An Introduction to the Space Renaissance movement from its co-founder

Space Renaissance International

I am thrilled to provide this guest article from Adriano Autino, the President and co-founder of Space Renaissance International. Whether you are technically a rocket scientist or not, or ever will be one, the space renaissance is open to everyone who chooses to join it. If you share the values of SRI, as I do, I hope you will join it too. Please appreciate that Adriano is Italian. He speaks English as a second language so some language may be a little rough but the purpose and plans are very clear. Brett

by A. V. Autino, SRI, President

1. The Space Renaissance history and focus

Space Renaissance International (SRI) has existed since 2008. It is known as a philosophical association, based on the historical Renaissance. It aims to rejuvenate  a philosophy that promotes evolution from the pre-copernican closed world view to the concept of an open world. Our philosophical foundation  is deeply humanist, which means in support of the nearly eight billion humans alive today, and their right to the future, to have children, to evolve as a civilization in freedom, peace, and democracy.

We assert that only expanding civilization into outer space can provide the abundance of resources, energy, and space that can warrant the platform for such further evolution. Remaining confined to Earth surface, the civilization would implode under the many exogenous and endogenous threats which are now evident, such as pandemics, pollution, extreme natural events, asteroid impacts, resource wars, just the name the most evident samples.

Our mission is to achieve progress in human society by facilitating its move to becoming an interplanetary society with aspirations as an interstellar civilisation.

By developing such great social process, our civilization will see  the greatest economic growth, unprecedented in history.

We are dedicated to getting humanity off-world, not just astronauts engaged in pioneering exploration, but humanity, en masse. It is a natural part of our development as a species.

Humanity can’t continue in an unsustainable manner within a closed-system. It is what has led to many of our current cultural and socio-economic problems. Our task is to blow wide-open the cell-door and to promote an open-system model. We have a chance to be part of something ‘better’ … something that promotes joy, aspiration, opportunity, and freedom.

The very core of our astronautic humanist thought is that our numeric growth is a key component of human cultural growth. We trust the concepts developed by Julian Simon, Robert Pirsig and other philosophers, who discussed the great value and the primacy of intelligent life as the highest outcome of nature. We believe that each single human life matters, and the life of each individual shall be preserved, since it could provide solution to some big issues. We share the concepts of compassion for every sentient being. Our scope is to decrease the suffering and to increase the happiness of every sentient being. And we believe that we are immersed in a cosmic ecology, not only in a planetary one.

We believe that there is a big delay, in the space community, understanding the needed urgent steps, to determine a change of paradigm, from space exploration to space settlement: the development of enabling technologies and methodologies to transport and accommodate civilian passengers in outer space for long-term living and working.

We want to accelerate such an essential development, necessary to really kick-off the space settlement. This is very urgent, because the window of opportunity for our civilization to kick-off the expansion could dramatically close. Recent global events like covid19 could  devastate our capacities to develop big projects.

The SRI short term focus is the urgent kick-off of civilian space development by  2025. The still dominant paradigm of space exploration doesn’t give the needed priority to science and technologies enabling untrained civilians to travel and live in space. We advocate a radical change towards a space settlement paradigm, in which a good priority will be given to, at least, the following strands of research, all of which are essential to allow the transport, accommodation, and prolonged stay of people in space:

  • low-cost space transport systems for civilian goods and passengers,
  • low acceleration space-crafts (both at launch and re-entry),
  • safe and comfortable atmospheric reentry mechanisms,
  • protection from cosmic radiation,
  • lunar habitats,
  • orbital habitats endowed with artificial gravity by rotation,
  • artificial green ecosystems in closed environments.

The SRI main initiatives, during 2020 and 2021, are the following:

The Space Renaissance Academy program, supported by the Medici Fund, will develop prizes, mentorships and bursaries for students and researchers, giving priority to the disciplines mentioned above.

The Space Renaissance Academy program also foresees to offer financial contributions to universities and research centres, to develop research on our priority disciplines.

Our association can be described, in short, as follows: philosophical, humanist, astronautic humanist, evolutionist, space settler, futurist, scientist, technologist, cosmic ecologist, space advocacy.

2. Who we want to reach, and our main arguments

Our main interlocutors are the following two large kinds of people:

  • Those seeking a desired future
    • the great benefits for civilization if and when the interplanetary expansion will be realized
    • because freedom, democracy and ethics only can grow in a context of abundant resources and growing economy, i.e. in the outer space
    • because only the solar system can provide the wide abundance of resources necessary for the growth and improving life of an 8 billion citizen civilization
  • Those who are concerned, to avoid an undesired future
    • the civilization risks, if the expansion will not be realized
    • we want to see mankind as a space-faring species, to expand civilization among the stars, because Planet Earth’s resources are finite, and will not last for any further growth
    • and because we cannot “keep all of our eggs in the same basket”

The above described subjects can be found mainly in the following social categories:

  • the new entrepreneurial and high-tech class, son of the industrial society, mass education systems and electronic revolution (21st  Century)
  • students and young people in general, which don’t have a future if the world will remain closed
  • teachers of all disciplines, seeking good materials  to inspire their students’ hope and new faith in the future.

