The celestial commons: How the space race projects old conflicts of property and power onto the moon

“ The circle of changes through which the moon passes in about thirty days, is marked, in the earliest stages of language, by a word which implies the space of time which one such circle occupies; just 119 as the circle of changes of the seasons is designated by the word year. The lunar changes are, indeed, more obvious to the sense, and strike a more careless person, than the annual; the moon, when the sun is absent, is almost the sole natural object which attracts our notice; and we look at her with a far more tranquil and agreeable attention than we bestow on any other celestial object. ”

“ Shining large and fair in the heavens, the moon seems, as a queen, to lead forth the hosts of the stars, but if we watch its course each of the twenty-seven days which it requires for its journey around the earth, we shall see that it continually falls behind the progress of the shining hosts, and possesses a motion entirely independent of them. The moon, like the earth, shines by the reflected light of the sun, and this causes the lunar or moon phases. ”

“ The moon has no atmosphere; no rain falls on her barren surface; no clouds move above her; no tempests howl in her caverns; no snows crown her volcanic peaks; no sunsets shine in gorgeous colors; there are no violet and crimson skies at dawn. The moon is the kingdom of eternal calm, and sleep, and stillness. If any blow disturbs the lunar surface, it is from the fall of meteors rained upon it through space. It is [Pg 77] to our atmosphere we owe the glories of the clouds, the beneficence of waters, the magic of frost changes, the rush of storms, the balmy breezes, the sky. ”

“ The Moon is not a Planet, but only a Satellite or Attendant of the Earth, moving round the Earth from Change to Change in 29 days 12 hours and 44 minutes; and going round the Sun with it every year. The Moon’s diameter is 2180 miles; and her distance from the Earth 240 thousand. She goes round her Orbit in 27 days 7 hours 43 minutes, moving about 2290 miles every hour; and turns round her Axis exactly in the time that she goes round the Earth, which is the reason of her keeping always the same side towards us, and that her day and night taken together is as long as our lunar month. ”

“ Dawn, as we have it on earth, can have no counterpart upon the moon. No atmosphere is there to reflect the solar beams while the luminary is yet out of actual sight, and only the glimmer of the zodiacal light heralds the approach of day. From the black horizon the sun suddenly darts his bright untempered beams upon the mountain tops, crowning them with dazzling brilliance while their flanks and valleys are yet in utter darkness. There is no blending of the night into day. ”

“ The sky is an eternally black space, vaultless, jeweled with stars by day as by night.
Let us suppose that we arrive among these savage [Pg 250] steppes at daybreak: the lunar day is fifteen times longer than our own, because the Sun takes a month to illuminate the entire circuit of the Moon; there are no less than 354 hours from the rising to the setting of the Sun. If we arrive before the sunrise, there is no aurora to herald it, for in the absence of atmosphere there can be no sort of twilight. ”

“ We set sail on this new sea because there is new knowledge to be gained, and new rights to be won, and they must be won and used for the progress of all people. For space science, like nuclear science and all technology, has no conscience of its own. Whether it will become a force for good or ill depends on man, and only if the United States occupies a position of pre-eminence can we help decide whether this new ocean will be a sea of peace or a new terrifying theater of war. ”

“ Our horizons and our competence have expanded to the point that we can consider unmanned missions to any region in our solar system; manned bases in earth orbit, lunar orbit or on the surface of the Moon; manned missions to Mars; space transportation systems that carry their payloads into orbit and then return and land as a conventional jet aircraft; reusable nuclear-powered rockets for space operations; remotely controlled roving science vehicles on the Moon or on Mars; and application of space capability to a variety of services of benefit to man here on earth. ”

“ Those who came before us made certain that this country rode the first waves of the industrial revolution, the first waves of modern invention, and the first wave of nuclear power, and this generation does not intend to founder in the backwash of the coming age of space. We mean to be a part of it—we mean to lead it. For the eyes of the world now look into space, to the moon and to the planets beyond, and we have vowed that we shall not see it governed by a hostile flag of conquest, but by a banner of freedom and peace. ”

“ There is nothing which so generally strikes the imagination, and engages the affections of mankind, as the right of property; or that sole and despotic dominion which one man claims and exercises over the external things of the world, in total exclusion of the right of any other individual in the universe. And yet there are very few that will give themselves the trouble to consider the original and foundation of this right. ”

