Reed's Ruminations: The Past, Present, and Future
Reflections on science, technology, and computing — leavened by personal experience
Tag: risk
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A Question to Ponder
What probability of successful return would you accept to be the first human to set foot on Mars? The question speaks to the centrality of our humanity, our insatiable curiosity and our hope to be remembered for having done something new, for having made a difference.
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Innovation: The Plane of Excellence
My friend Thomas Sterling once posed a rhetorical question whose answer still haunts me, “In which year of birth (1930 or 1970) would one have had the higher probability of walking on the moon?” Putting aside the Cold War dynamics of the race to the moon, which were both real and complex, Sterling’s question is…