Now he runs an agency that has transitioned away from Space Shuttle missions to one focused on exploration. Everything we do in this agency is with the express purpose of making life better for people here on earth. He answers, in part, to senator ted cruz, chair of the Senate Subcommittee on Space Science and competitiveness. Cruz is also a Climate Change skeptic. I dont worry about trying to change someones mind, i try to present data that is very accurate. Bolden service at the Agency Follows a decades long career with the marine corps, he retired a Major General. Its a carrer a young black man growing up in the segregated south could never have imagined. I ended up going in the marine corps and ah, servin in vietnam. My family and friends were sometimes bein killed on the streets back home, i knew what i was going to face when i went back and yet, in that same period of time, we put a human on the moon i spoke to Charles Bolden at nasa headquarters in washington. Well, youve been on the job almost six years. Thats about right. And curiosity rover is on mars. Weve got a Mission Heading out to look at jupiter. Were getting ready to replace the hubble telescope. Theyre wonderful things. Theyre facinating things. Theyre groundbreaking things. But theyre not necessarily all the same thing, which if youre watching from outside you might look and say, well, whats nasa for in 2015 . Yeah, the universe is a big place and nasa since its inception has been about looking outward, helping us to understand the universe in which we live but more importantly helping us to understand this planet on which we live because it all begins right here. We were established in 1958 and since then weve been challenged by the National Space act to make discoveries about our planet, make discoveries about the universe and, oh by the way, continue to keep the u. S. First in aeronautics and Space Exploration. Since i was a kid, and as a boomer i was right in the sweet spot for nasas heyday as an agency. And john glenn and gus grissom and on and on and on were figures that we talked about. Those days, i think it was very easy to answer the question, what is nasa for . But as were not, laugh emphasizing man space flight human accompanied space flight as much, is it a tougher sell . You know, nasas heyday is today to be quite honest. Our best days are ahead of us and today is the best day for young men and women who want to be in aeronautics and in the aerospace field. You ticked off several of the things that weve done just in the past six years. And im incredibly proud of the 18,000 Civil Servants and almost 40,000 contractors now who make up our family. And i have to remind people all the time, we are not, everybody thinks of us as a technical organization. We are a people organization. Oh, no knock at at todays nasa. And i know youve got your virtual and physical fingers in a lot of different pies. But i think its probably less wellknown by the general public at large, and part of that must be that what concentrated our eyes on getting to the moon, that had us looking upward was the cold war context, the space race, the idea that america had to be first in a lot of other things. And right now were one player among many. But there are a lot of players i mean, china, india, russia always. Is it as clear to the average american what nasas for as it was when we were trying to beat the russians to the moon . I think the fact that, there is no one player and that the players today include entrepreneurial interest academic interest, american industryforeign industry. The fact that following president obamas direction to me, we have reached out and expanded the number of, what we call nontraditional partners, that is a tribute to the work that nasa has done. The whole purpose of establishing a space agency, in the form of nasa under our direction from, from the beg very beginning was to take things that we develop particularly technologies and get them out into the marketplace. I was an adult when we, set foot on the moon. Prior to that, i knew what astronauts were but, i was not inspired to be one. Im, i a little different than, than a lot of people for a lot of different reasons. The times were different then. We, i lived in the segregated south. So doin that was out of the question for me. Today i cannot find an american kid or a kid in any foreign country who doesnt at least after theyve seen me talk or heard me talk, doesnt at least have an inkling of thought that, you know, i can do that. And that was not the glory days. I think the glory days are today because its today that we have expanded the interest in exploration, expanded the desire to be like us. We are the best nation in the world when it comes to exploration. There is nobody as good as we are. And itll be some time before anyones as good as we are. In, in two more years, were gonna be launching americans from american soil. That will be key, to have an american capability to get our own astronauts into space will be key from a National Pride standpoint. But we get americans into space today. We have not, we have not missed a beat since we, since we lost columbia back in 2003. Well, scott kelly is on his way to the interNational Space station. Hes there. Hes there. Hes havin a good time. laugh well, hes gonna be there for a year so he better be havin a good time. He is, so far hes havin a good time. laugh but he had to hitch a ride with the russians. And he didnt hitch a ride. I, you know, i, i, i, i, i hear that term all the time. It was, it was a planned evolution from, from the loss of columbia to today where we said, okay. A couple of things we need to do. We need to get the interNational Space station finished. That was an edict or a mandate out of the columbia accident investigation board. And the other thing we need to do is we need to migrate away from shuttle and try to start using commercial entities for access to space. It took several president s