The space shuttle lifted off today on a mission to the International Space Station. I’m excited about the space station. We’re finally getting our space dreams for the 21st century in gear. Better late then never.

But there’s still a long way to go. Arthur C. Clarke’s vision of 2001 was far too premature; we’re nowhere near that level of technological advancement today. Even the ISS is a far cry from the launch-pad cum space-hub that we envisioned our space stations would be in the 1960’s. This is just the testing ground, the schematics, not even a working prototype.