The Danger Is Different From

It's Not Enough To Shelve Your Own Competitive Streak. You Have To Try, Consciously, To Help Others Succeed. Some People Feel This Is Like Shooting Themselves In The Foot - Why Aid Someone Else In Creating A Competitive Advantage? I Don't Look At It That Way. Helping Someone Else Look Good Doesn't Make Me Look Worse. In Fact, It Often Improves My Own Performance, Particularly In Stressful Situations.

Other Anatomical Changes Associated With Long-duration Space Flight Are Definitely Negative: The Immune System Weakens, The Heart Shrinks Because It Doesn't Have To Strain Against Gravity, Eyesight Tends To Degrade, Sometimes Markedly (no One's Exactly Sure Why Yet). The Spine Lengthens As The Little Sacs Of Fluid Between The Vertebrae Expand, And Bone Mass Decreases As The Body Sheds Calcium. Without Gravity, We Don't Need Muscle And Bone Mass To Support Our Own Weight, Which Is What Makes Life In Space So Much Fun But Also So Inherently Bad For The Human Body, Long-term.

It's Almost Comical That Astronauts Are Stereotyped As Daredevils And Cowboys. As A Rule, We're Highly Methodical And Detail-oriented. Our Passion Isn't For Thrills But For The Grindstone, And Pressing Our Noses To It.

Our Role Is To Develop Techniques That Allow Us To Provide Emergency Life-saving Procedures To Injured Patients In An Extreme, Remote Environment Without The Presence Of A Physician.

"what's The Next Thing That's Going To Kill Me?" Is A Mantra For Pilots And Astronauts.