The Rebbe's Radical Rocket Science
Tech Tribe Dispatch #109
💡 Think:
In the early days of the space race, Scientists faced a quandary: To send a person to the moon, they would need to launch a ship with a considerable amount of fuel. But the increased fuel would need a large part of the ship to be dedicated to storing it, which would add to the weight of the ship, which would require more fuel, which in turn would need even more place for storage . . .
They turned to the multi-stage rocket. First documented in China in 14th century, where it was called “fire dragon issuing from the water,” the multi-stage rocket offered an elegant solution:
By jettisoning stages when they run out of propellant, the mass of the remaining rocket is decreased. Each successive stage can also be optimized for its specific operating conditions… This staging allows the thrust of the remaining stages to more easily accelerate the rocket to its final speed and height.
There is a lesson we can learn from this:
Small children are often motivated by simple prizes: Stickers, candy and the like. As thy grow older, the source of the motivation changes: toys, good grades, success in school . . . and ultimately as adults, we can appreciate the reward of the deed itself. The complex sense of satisfaction through achieving and accomplishing something done with transformative intent.
Each sense of reward is a stage in the trajectory of our launch. As we grow, as we reach new heights, we jettison the old motivation, in favor of the loftier one. Try to motivate an adult with a lollipop, and either it will fail or something else has gone wrong.
So too in terms of our Jewish identities: The early sense of motivation and education we experience as Jews is ideal for those early stages of development. But as we grow, our relationship and appreciation for what we strive to do must grow as well. Basing our Jewish identity on what we learned in Hebrew School or preparation for Bar or Bat Mitzvah is to relay on an earlier stage - when we are already on our way to obtain new heights.
And, if we tap into that new stage, we can truly reach the stars.
Based on a conversation between the Lubavitcher Rebbe and Professor Velvl Greene
🎬 Watch:
In this month’s curated conversation for Jewglers x Tech Tribe at Google, we explore if lab grown meat can give us kosher bacon or ‘real’ cheese burgers.
📚 Read:
📸 Faye Schulman Dies; Fought Nazis With a Rifle and a Camera. She joined the Resistance brigade after her family was executed and used her photographs as proof of German barbarity and Jews’ determination to fight back.
💪 ‘The Almighty Helped Me to Survive’: A Marine’s Tale From the Pacific Theater
Bernard Haller’s gravestone declares that he never missed a day of tefillin or ate non-kosher meat
🎖️ A Chabad Rabbi Brings Honor to Japanese American Troops His Grandfather Led in WWII. After 15 years of effort, a commemorative stamp is issued.
Like what you saw? Want more? Please feel free to forward this email far and wide!
Support Tech Tribe’s mission to build community and curate epic experiences for young Jews in tech and digital media!