saying we were gonna do that. But it took president obama coming into office and sayin, look, weve gotta do this. You know, we, we need to do it. As a former shuttle pilot, i could not have agreed more. You know, i came into nasa in 1980 to, to go to space, to go to deep space. We werent flying the Space Shuttle when i came in. Thats how old i am. We were two years overdue. It was scheduled to fly in 1978, 1980 i arrived and we were still a year away from flyin. But we finally flew. We had an incredible 30year run, where we taught other nations. We taught american industry. We taught people how to get off this planet. Well, scott kellys gonna or, orbit the earth for a year. Thats right. Its been a long time since an american has set foot on the moon. Whats he gonna do up there . Why is it important that hes there . What can we learn from Long Missions like that that applies to other things that you want to do . Getting to space is very difficult. Getting to mars is very, very, very difficult. We are going to get there in the 2030s. That is the ultimate objective of this administration and the current day nasas, with humans. We have been around and on mars now for decades. We never left the moon. So those are, those are things that we have already accomplished. But getting humans to mars requires a lot more understanding of the human body and how it, how it is affected by Long Duration periods of time in a microgravity environment, in a radi, higher radiation environment. We need to develop our technologies a little bit better than they are today. We dont have resilient life support systems. So there are three things that we need. And i always, i always try to describe this as a threelegged stool because everybody can relate to a threelegged stool. Leg number one is absolutely critical because its the beginning. Weve gotta be able to get to space. That legs bein filled out. The second critical piece is the interNational Space station. That is our toehold on the rest of the solar system, if not the universe. And then the third leg is our ability to go to deep space. And thats two things that were developing right now. Its a heavylift launch vehicle. We call it the space launch system, or sls. And its a capsule. Its a module in which the crew will fly, and that we call orion. And when we put the two of em together well be able to get humans, back to the area of the moon and on to mars. If we dont have either one of those, we dont get to mars. In terms of complexity, in terms of cost, in terms of risk, its exponentially more difficult to get a living human being to mars than Research Materials laugh and tools and diggers and rovers and all kinds of other things. What is it about the Human Element that makes us willing to spend that extra money, take that extra, extra risk and spend years more inventing the things that we need to do it in the first place . We seek to go to mars in particular with humans because its in our dna. It is, it, it is a basic fundamental, manner of cr, of, a curiosity, if you will, for the human species to, to be able to survive on more than one planet. So thats one reason. The second reason is because mars tells us a lot about our own planet earth. We need to understand this planet a lot better than we do. Mars used to be like earth we believe. Mars now has a very thin atmosphere. Mars is now barren and desolate. We think the solar winds have scraped off mars atmosphere. So we want to understand that because we dont want this planet, to one day be the way that mars is today. So, youve gotta send humans at some point because as i mentioned earlier, robots are great. Weve had robots on mars for decades. We have had m, robots on the moon. We will have a vehicle thats looking at orbiting in the vicinity of every single planet and dwarf planet, in the solar system. You know, recently a call went out for people who were willing to make a oneway trip to mars. Would they accept the training . Would they go on the mission understanding that they would never come back. And there was no shortage of people who wanted to try it. Y, i bet you can relate to that . I can relate to that. However, i promised people when i go out and say i want young people, and i, and i will use the term young meaning age because i, i probably wont get to go to mars. Were not doing this for my generation. I am doing it for the generation of my granddaughters and, and younger because were about, 20 years away from going to mars, getting ready to slip under the 20year timeframe. And so its gonna be those that weve got to inspire. And, but i tell them all the time, im not gonna send you on a oneway mission. I am determined that we will have the technologies, we will understand the human body and its functions so that i can safely get you to mars, have you live on the planet for a year or whatever period of time it is and then safely bring you back. So that, 1 you can talk about it, you can help us prepare other people who are gonna go because were, kind of, like pioneers. You know, were, were crossin the mountains, heading over to see whats over there. But there is a lot of work to be done before we can, we can safely have people stay. And i need to have people come back and talk about it and tell us about what they experienced. Theres a new congress and the, in the senate, the chairman of the committee of responsibility is someone who is, quite happy to tell you that he, is not sure that humans are capable of making changes in the atmosphere that change the climate. He wondered about all the Earth Science and observatory work that your agency is doing during a recent hearing. Are you a little surprised that youre still having to explain that to people, and not just anybody but i guy who is pretty high up the food chain and also has some of your fate in his hands. laugh president obama has equipped this agency in the six years, almost six years that ive been here with, approximately 170, 107 billion dollars