Rational means exercising reason and sound judgment. In international relations theory the rational actor model is that when making a decision the rational decision maker takes into account the foreign policy goals of the nation and determines which one takes priority over others. Then the decision maker weighs up the […]

Since it parachuted onto Mars last September, the American space agency NASA has made the most of the success of the Curiosity rover as it explores the inhospitable Martian terrain around its landing site. While it has achieved some notable exploratory firsts, Curiosity is potentially harming the very human trait […]

It is the early hours on the morning of Thursday, December 7th 1972. A human being  has just snapped a photograph that will change the world. The man in question is not even a trained photographer; doesn’t answer to any editorial team. He’s a geologist by trade, but couldn’t be […]

The recent touchdown in the People’s Republic of China of the Shenzhou 9 spacecraft signals a turning point in the way we perceive space travel. Could the first human being to walk on the moon in almost half a century be a communist? After a thirteen-day flight by astronauts Jing […]

A tenuous link – an experience shared. William Bradford, the son of a Yorkshire farmer, was born in sleepy Austerfield, just outside Doncaster in 1590. What if I was to tell you this man was a factor two of mankind’s most heroic adventures? That without him Neil Armstrong may never […]