Strong words. I'm not sure why you came down so hard on what is a reasonable opinion. I don't speak for lamby, but it might be that what he was regretting is t

Strong words. I'm not sure why you came down so hard on what is a reasonable opinion. I don't speak for lamby, but it might be that what he was regretting is that nationality is essentially the only identity that is popularly used to characterise astronauts. When was the last time an astronaut was described (to take your examples) primarily in terms of their religion, attitude to tech, or preferred literary genre? It doesn't happen. But from space, national boundaries are invisible. This is part of what causes the so-called "overview effect" [1] that some space travellers report. I don't know, but I suspect that lamby may have been alluding to this. Three human beings went into space today on expedition 47. What do you know about them, apart from that they are Russian, American, and British? Do you have any other ways to characterise them? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overview_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overview_effect