that states that Mars is not bound by any Earthly government).
If you’ve followed some of the work on Starlink’s affordability and utility, you’ll also be particularly interested in Gwinn’s coverage of the volleys over how SpaceX’s Starlink “donation” is being paid for, a fascinating dive into the real-world messiness of a seemingly PR win.
Earth Imagery’s Colonial Legacy
In this article for Opinio Juris’ Symposium on Fairness, Equality, and Diversity in Open Source Investigations, international lawyer Cris van Eijk takes a look at the troubled history of remote sensing. van Eijk also provides a series of useful and thought-provoking questions for users of remote sensing data– which, because of the way imagery of Earth is interwoven with many people’s daily lives (hello, Google Earth), everyone should read.
That’s all the newsletter for now! Remember to pick up a copy of Off-Earth, and we hope to see you at our live Q&A on March 16th!
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