Space tourism has officially become a reality, after Virgin Galactic, founded by Richard Branson, on Tuesday began selling tickets for flights into space. The 90-minute flight costs $450,000.
But in the midst of this space race, there are those who are already thinking ahead and coming up with the idea of privatizing the moon. The concept came from the Adam Smith Institute, a think tank The UK’s neo-liberals are calling for the privatization of the Earth’s natural satellite to help fight global poverty.
In a report published last Thursday entitled “Space Invaders: Property Rights on the Moon“, the The Adam Smith Institute argues that the Moon should be divided into pieces, each destined for a country, which in turn may choose to lease these same spaces to space tourism and exploration companies. From the point of view think tankthe space equity money will boost the global economy and help reduce global poverty.
“Property rights play a key role in raising standards of living, innovation and human dignity here on Earth,” says Daniel Pryor, director of research at the Adam Smith Institute. “The same would be true if we applied this logic to space, providing a unique opportunity to start over when designing effective property rules,” he adds.
For Rebecca Lowe, the report’s author, creating a “clear” and “morally justified” system for assigning and regulating property rights in space “would have significant benefits beyond the financial rewards for people who become owners.” “Such a system would encourage responsible stewardship of space, as well as opportunities for new scientific discoveries and democratic space exploration,” says Lowe.
However, there are some obstacles to achieving the utopia of the Adam Smith Institute, the United Nations Treaty on Outer Space. The 1967 agreement states that space belongs to everyone and that no state or person can claim sovereignty over outer space or any celestial body.
The institute, in turn, argues that this treaty is already “obsolete” and that it is necessary to “sooner or later address the issue of extraterrestrial property rights.”
The idea is not reaped
The concept of privatizing the Moon was not well received by the public, with a torrent of criticism on social media. “When you finish colonizing and exploring Earth, it’s the moon’s turn,” he wrote on Twitter. The Adam Smith Institute announced that privatizing the moon would help eradicate poverty on Earth. And you thought that capitalism was out of ideas, ”writes another user on the social network.
Professor Malcolm MacDonald, director of the Scottish Center for Excellence in Satellite Applications and a member of the British Space Agency’s board of directors, also questions the logic of the Adam Smith Institute. “I don’t understand how widening inequality in our Earth system all the way to the Moon will really advance across all of humanity.” The teacher announced to the Scottish newspaper the National.
The UK’s anti-privatization group also criticized “We Own It”. think tank neoliberalism. “Not only encouraging the exploitation of the planet’s natural resources, the Adam Smith Institute is now committed to splitting the moon into something that can be bottled and sold.”Group manager Kat Hobbs said the National.
As they acknowledged in their report, no one can own the Moon under current legal terms. The United Nations Outer Space Treaty states that space exploration is “the prerogative of all mankind.” But for fans of the extremist ideology that says everything should be privatized, nothing, Not even the moon, sacred,” accuses Hobbs.
“You are research centers We must come up with solutions on how to take better care of our planet, rather than speculating how we can turn the Moon into a profit center,” he adds.
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