What can we learn about ourselves from epic space missions?

Now that Cassini has met its end by plunging into Saturn, it's time to reflect on what we've learned over the decades.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to brain Stuff from how Stuff Works, Hey, brain Stuff,
It's Christian Sager here before meeting its fiery demise in
Saturn's atmosphere on Friday September, NASA's groundbreaking Cassini mission to
Saturn had spent thirteen years redefining our view of the
beautiful ringed gas giant, but its discoveries went well beyond

(00:28):
pure science. Like the long duration space missions that came
before it, the Galileo mission to Jupiter, the Twin Voyager probes,
and more recently, the European Rosetta mission, Cassini irrevocably changed
our perspectives, becoming ingrained in the lives of the people
who worked with the mission and had tangible impacts on society.

(00:51):
Cassini's scientific accolades are nothing short of revolutionary. With the
help of the European High Jen's Lander, it explored the
stunning lee dynamic atmosphere of Titan, discovering vast lakes of
liquid methane and uncovering a vast subsurface ocean of liquid water.
Close up examinations of the planet's rings revealed stunning detail

(01:15):
and the intricate relationship with its moons. Cassini tracked changes
in Saturn's atmosphere as its seasons progressed, a feat that
could only be achieved by putting a long duration probe
in orbit about the planet for more than a decade.
And then there's end cell Aduce, a small icy moon that,

(01:37):
until Cassini arrived in two thousand four, hit a secret
and ocean with the potential for life. Thanks to end
sell Aduce, it doesn't look as if you need a
planet with liquid water on its surface like Earth. Unlike
our world, moons like en Celaduce, Titan, possibly Dione, Jupiter's Europa,

(01:59):
and nept Tunes Triton hide their liquid water underneath their surfaces,
and these moons are abundant dynamic places in our solar system.
Io has volcanic plumes and Europa has a liquid ocean
with seas, rain rivers, and volcanoes. Geysers come out of

(02:19):
Neptune's moon Titan. Though these places are extremely cold and
water cannot exist as a liquid. Other chemicals with lower
freezing points step in to become their lubricants, and in
the case of Titan, its methane and all kinds of hydrocarbons.
In the case of insuladuce it's liquid water heated by

(02:40):
tides all the way out to Neptune, where the lubricant
is nitrogen. This could mean that we might discover a
similar rich diversity in other star systems. Space exploration has
a knack for putting our place in the universe into perspective,
but this goes beyond onto the science. It has an

(03:01):
impact on society, like the famous pale blue dot photograph
of a distant Earth captured by the Voyager one spacecraft
as it was speeding into the unknown frontiers of our
Solar system. Too, Cassini's own portrait of Earth during the
Wave at Saturn event. Space exploration can give the world

(03:24):
a sense of togetherness. These images from space also act
as a catalyst. These images from space also act as
a catalyst to give people optimism considering beauty beyond the
strife here on Earth. Today's episode was written by Ian O'Neill,

(03:47):
produced by Tristan McNeil, and for more on this and
other topics, please visit us at how stuff works dot com.