Extraterrestrial real estate - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Extraterrestrial real estate is land on other planet

Planet

A planet is a celestial body orbiting a star or stellar remnant that is massive enough to be rounded by its own gravity, is not massive enough to cause thermonuclear fusion, and has cleared its neighbouring region of planetesimals.The term planet is ancient, with ties to history, science,...

s or natural satellite

Natural satellite

A natural satellite or moon is a celestial body that orbits a planet or smaller body, which is called its primary. The two terms are used synonymously for non-artificial satellites of planets, of dwarf planets, and of minor planets....

s or parts of space

Outer space

Outer space is the void that exists between celestial bodies, including the Earth. It is not completely empty, but consists of a hard vacuum containing a low density of particles: predominantly a plasma of hydrogen and helium, as well as electromagnetic radiation, magnetic fields, and neutrinos....

that is sold either through organizations or by individuals. Ownership of extraterrestrial real estate is not recognised by any authority. Nevertheless, some private individuals and organizations have claimed ownership of celestial bodies, such as the Moon, and are actively involved in "selling" parts of them through certificates of ownership termed "Lunar deeds", "Martian deeds" or similar. These "deeds" have no legal standing.

History

The topic of real estate on celestial objects has been present since the 1890s. Coming in and out of public focus for several decades, major notability was established for the idea in 1936. A. Dean Lindsay made claims for all extraterrestrial objects on June 15, 1936 and sent a letter to Pittsburgh Notary Public along with a deed and money for establishment of the property. The public sent offers to buy objects from him as well.

Legal issues

The United Nations

United Nations

The United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, and achievement of world peace...

1967 publication "Outer Space Treaty

Outer Space Treaty

The Outer Space Treaty, formally the Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies, is a treaty that forms the basis of international space law...

" states space is the "province of all mankind", and is not subject to claims on sovereignty by States. As treaties apply to States and place obligations on States, and since the Space Treaties were drafted at a time when, realistically, the only "people" going into space were States, none of the space treaties make reference to private parties. The Outer Space Treaty of 1967 has currently been ratified by 98 states, including all the major space-faring nations.

The international Moon Treaty

Moon Treaty

The Agreement Governing the Activities of States on the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies, better known as the Moon Treaty or Moon Agreement, is an international treaty that turns jurisdiction of all celestial bodies over to the international community...

, finalised in 1979 and entering into force in 1984, forbids private ownership of extraterrestrial real estate. However, as of January 1, 2008 only 13 states have ratified the agreement, and none of these are major space-faring nations. Kazakhstan has ratified the treaty and is host to the Baikonur Cosmodrome

Baikonur Cosmodrome

The Baikonur Cosmodrome , also called Tyuratam, is the world's first and largest operational space launch facility. It is located in the desert steppe of Kazakhstan, about east of the Aral Sea, north of the Syr Darya river, near Tyuratam railway station, at 90 meters above sea level...

. However, the facility is operated through a leasing agreement by Russia

Russia

Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

. India

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

has also signed the treaty and they now have space missions.

Private purchase schemes

A number of individuals and organisations offer schemes or plans claiming to allow people to purchase portions of the Moon

Moon

The Moon is Earth's only known natural satellite,There are a number of near-Earth asteroids including 3753 Cruithne that are co-orbital with Earth: their orbits bring them close to Earth for periods of time but then alter in the long term . These are quasi-satellites and not true moons. For more...

or other celestial bodies. Though the details of some of the schemes' legal arguments vary, one goes so far as to state that although the Outer Space Treaty

Outer Space Treaty

, which entered force in 1967, forbids countries from claiming celestial bodies, there is no such provision forbidding private individuals from doing so.

Many states and countries have corollaries to their real estate and property laws to prevent wanton claiming of new-found lands, that state that a simple claim to the territory is not enough; the claimant must also demonstrate "intent to occupy," something that, at this time, is obviously difficult to do with the Moon or any other celestial body.

Considering these facts, legally, the schemes' "deeds" have only symbolic or novelty value and no official governing body in the world has yet granted any legal validity to them.

The short story

Short story

A short story is a work of fiction that is usually written in prose, often in narrative format. This format tends to be more pointed than longer works of fiction, such as novellas and novels. Short story definitions based on length differ somewhat, even among professional writers, in part because...

The Man Who Sold the Moon
The Man Who Sold the Moon
The Man Who Sold the Moon is a science fiction novella by Robert A. Heinlein written in 1949 and published in 1950. A part of his Future History and prequel to "Requiem", it covers events around a fictional first Moon landing, in 1978, and the schemes of Delos D...

by Robert A. Heinlein

Robert A. Heinlein

Robert Anson Heinlein was an American science fiction writer. Often called the "dean of science fiction writers", he was one of the most influential and controversial authors of the genre. He set a standard for science and engineering plausibility and helped to raise the genre's standards of...

, which was written in 1949, offers a portrayal regarding such plans or schemes, and created the concept of a Lunar Republic. Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land
Stranger in a Strange Land
Stranger in a Strange Land is a 1961 science fiction novel by American author Robert A. Heinlein. It tells the story of Valentine Michael Smith, a human who comes to Earth in early adulthood after being born on the planet Mars and raised by Martians. The novel explores his interaction with—and...

also makes reference to a space law case called the Larkin Decision.

Ownership of empty space

Ownership of empty space can be thought of as a different issue from that of land ownership on extraterrestrial bodies, because of its emptiness, the difficulty of defining its bounds, and the difficulty of keeping anything within it. The United Nations "Outer Space Treaty" reserves space for the good of mankind, and effectively prohibits private ownership of arbitrary parcels of empty space, although governments which have not signed the relevant treaties may dispute the U.N.'s authority in this matter.

