We set sail on this new sea because there is new knowledge to be gained, and new rights to be won, and they must be won and used for the progress of all people," he said on Sept. 12, 1962, in a speech at Rice University in Houston. "But why, some say, the moon? Why choose this as our goal?"
In answering his own hypothetical question, Kennedy explained why we explore.
"We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard," he said, "because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win." - https://www.nasa.gov/feature/the-human-desire-for-exploration-leads-to-discovery
