This podcast, recorded at the Academy of Achievement's 2000 gathering in Scottsdale, Arizona, features two outstanding space scientists, Story Musgrave and Donna Shirley. Story Musgrave grew up on a farm in Western Massachusetts, with what he calls "an extraordinarily dysfunctional family." Following service in the United States Marine Corps, he earned his medical degree at Columbia University. In 1967, he was selected by NASA to be among the first cohort of astronaut-scientists. He practiced medicine as a surgeon for 20 years, while training as an Air Force pilot and helping design much of the equipment that would be used for space walks and other extravehicular activity on the Space Shuttle missions. Dr. Musgrave flew on all six vehicles of the Space Shuttle program. His ingenuity and stamina dazzled the world when he commanded the mission to repair the Hubble Space Telescope, in orbit high above the earth. In this podcast, he tells the Academy's student delegates about the human relationship to the earth, space and all life. He describes his own "calling" to space travel. Donna Shirley grew up in the small town of Wynnewood, Oklahoma. Her parents encouraged her academic interests, but her neighbors and teachers were surprised when the very small girl took an intense interest in flying airplanes. Before she was out of her teens, Donna Shirley was soloing and earning her pilot's licenses. She entered college in the 1950s, with the express purpose of studying aeronautic engineering when engineering schools were still an all-male bastion. From her early teens she had been fascinated by science fiction and dreamed of exploring Mars. After winning a job with NASA, she worked on the very first unmanned mission to Mars in 1966. Her devotion to Mars research came to splendid fruition on July 4, 1997. The entire world watched as the Mars Pathfinder and the Sojourner Rover successfully landed on Mars. Two months later the Mars Global Surveyor successfully went into orbit around the red planet. Not only were these events two of the U.S. space program's greatest successes, but they may well provide the world with some of the most important scientific data of the 20th and 21st centuries. In this podcast, Donna Shirley weighs the expense of space exploration against its importance to extending our knowledge of the universe. In a discussion with the Academy's student delegates, Story Musgrave and Donna Shirley consider the possibilities of manned missions to Mars.