o, over the sixyear period of time ive been here. And, and if my, if my numbers serve me correctly, about 49 billion of that has been devoted to human space flight and about 11 billion devoted to Earth Science. I happen to be one who believes that the most important planet in the universe, and we have now discovered thousands, the most important planet in the universe is the one on which we live. And our job here at nasa is to create incredible groundshake groundshaking instruments satellites that provide data to decisionmakers. Everything we do in this agency is with the express purpose of making life better for people here on earth. And i think we do that in spades. Do you think you convinced senator cruz that the human beings can change the climate . Let me tell you what i tell my daughter and, and other young ladies. And this, youre gonna say what difference does this make . They struggle every day to become, a fully integrated part of our society because women and minorities are still not fully accepted in our society as, as capable of being contributing members. And i tell them every single day, look, dont waste your time tryin to talk somebody into accepting you. Do your job. Do it well. And then if they dont get it, you will either be their boss and, you know, you can get rid of em or what. I dont, i dont worry about trying to change someones mind. I try to present data that is very accurate. We say, this is what were going to do. We understand the president wants this. The Congress Wants this. The American People want it. Were gonna do this. Were gonna do it at that cost and were gonna do it on this schedule. And every single year we have gotten better and better and better at being able to deliver on time, on cost, or sometimes under cost. Every once in a while we have a burp, but that happens in any organization. Still ahead on talk to al jazeera, Charles Bolden reflects on the people who died in the fight for civil rights, paving the way for him and others. Im ray suarez, this week on talk to al jazeera , nasa administrator Charles Bolden. You were born into a segregated society in south carolina. Now, you are a retired Major General. Youve been to space. Transitioned. A bunch of times. laugh my wife hates the term retired. laughter im transitioned. Well, youre no longer working as a Major General. I know there is a precise u, use of that word, and maybe that wasnt it. laugh well, you ended your active duty career as a Major General in the United States marine corps. Something that would have been unimaginable when you were born. It seems like a good time to s take stock. I mean, you work for a black president. I dont take anything for granted. laugh let me tell you. I, my granddaughters are from a mixed marriage. So i have to explain to them you know, because of the, the shade of their skin why black History Month is important. I try to explain to them the significance of the, of, of selma and the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights act, and the critical importance of that. You know, im a part of this administration. And i am a part of the leadership of the greatest nation on earth. And, so i have to remind people we are where we are today, i am here where i am today because people died and sacrificed so that i can do this. And if we dont remember that and make sure that we maintain that, then there will, may never be another me sitting in this chair because we can go backwards just as easily as we can go, in fact, its frequently easier to go backwards than it is to go forward. And i want to keep us stepping forward. And thats what were doing. We now have commercial capability to get things and soon people to space. We have, i have 700, more than 700 agreements, International Agreements with, with more than 120 nations. My predecessors back in the beginning of nasa, they didnt worry about any of that. They had one nation to worry about and that was the United States. I dont worry about it. I am very proud. You know, i just came back from watching scott kelly, launch out of, out of kazakhstan, baikonur. And had an opportunity to walk with him to the vehicle. I cant do that here cause we we just dont do things that way. But it was, it was, it was so invigorating for me to be walking alongside my fellow countryman who was getting ready to go and start one of the most incredible human journeys, that weve done in a long time. Itll be the first time an american has spent a year in space. And thats gonna help us on our stepping stone approach to getting humans to mars. And it is an incredibly valuable flight for us, an incredibly necessary flight. Scott understands the risk. His family understands the risk. And, and he thinks its worth it. You watched the events of the last 12 months. Then you pick up the paper and see scott kelly with his russian counterpart heading up into space. Do we get along better right now with russians off of the surface of the planet earth than we do right here on it . I think weve always gotten along with everyone off the planet better than we have on it for one simple reason, were missionfocused. We have, we have a concrete mission. That mission right now with, with all of our, other four, there are five partner entities that run the interNational Space station. And we are focused on making sure that the, that the interNational Space station is effectively utilized. We are all focused on eventually getting humans to mars. Thats an agreement among all the nations that are part of the, the interNational Space station program. And so that is a singular focus for all of us. We can become multiplanet species. So, you know, thats, thats my inspiration and my motivation. I, i, you, you mentioned my growin up in the segregated south. The year that i graduated from high school, ca Johnson High School in columbia, south carolina, i lost my president. laugh let me tell you, thats pretty devastating, you know. I ended up going in the marine corps