Imagine life on a spaceship. Wearing disposable clothes that have to be replaced every three days. Eating vacuum-packed ready meals and drinking rehydrated beverages through a straw. Just four inches of titanium between you and certain death in the icy vacuum of space.

This is the subject of Orbital, the fifth novel by English author Samantha Harvey. On Tuesday evening, it was chosen for the Booker Prize, one of the most prestigious writing awards in the world. The chair of the judges, Edmund de Waal, praised the book's "extraordinary intensity of attention to the precious and precarious world we share".¹

The novel shows how living in space can change an astronaut's perspective. They see 16 sunrises and sunsets in the course of a day. Continents pass by in a quarter of an hour. Islands shrink before their eyes thanks to rising sea levels.

Harvey could not make this trip herself. Instead she had to imagine everyday life on a satellite. But this year the first non-professional astronaut walked in space: billionaire Jared Isaacman.² In the future, space travel will become more affordable for everyone. Perhaps there will even be school trips into the stratosphere.

Exploring space has many practical benefits. It encourages developments in engineering, robotics and communication technology. It also allows scientific experiments that help us to understand the human body, global weather patterns and the origins of life.

Visiting space also has philosophical benefits. It gives people a sense of the vastness of the universe, and how precious our own planet is. As the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) claims: "Space travel unites the world to inspire the next generation."³ That next generation would be even more inspired if they could visit space themselves.

But, even if school trips on to satellites were possible, they might be a mistake. Space travel is extremely wasteful, with rockets using up as much fuel as a million cars.⁴ At the same time, there are plenty of wonders to visit on Earth: mountains, deserts, forests and seas. It makes no sense to focus on outer space when our own planet still contains so many mysteries.

There is also the deeper question of whether travel really benefits anyone. Most people who visit faraway countries come back exactly the same - why would visiting space be any different? As the Portuguese author Fernando Pessoa wrote: "Only extreme poverty of the imagination justifies having to move around to feel."⁵

Donald Trump has spoken in favour of astronauts travelling to Mars. When he becomes President, the US government may well increase funding for space travel.⁶ But critics argue that government money would be better spent on economic support for ordinary Americans.

Given the cost, space travel for the masses is still many decades away. In the meantime, everybody can read Samantha Harvey's novel. Orbital is just 136 pages long, but it carries the reader into another world. This is the magic of fiction: allowing you to travel into space from the comfort of your chair.

Should a day in orbit be part of the curriculum?

Yes: Travelling into space would teach students about the wonders of engineering and technology. It would also help them to value the planet and its limited resources.

No: The world is full of wonders; there is not need to visit space to feel inspired. Besides, travel is not a virtue, and most people return from long journeys no different from when they left.

Or... There may well be benefits from visiting space, but there are better uses of public money. Happily, reading Orbital helps us to imagine an astronaut's perspective.