Hermann Oberth Quotes

We are at the moment looking at space as something to be entered by the tremendous thrust of a rocket because that is the attitude of attacking the unknown. And that causes us not to realize that we are already on the most magnificently equipped spaceship, which could hardly be improved upon. It has got a source of temperature and energy just at the right distance from it. It's beautifully equipped with oxygen, with food supplies, with all kinds of delightful things to do while on the journey.... and it's traveling through space at a colossal speed... and it's called the planet Earth.

The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination.

By 2025 we expect new spacecraft designed for long journeys to allow us to begin the first ever crewed missions beyond the Moon into deep space. So we'll start by sending astronauts to an asteroid for the first time in history. By the mid-2030s I believe we can send humans to orbit Mars and return them safely to Earth. And a landing on Mars will follow and I expect to be around in see it.

I think the human race doesn't have a future if it doesn't go into space.

It's hardly a secret that I'm skeptical of declarations that the aliens are out and about on our planet. Still, I try to answer every one of these mails and phone calls because, after all, it's not a violation of physics to travel from one star system to another.

Rocket scientists agree that we have about reached the limit of our ability to travel in space using chemical rockets. To achieve anything near the speed of light we will need a new energy source and a new propellant. Nuclear fission is not an option.

The Space Program is an investment of the nation’s future…. Humans will not be confined to this planet forever.

Humanity is not forever chained to this planet.

There are many in the field of cosmology, who believe as I do, that finding ways to travel great distances will be essential to keeping human kind alive in an aging universe.

Dreams of warp drives and hyperspace are just that - dreams.

I don't like the way the whole thing has developed. And I just hope that we develop our own transportation system, both spacecraft and new boosters, as soon as possible. I hate to think that we may be out there seven to ten years out and dependent on the Russians for our journey into space.

I hate to think that we may be out there seven to ten years out and dependent on the Russians for our journey into space.

If we restructure things to see that the hero's journey is a degree in astrophysics rather than a journey to star in a reality show, that's a better world.

Really exotic methods of propulsion . . . will have to be devised to get there. How it will be done, I do not know. Whether it will be done, I am not quite certain. But I would bet it can be done.

I think no matter where we go in space to me the important thing is not only getting there and getting back, but it's also doing research, because that opens up as a possibility with that new distance of travel in space.

And I think my spaceship knows which way to go.

To set foot on the soil of the asteroids, to lift by hand a rock from the Moon, to observe Mars from a distance of several tens of kilometers, to land on its satellite or even on its surface, what can be more fantastic? From the moment of using rocket devices a new great era will begin in astronomy: the epoch of the more intensive study of the firmament.

The destiny of Earthseed is to take root among the stars.

The moon is the first milestone on the road to the stars.

There are flying grandfathers. But I intend to be an orbiting grandfather.

Nothing will ever be what the Voyager mission was.

Development of the space station is as inevitable as the rising of the sun; man has already poked his nose into space and he is not likely to pull it back . . . . There can be no thought of finishing, for aiming at the stars-both literally and figuratively-is the work of generations, and no matter how much progress one makes, there is always the thrill of just beginning.

Traveling through space is stupifyingly monotonous.

Every age has its dreams, its symbols of romance. Past generations were moved by the graceful power of the great windjammers, by the distant whistle of locomotives pounding through the night, by the caravans leaving on the Golden Road to Samarkand, by quinqueremes of Nineveh from distant Ophir . . . Our grandchildren will likewise have their inspiration-among the equatorial stars. They will be able to look up at the night sky and watch the stately procession of the Ports of Earth-the strange new harbors where the ships of space make their planetfalls and their departures.

Since I was really little, I've just always had an obsession with, not just science fiction, but science and space. And also because as time passes and the more advanced science becomes, the more interesting it becomes.