A space ownership issue of current practical importance is the allocation of slots for satellites in geostationary orbit

Geostationary orbit

A geostationary orbit is a geosynchronous orbit directly above the Earth's equator , with a period equal to the Earth's rotational period and an orbital eccentricity of approximately zero. An object in a geostationary orbit appears motionless, at a fixed position in the sky, to ground observers...

. This is managed by the International Telecommunication Union

International Telecommunication Union

The International Telecommunication Union is the specialized agency of the United Nations which is responsible for information and communication technologies...

. The 1976 Declaration of the First Meeting of Equatorial Countries, also known as the Bogotá Declaration, signed by several countries located on the Earth's equator

Equator

An equator is the intersection of a sphere's surface with the plane perpendicular to the sphere's axis of rotation and containing the sphere's center of mass....

, attempted to assert sovereignty over those portions of the geosynchronous orbit that continuously lie over the signatory nation's territory. These claims did not receive international support or recognition and were subsequently largely abandoned.

Notable claims

Martin Juergens from Germany claims that the Moon has belonged to his family since July 15, 1756, when the Prussian emperor Frederick the Great presented it to his ancestor Aul Juergens as a symbolic gesture of gratitude for services rendered, and decreed that it should pass to the youngest born son.

A. Dean Lindsay made claims for all extraterrestrial objects on June 15, 1936 and sent a letter to Pittsburgh Notary Public along with a deed and money for establishment of the property. The public sent offers to buy objects from him as well.

James T. Mangan

James T. Mangan

James T. Mangan was a famous eccentric, public relations man and best-selling author on self-help topics who publicly claimed ownership of outer space in 1948....

(1896–1970) was a famous eccentric, public relations man and best-selling author on self-help topics who publicly claimed ownership of outer space

Outer space

in 1948. Mangan founded what he called the Nation of Celestial Space
Nation of Celestial Space
The Nation of Celestial Space was a micronation created by Evergreen Park, Illinois, resident James Thomas Mangan. Celestia comprised the entirety of "outer space", which Mangan laid claim to on behalf of humanity to ensure that no one country might establish a political hegemony there...

and registered it with the Recorder of Deeds and Titles of Cook County, Illinois

Cook County, Illinois

Cook County is a county in the U.S. state of Illinois, with its county seat in Chicago. It is the second most populous county in the United States after Los Angeles County. The county has 5,194,675 residents, which is 40.5 percent of all Illinois residents. Cook County's population is larger than...

, on January 1, 1949.

Robert R. Coles, former chairman of New York's Hayden Planetarium

Hayden Planetarium

The Hayden Planetarium is a public planetarium, part of the Rose Center for Earth and Space of the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, currently directed by astrophysicist Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson....

, started "the interplanetary Development Corporation" and sold lots on the moon for one dollar per acre.

Dennis Hope, an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

entrepreneur

Entrepreneur

An entrepreneur is an owner or manager of a business enterprise who makes money through risk and initiative.The term was originally a loanword from French and was first defined by the Irish-French economist Richard Cantillon. Entrepreneur in English is a term applied to a person who is willing to...

, sells extraterrestrial real estate. In 1980, he started his own business, the Lunar Embassy Commission. As of 2009 Hope claimed to have sold 2.5M 1-acre plots on the Moon, for around US$20 per acre. He allocates land to be sold by closing his eyes and randomly pointing to a map of the Moon.

Adam Ismail, Mustafa Khalil and Abdullah al-Umari, three men from Yemen, sued NASA

NASA

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is the agency of the United States government that is responsible for the nation's civilian space program and for aeronautics and aerospace research...

for invading Mars. They claim that they "inherited the planet from our ancestors 3,000 years ago". They based their argument on mythologies of the Himyaritic

Sabaean language

Sabaean , also known as Himyarite , was an Old South Arabian language spoken in Yemen from c. 1000 BC to the 6th century AD, by the Sabaeans; it was used as a written language by some other peoples of Ancient Yemen, including the Hashidites, Sirwahites, Humlanites, Ghaymanites, Himyarites,...

and Sabaean

Sabaeans

The Sabaeans or Sabeans were an ancient people speaking an Old South Arabian language who lived in what is today Yemen, in the south west of the Arabian Peninsula.Some scholars suggest a link between the Sabaeans and the Biblical land of Sheba....

civilizations that existed several thousand years B.C.E

Gregory W. Nemitz claimed ownership of Asteroid 433 Eros

433 Eros

433 Eros is a near-Earth asteroid discovered in 1898, and the first asteroid to be orbited by a probe . It is an S-type asteroid approximately 34.4×11.2×11.2 km in size, the second-largest NEA after 1036 Ganymed, and belongs to the Amor group.Eros is a Mars-crosser asteroid, the first known...

, on which NEAR Shoemaker

NEAR Shoemaker

The Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous - Shoemaker , renamed after its 1996 launch in honor of planetary scientist Eugene M. Shoemaker, was a robotic space probe designed by the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory for NASA to study the near-Earth asteroid Eros from close orbit over a...

landed in 2001. His company Orbital Development issued NASA a parking ticket for $20.

After purchasing the Lunokhod 2

Lunokhod 2

Lunokhod 2 was the second of two unmanned lunar rovers landed on the Moon by the Soviet Union as part of the Lunokhod program....

lunar lander, computer game designer and astronaut's son Richard Garriot jokingly claimed the rest of the Moon in the name of his gaming character, Lord British, under the premise that existing treaties prohibit governments from territorial claims to the Moon, but not individuals.

External links

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