Transmission #18 from Tycho (Common Heritage of Humankind)

"God himself says 'speaking through the voice of nature' inasmuch as it is not His will to have Nature supply every place with all the necessaries of life, He ordains that some nations excel in one art and others in another. ... So by the decree of divine justice it was brought about that one people should supply the needs of another.
Those therefore who deny this law, destroy this most praiseworthy bond of human fellowship, remove the opportunities for doing mutual service, in a word do violence to Nature herself. For do not the oceans, navigable in every direction, with which God has encompassed all the earth, and the regular and the occasional winds which blow now from one quarter and now from another offer sufficient proof that Nature has given to all peoples a right of access to all other peoples." - Hugo Grotius

Phase of the Moon Today: Waxing Crescent 40% of Full - the clouds are back in town

The quote above comes from the book Mare Liberum by Hugo Grotius a 17th century legal scholar. He was the first person I know of that described the Common Heritage principle to the Sea and I think it can be related now to the Moon. The Moon Treaty created in 1979 "is an international treaty that turns jurisdiction of all heavenly bodies (including the orbits around such bodies) over to the international community." This Common Heritage of Humankind has been discussed lately in our class discussions and one piece of this 'legislation' that caught my attention was that a small number of countries have signed and ratified this treaty. Therefore it really is a failure of international law and another failure of the UN since those countries that have not signed it do not abide by it.
Another piece of interest that stood out was that it "bans altering the environment of celestial bodies and requires that states must take measures to prevent accidental contamination." After the LCROSS impact mission blatantly violates this article I ask the question, is anyone bothered by this impact? What gives us the right to do this to the Moon? Should we have an international protection agency for the Moon? Lunar Protectors?
..I think so...
signing off...
kb