Term Exploration: Satellite

The term satellite can be used in many contexts to describe an object that is within the influence of another yet larger object. During the Renaissance, astronomers described moons and other smaller objects floating around planets as satellites. The term was first coined in the 1665-1666 edition of The Royal Society's Philosophical Transactions. This was used to describe, "one of those small stars moving about its Body (which are therefore called his satellites)" (Philosophical Transactions 1665-1666). Before the Space Age in the 1940s and early 1950s, the term satellite was spoken in a political context to describe a dependent nation of a larger nation. At the end of the war the allies would help, "any liberated European state or former Axis satellite" (The United Press, 1945). This term carried a lot significance in a political context throughout the Cold War. In the Space Age and today, the term satellite refers to a space craft orbiting Earth's atmosphere. It is the most common association with the term today. Satellites are used in an astronomical context, but it is used as a technical term by astronomers. It is rarely used in a political context because there are no satellite states in existence. Satellites are used today for our television, radio, internet, and even in our cars (New York Times 2010). The satellite is used today as a form of communication and information technology and is only dependent of the Earth because of physics and having the ability to orbit.