YOU could lose yourself in the picture on Page 3 today, even though it is just an artist's impression.

The Earth - so small, so white, so blue, so far away - looks beautiful, and the thought of people living on the surface of the alien, inhospitable moon is strange in the extreme. What will they eat? What conditions will they live in? What does it smell and sound like out there? What will they find when they start to mine?

This, though, is what Space exploration is about. It is about broadening our minds and expanding our horizons. It is about inspiring young and old, about asking new questions and meeting new challenges...

It is true that the billions the US is planning to spend on creating a moonbase could make a difference if it were spent on the poverty-stricken in Africa.

But the planet as a whole would be a lot poorer if we didn't dare to innovate on such a grand scale.

It is also true that some - remembering successive presidents' attempts to introduce Star Wars-type missile programmes - might be sceptical about America's long-term aims in attempting to colonise another planet. But it is also true that Nasa will want to defray the cost of the project so it may be forced to embark upon true international co-operation with Europe, Russia and Japan, and that can only be a good thing.

Perhaps it is the timescale that makes this project so exciting. We stand on the brink of 2007; the 2012 Olympics in London are just around the corner, we already know that the 2014 World Cup will be played in South America. So the moonbase planned for 2020 is tantalisingly close.

But the Americans had better be quick. Otherwise - as Cluff suggests on Page 1 with only some of his tongue in his cheek - a Tesco store will already be up and running.