Guest: Chris Carberry. Topics: Mars Society, NASA Administrator, terraforming Mars, life on Mars, commercial missions to Mars, Mars advocacy. Chris Carberry, Executive Director of The Mars Society, was the guest today to discuss the upcoming Mars Society Conference at College Park, MD on the campus of the University of Maryland from July 30-August 2, 2009. To find out more about the conference, please visit www.marssociety.org/portal/c/Conventions/2009. In addition, the Call for Papers is still outstanding so if you are interested in submitting a paper for this conference, please visit www.marssociety.org/portal/c/Conventions/2009/news/2009ConventionCallFo…. During our discussion, Chris went over the key note speakers and some of the major conference themes. As the show progressed, we talked about terraforming Mars, methane and possible life on Mars, the next NASA Administrator and what would be a good way for NASA to facilitate a humans to Mars mission as soon as possible. See if you agree with what Chris Carberry said NASA should do. Another topic that came up for discussion was effective advocacy. We talked about having a unified space advocacy approach rather than lots of space advocate organizations pursuing their own agenda. Comparisons were made to national lobby and advocacy organizations such AARP and the NRA. I think you will find Mr. Carberry's comments on this issue to be most intereesting. Student programming for The Mars Society was discussed as well as student pricing and dorm space for the upcoming conference. Chris also told us that this year's conference would make use of lots of panels, more so than in the past. Toward the end of the program, Chris was asked about joint projects with environmental groups and the alleged conflicts space advocacy organizations have with environmental groups. Listen to what Chris has to say about this and some upcoming Mars Society projects. If you have a question or comment for Chris Carberry or want to know more about The Mars Society and the 2009 convention, please email Chris at carberry@marssociety.org.
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The Space Show