“ There is a love of power inherent in human nature; and it cannot be uncharitable to suppose that the nation in general, and the cabinet in particular, are too likely to be influenced by it. What can be more flattering than to look across the Atlantic, and to see in the boundless continent of America, increasing Millions whom we have a right to order as we please, who hold their property at our disposal, and who have no other law than our will. ”

“ All Economic details, the familiar and the unfamiliar, the obvious and the mysterious, the known and the unknown, generalize with precision into the three Basic Facts of Economics—Artificial Objects, Natural Resources and Man.
Natural Resources are the source and the indispensable condition at every stage, from beginning to end, in the production of every kind of satisfaction for human wants. Man is the active agent at all stages. Artificial Objects constitute the category into which each result generalizes at each stage of production. ”

“ That the remuneration of the labor of a country is mainly governed by the relations between demand and supply is an inexorable fact. In view of the international mobility of capital, the main distinctive factor in the demand for the labor of a particular country is the supply of natural resources, which it knows how to use. Where the natural resources are great relatively to the population, there wages will rule high; where the converse is true, wages will rule low. ”

“ Perhaps it is a mistake to think of intellectual property in the same way we think of physical property. Perhaps limitations and exceptions to those rights are as important as the rights themselves. Perhaps the public domain has a vital and tragically neglected role to play in innovation and culture. Perhaps relentlessly expanding property rights will not automatically bring us increased innovation in science and culture. Perhaps the second enclosure movement is more troubling than the first. ”

“ But to maintain, by fire and sword, dominion over the persons and the property of a people out of the realm, who have no share in its legislature, contradicts every principle of liberty and humanity.—Legitimate government, let it be remembered, as opposed to oppression and tyranny, consists “only in the dominion of EQUAL LAWS made with COMMON CONSENT, or of men over THEMSELVES; and not in the dominion of communities over communities, or of ANY MEN OVER OTHER MEN.”—This is the great truth I have endeavoured to explain and defend ”

“ From gravitation come the movement of the moon in her orbit, that of the planets round the sun, and perhaps a progress of the whole solar system through space; from the living energy of the plant cherished by the moisture and heat of heaven proceed, the expanding of the leaf, and the putting forth of the flower and fruit; from the laws of molecular attraction, come the beautiful forms of the mineral, vegetable, and animal creation; from the principle of love to God comes the habit of delighting in him ”

“ By virtue of attraction, the Moon causes the Earth to turn every month around their common centre of gravity,—a point which travels one thousand seven hundred kilometres below the surface of [199] the globe. The Earth causes the Sun to turn annually around their common centre of gravity, situated four hundred and fifty-six kilometres from the solar centre; all the worlds act upon each other perpetually, so that there is no isolation, no real separation, between them. Instead of being a void separating the worlds from one another, space is rather a connecting link. ”

“ By and large, the kind of science-fiction which makes tomorrow's headlines as near as this morning's coffee, has enlarged popular awareness of the modern, miraculous world of science we live in. It has helped generations of young people feel at ease with a rapidly changing world.
But fashions change, old loves return, and now that Sputniks clutter up the sky with new and unfamiliar moons, the readers of science-fiction are willing to wait for tomorrow to read tomorrow's headlines. Once again, I think, there is a place, a wish, a need and hunger for the wonder and color of the world way out. ”

“ Following the modern spirit, the real poems of the present, ever solidifying and expanding into the future, must vocalize the vastness and splendor and reality with which scientism has invested man and the universe, (all that is called creation) and must henceforth launch humanity into new orbits, consonant, with that vastness, splendor, and reality, (unknown to the old poems,) like new systems of orbs, balanced upon themselves, revolving in limitless space, more subtle than the stars. ”

“ There is no strife, no prejudice, no national conflict in outer space as yet. Its hazards are hostile to us all. Its conquest deserves the best of all mankind, and its opportunity for peaceful cooperation may never come again. But why, some say, the moon? Why choose this as our goal? And they may well ask why climb the highest mountain? Why, 35 years ago, fly the Atlantic? Why does Rice play Texas?
We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon... (interrupted by applause) ”