and, servin in vietnam. My family and friends were sometimes bein killed on the streets back home. I knew what i was gonna face when i went back. And yet in that same period of time we put a human on the moon and then we did it over and over and over again six times. You know, tell me, thats why i say to people, dont tell me what we cant do. I have seen it. I have experienced it. There is nothing like that on one of those visits to the moon we left a plaque that said, we came in peace to serve all mankind. And that just sounded, like some more of that idealistic frabajaba sic . But now that were actually going into space with people from other places on earth, and working with them up there sharing information, telling people what we know, learning from what theyve learned, it now seems more real to me in the 21st century that we may do something up there that serves all mankind than it did in 1967 when we had missiles pointed at each other and this was very much an american operation getting up there. I choose where we are today where with all the conflict that goes on down here on earth. You know, i am blessed to have the opportunity to have been, to have seen this planet from a little bit different Vantage Point than the average person has an opportunity to see it. My last flight in space was with, a person who is one of my best friends today, sergei konstantinovich krikalev, the first russian cosmonaut to fly on, an american spacecraft in the beginning of the shuttlemir era. And sergei and i look back on our lives every once in a while and, you know, he for a while ran the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in, outside of moscow in star city. And i, i became the nasa administrator. And the two of us, kind of, look at each other and go, hey, how, who, how did they make these mistakes . But we you know, we understand. When i very, the first time i met him, we talked at dinner. And, i was not anxious to fly a flight with, with a russian cosmonaut. But i met sergei and vladimir titov, who was his backup. And we talked all night about our kids and what we wanted for the world. And yeah, is that idealistic . Yes, it is. But is that, is that life . It, you, you bet it is. Youre watching talk to al jazeera. Up next, is the cost of Space Exploration worth it . Charles bolden weighs in. Fall of saigon, forty years later. We have no idea how many were killed. Unanswered questions, a botched withdrawal lives lost. Examining the impact that still resonates today. A special report starts tomorrow, 10 00 eastern. On al jazeera america. Youre watching talk to al jazeera. Im ray suarez, speaking with Charles Bolden the administrator of nasa. Throughout the years people have looked at the tremendous cost of doing Space Exploration and then looked at the problems on earth and said boy, that would feed a lot of people. To those people whove heard the litany of basic science and breakthroughs that youve just mentioned, what would you close with to tell em this is all worth it. It is all worth it. And they should be glad that their tax money is going to it because our mission or our vision is to, to, to pursue the unknown, to reach to, for new heights to pursue the unknown so that everything we do makes life better here on earth. I am incredibly proud that, you know, you could, yeah, we could spend the money elsewhere. We choose to spend it on technology and exploration and and discoveries that make life here on earth better. Developments that we are doing right now, Technological Developments on the interNational Space station Water Purification miniaturization of medical instruments, those things are now in villages and small towns all over the world making life better for people. They never would have been done had we not had the necessity to do that because we had People Living in a very hostile environment that we call space. So we are in fact spending every single dime of the taxpayers money to make life better here on earth. I, i contend that thats much better than what you could do by taking that money and distributing it to individual people or individual locations or whatever you have. Everything we do makes life better here on earth. Every single dime of the taxpayers money adds to the amount of effort that goes into teaching kids stemrelated courses. So my 18 billion budget, i take 18 billion and put it on Stem Education and put it on feeding people. And, and some folks may say makes noise you bein cute. Im not bein cute. Ask a young lady who is, an expectant mother in some village in south america who now has a midwife with a doctor 200 miles away and the midwife has, you know, a little instrument that they can look at the fetus and beam it to a doctor wirelessly 200 miles away so that the doctor can, can tell. Thats Space Exploration being delivered to that village. Or somebody who is drinking clean drinking clean Drinking Water and cutting down on the death rate of, of infants. Those are some of the results that come serendipitously in many cases from nasa research and technology development. Charles bolden is the administrator of the National Aeronautics and space administration. Great to have you with us on talk to al jazeera. Ray, thank you very much. Thanks so much. Sunday. Poprock, new wave icon kate pierson. Woo woo woo woo revealing the secrets behind her biggest hits. I can express myself in a different way. Her latest controversial track. I was very taken aback. And making a long Lasting Impact on the world. I have to just be myself. Every sunday night. I lived that character. Go one on one with americas movers and shakers. We will be able to see change. Gripping. Inspiring. Entertaining. Talk to al jazeera. Sunday, 6 30 eastern. Only on al jazeera america. Hello, im dominique gisin, and youre at joleon lescott. Here are some of the cameron lizotte, and here are richard gizbert, and here are some of the stories we are at. Media and politicians point the finger at one another