In light of our current crisis, I can’t help thinking about uncertainty and what it means for our lives and our work. Looking through the lens of uncertainty, I keep coming across examples of unknown, highly unlikely events perturbing the lives of individuals and, sometimes, millions of people.
In 1969, David Bowie released the song ‘Space Oddity.’ Many people mistakenly thought it had been inspired by the moon landing, but Bowie later explained that it was inspired by watching film director Stanley Kubrick’s “2001: A Space Odyssey,” on which the song’s title is a riff. Fast forward 22 years to March 25, 1991, and Sergei Krikalev, a handsome young Kosmonaut of the former USSR, steps out of the landing capsule at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the newly independent country of Kazakhstan, after a total of 311 days in space aboard the Mir space station. Or rather, he is carried out, breathing his first gulps of fresh air. His lack of muscle mass did not quite allow him to walk out. 311 days of weightlessness does eat away at your muscles even if you train every day. At the time, Krikalev was 33 years old, having celebrated his 33rd birthday while on the space station. Krikalev was also called the last citizen of the USSR. During his stay in space, the USSR had ceased to exit!
Imagine, here you are, a Kosmonaut, holding one of the highest, most prestigious assignments you could take on for your…