“ But I feel sorry for my old pals of the Moon Patrol. Somebody is going to get hurt!"
"And it may be we," said Bill. "The Triton will be convoyed by several war-fliers, and she can fight with her own rays. It looks to me like a hard nut to crack."
"I used to dream about how I would take a ship if I were the Prince of Space," said Captain Brand. "I've just been talking our course of action over with him. We've agreed on a plan."
In an hour the Prince and Dr. Trainor entered the bridge. Paula appeared in a few moments. Her face was drawn and pale; unhappiness cast a shadow in her brown eyes. ”

“ When focused on a point, the impact-pressure of their rays equaled that of the projectile from an ancient cannon. Metal in the positive ray is heated to fusion, living matter carbonized and burned away. And the positive charge carried by the ray is sufficient to electrocute any living being in contact with it.
This Moon Patrol fleet of nine sunships was setting out in pursuit of the Prince of Space, the interplanetary buccaneer who had abducted Paula Trainor and her father, and the enigmatic Mr. Cain. Bill was going aboard as special correspondent for the Herald-Sun. ”

“ I am going to fit out the Red Rover for a voyage to Mars. It will take that much vitalium for the batteries."
"We are going to Mars!"
"The only hope for humanity is for us to strike first and to strike hard!" ”

“ Easily enough to furnish power for the voyage to Mars. We have the metal—provided we can get away with it."
"Is there still danger?" Paula inquired nervously.
"Yes. Most of the passengers of the Triton were still alive. When I gave her captain my card, he told me that they sent a heliographic S.O.S. as soon as we attacked. Some forty or fifty fliers of the Moon Patrol will be hot on our trail."
The Red Rover flew on into space, under all her power. Presently the lookouts picked up a score of tiny flickering points of light behind them. The Moon Patrol was in hot pursuit. ”

“ So little do men in power sometimes know how to preserve power; and so remarkably does the desire of extending dominion sometimes destroy it.—Mankind are naturally disposed to continue in subjection to that mode of government, be it what it will, under which they have been born and educated. ”

“ Chief among these time-warped preconceptions—or superstitions—that so stand over out of the alien past among these democratic peoples is the institution of property. As is true of preconceptions touching the supernatural verities, so here too the article of use and wont in question will not bear formulation in mechanistic terms and is not congruous with that mechanistic logic that is incontinently bending the habits of thought of the common man more and more consistently to its own bent. ”

“ It will perhaps be objected to this, that if gathering the acorns, or other fruits of the earth, &c. makes a right to them, then any one may ingross as much as he will. To which I answer, Not so. The same law of nature, that does by this means give us property, does also bound that property too. God has given us all things richly, 1 Tim. vi. 12. is the voice of reason confirmed by inspiration. But how far has he given it us? To enjoy. As much as any one can make use of to any advantage of life before it spoils, so much he may by his labour fix a property in: ”

“ The only true foundation of any right to property is man’s labor. That is property, and that alone which the labor of man has made such. What right, then, can the Government have in the soil of a wild and uncultivated wilderness as a source of revenue, to which not a day nor hour’s labor has been applied, to make it more productive, and answer the end for which it was created, the support and happiness of the race? ”

“ The moment the fact ceases to be exceptional, the moment diamonds can be had in abundance by merely picking them up, that moment their value will simply represent the cost of the physical effort requisite to pick them up. Again, if land squatted upon has any value as property whatever in the first instance, it is because it is the embodiment of the labor required to discover it, to conquer it, to defend and protect it; to effect all of which, taxes, which are the results of labor, may have been paid for centuries. ”

“ When possession is taken of a "res nullius," that is, of an object which is not, or has never been, reduced to dominion, the possessor is permitted to become proprietor from a feeling that all valuable things are naturally the subjects of an exclusive enjoyment, and that in the given case there is no one to invest with the right of property except the Occupant. The Occupant in short, becomes the owner, because all things are presumed to be somebody's property and because no one can be pointed out as having a better right than he to the proprietorship of this particular thing. ”

“ The mere discovery of new and richer mines need not, of itself, lower the price of the precious metals. Their price depends on their cost of production; and it may be very much increased, even under the most favorable natural conditions, by the unskillfulness of labor, the dearness of the means of [pg 412] subsistence, of machinery and of auxiliary substances, by insecurity to property or to the person ”

“ That force of states, which ought to be applied only to their own defence, we see continually applied to the purpose of attack, and used to extend dominion by conquering neighbouring communities.—Civil governors consider not themselves servants but as masters. Their stations they think they hold in their own right. The people they reckon their property; [31] and their possessions, a common stock from which they have a right to take what [66] they will, and of which no more belongs to any individual than they are pleased to leave him. ”