In marketing theory they are known as “innovators”. They are often called ‘lighthouses’ because they serve as a beacon of light for the rest of the population to follow. They specifically unlock the ‘early adopters’ (‘the law of diffusion of innovation’ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diffusion_of_innovations) and from there we reach a tipping point.

Our methodology, as soon as we get in contact with such good willing people, should work to give visibility to them and their efforts, helping them to develop their potential, as renaissance leaders.

3. The SRI main goals and plans to achieve them

Our main goal is to communicate our concepts to a very much larger audience, world wide.

We want to influence the large public opinion, to understand the dramatic urgency of expanding human civilization into outer space.

And we want to move political leaders to implement a sustainable civilian space development policy.

In extreme synthesis, SRI wants to act as a world wide political party, reaching to influence the large public opinion and orient their voting capabilities towards new enlightened leaders, endowed with proper capacities to understand the civilization needs and develop suitable programs to fulfil them.

To do that we need to achieve powerful communication means, such as broad newsletter services, professional videos, capacity to get partnerships and testimonials in different worldwide communities, such as the academic communities, the arts and culture worlds, celebrities and recognized opinion leaders.

SRI needs funds to develop a broad outreach programme, hiring professionals and interns in many fields, at least: digital fundraisers, graphic designers, media and social media experts, professional newsletter services, video producers, filmmakers, editors.

SRI also needs funds to provide travel & subsistence expenses reimbursed to the SRI President and other SRI officers to travel and spread our concepts and proposals in conferences and meetings world wide. Also, we need to travel to visit space facilities, companies and research centres relevant for our campaigns and initiatives.We also need to hire and pay officers, to coordinate several volunteer activities:

  • Organizing big and small SRI social events
  • Developing livestream and podcasts for SRI on Radio / TV
  • Offering internships opportunities to students and graduates
  • Offering mentorship opportunities to graduating students
  • Partnering with Universities and Research Centres
  • Organizing Space Renaissance Arts Events and Contexts
  • Collecting information about New Space and Aerospace industry in your Country
  • Making interviews to relevant space people in your Country
  • Making interviews to normal people about civilian expansion into space in your Country
  • Writing articles on local media about civilian expansion into space
  • Talking on local media about civilian expansion into space
  • WebMasters
  • WebDesigners
  • Newsletters publishers
  • Google Advertising Experts
  • Facebook Advertising Experts
  • Seeking and participating to Grants & Prizes
  • inviting new members to the SRI newsletter google group
  • inviting new members to the SRI facebook group and followers/likers to the SRI local facebook pages
  • inviting new followers in linkedin, twitter, instagram
  • inviting people to join SRI, on social media
  • illustrating the SRI mission, vision and programs to new people
  • working in SRI international initiatives, selecting people who could be interested to join SRI
  • sharing best practices among the SRI community
  • systematic worldwide search for writers in the fields of space philosophy, futurism and science fiction, space science & technology, space economy writer, with the aim of create a live community, discussing and organizing the renaissance of human civilization into the outer space

These are our milestones looking towards 2021:

  • 2020 Autumn – a public conference to present the Civilian Space Protocol in Italy (if coronavirus will allow it)
  • 2021 Springtime – the Civilian Space Protocol Congress
  • 2021 Springtime – the 3rd SRI World Congress (likely a section of the above congress)
  • 2021 January – official launch of the Medici Fund
  • 2021 June – official launch of the SR Academy mentorship programme

And these are our desired achievements by 2025:

  • SRI to have contributed to the kick-off of the civilian space development, e.g. some meaningful governments having adopted the Civilian Space Protocol
  • The SRI audience worldwide is millions of people
  • The SRI membership worldwide is  hundreds of thousands people
  • The SR Academy has a number of working classrooms with thousands of students
  • The Medici Fund is worth of several million Euros, capable of funding:
    • mentorships, prizes and bursaries for students (figures will be detailed later)
    • some newspace startups and research centres, for the development of civilian space travel & living enabling technologies

I invite everyone who shares the values of Space Renaissance International to take the next step with a visit to our website. You will see we have already built an exciting movement. I hope you will join us as a member so that together we can make our vision a reality.

Adriano V. Autino, President

Space Renaissance International

Contact info: adriano.autino@spacerenaissance.org


About Brett Rocket Scientist

Brett creates artful work in engineering, ideas, and innovation. In addition to 2 degrees, 3 patents, and over 15 years experience in aerospace engineering, he is the author of several books to foster STEM careers. He volunteers his time and skills as an officer with professional societies.

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