“ Some, I doubt not, are influenced by no other principle, than a regard to what they think the just authority of this country over its colonies, and to the unity and indivisibility of the British Empire. I wish such could be engaged to enter thoroughly into the enquiry, which has been the subject of the first part of this pamphlet; and to consider, particularly, how different a thing maintaining the authority of government within a state is from maintaining the authority of one people over another, already happy in the enjoyment of a government of their own. ”

“ From the nature and principles of Civil Liberty, as they have been now explained, it is an immediate and necessary inference that no one community can have any power over the property or legislation of another community, which is not incorporated with it by a just and adequate representation.—Then only, it has been shewn, is a state free, when it is governed by its own will. But a country that is subject to the legislature of another country, in which it has no voice, and over which it has no controul, cannot be said to be governed by its own will. ”

“ But, probably, most persons will be for using milder language; and for saying no more than, that the united legislatures of England and Scotland have of right power to tax the Colonies, and a supremacy of legislation over America.—But this comes to the same. If it means any thing, it means, that the property and the legislations of the Colonies, are subject to the absolute discretion of Great Britain, and ought of right to be so. The nature of the thing admits of no limitation. The Colonies can never be admitted to be judges, how far the authority over them in these cases shall extend. ”

“ There is something (says a great writer) so unnatural in supposing a large society, sufficient for all the good purposes of an independent political union, remaining subject to the direction and government of a distant body of men who know not sufficiently the circumstances and exigencies of this society; or in supposing this society obliged to be governed solely for the benefit of a distant country; that it is not easy to imagine there can be any foundation for it in justice or equity. ”

“ In fact, in many cases, the reality is even worse: there appears to be a complete ignorance about the value of the public domain. Property's opposite, its outside, is getting short shrift. 47
To paraphrase a song from my youth, "how did we get here?" Where should we turn to understand the role of intellectual property in the era of the Internet and the decoding of the human genome? We could turn to the cutting edge of technology or to economics or information theory. ”

“ How important is it that we get the rules of intellectual property right? To me, a number of my colleagues, some librarians, a few software gurus, the White Paper was more than just a bit of bad policy in a technical field—like a poorly drafted statute about the witnessing of wills, say. When you set up the property rules in some new space, you determine much about the history that follows. Property rules have a huge effect on power relationships and bargaining positions. Think of rules setting out water rights or the right to drive cattle over homesteaders' land in the American West. ”

“ LEARNING FROM ENVIRONMENTALISM 23
I have argued that our policies are distorted not merely by industry capture or the power of incumbent firms, but by a series of cultural and economic biases or presuppositions: the equation of intellectual property to physical property; the assumption that whenever value is created, an intellectual property right should follow; the romantic idea of creativity that needs no raw material from which to build; the habit of considering the threats, but not the benefits, of new technologies; the notion that more rights will automatically bring more innovation ”

“ The only demand that property recognizes is its own gluttonous appetite for greater wealth, because wealth means power; the power to subdue, to crush, to exploit, the power to enslave, to outrage, to degrade. America is particularly boastful of her great power, her enormous national wealth. Poor America, of what avail is all her wealth, if the individuals comprising the nation are wretchedly poor. If they live in squalor, in filth, in crime, with hope and joy gone, a homeless, soilless army of human prey. ”

“ You start with the site value of the land at the present moment, and by site value—I am not going into technicalities—we mean, roughly speaking, the value of the land divested of the buildings. You do not go back into the past, you take things as they are; you do not rip up the previous history; you do not interfere with existing or past contracts. You give to every man, however he has acquired it, the full and undisturbed enjoyment of the rights, privileges, and property which he at present possesses. ”

“ The possession of rich natural [Pg 560] resources to-day does not insure a community enduring prosperity.
Effect of accumulating wealth
3. The mass and quality of wealth will increase rapidly if social and political conditions remain stable. The main method of increasing wealth must be the putting of energies and resources into more abiding forms. In order that a motive for saving may be present, there must be stable conditions. Increasing subordination of present to future will be accompanied by a fall in the rate of interest. ”

“ Property, the dominion of man's needs, the denial of the right to satisfy his needs. Time was when property claimed a divine right, when it came to man with the same refrain, even as religion, "Sacrifice! ”