Background: Maurice Robert "Mike" Gravel (; born May 13, 1930) is an American politician who was a Democratic United States Senator from Alaska from 1969 to 1981 and a candidate in the 2008 U.S. presidential election. Born and raised in Springfield, Massachusetts, by French-Canadian immigrant parents, Gravel served in the U.S. Army in West Germany, and he later graduated from the Columbia University School of General Studies. He moved to Alaska in the late 1950s, becoming a real estate developer and entering politics. He served in the Alaska House of Representatives from 1963 to 1966 and also became Speaker of the Alaska House.
Context: In 1980, Gravel was challenged for the Democratic Party's nomination by State Representative Clark Gruening, the grandson of the man Gravel had defeated in a primary 12 years earlier. Several factors made Gravel vulnerable. As an insurgent candidate in 1968, Gravel had never established a firm party base. Not liking to hunt or fish, he was also always culturally suspect in the state. A group of Democrats, including future governor Steve Cowper, led the campaign against Gravel, with Gravel's actions in respect to the 1978 and 1980 Alaskan lands bills a major issue, especially given that the latter's denouement happened but a week before the primary. The sources of Gravel's campaign funds, some of which came from political action committees outside the state, also became an issue in the contest. Another factor may have been Alaska's blanket primary system of the time, which allowed unlimited voting across party lines and from its many independents; Republicans believed Gruening would be an easier candidate to defeat in the general election.  Gruening won the bitterly fought primary, with about 55 percent of the vote to Gravel's 44 percent. Gravel would later concede that by the time of his defeat, he had alienated "almost every constituency in Alaska."  Gruening lost the general election to Republican Frank Murkowski. Gravel was the last Democrat to represent Alaska in Congress for 28 years, until Anchorage Mayor Mark Begich defeated Stevens, by now an aged, iconic figure who had just been convicted of seven felonies for taking unreported gifts, in a very close and protracted election result in mid-November 2008. (The charges against Stevens were subsequently dropped due to prosecutorial misconduct.)
Question: Why did that happen?
Answer: As an insurgent candidate in 1968, Gravel had never established a firm party base.

Background: Bruno Latour (French: [latuR]; born 22 June 1947) is a French philosopher, anthropologist and sociologist. He is especially known for his work in the field of science and technology studies (STS). After teaching at the Ecole des Mines de Paris (Centre de Sociologie de l'Innovation) from 1982 to 2006, he became Professor at Sciences Po Paris (2006-2017), where he was the scientific director of the Sciences Po Medialab. He retired from several university activities in 2017.
Context: Latour's work Nous n'avons jamais ete modernes : Essais d'anthropologie symetrique was first published in French in 1991, and then in English in 1993 as We Have Never Been Modern.  Latour encouraged the reader of this anthropology of science to re-think and re-evaluate our mental landscape. He evaluated the work of scientists and contemplated the contribution of the scientific method to knowledge and work, blurring the distinction across various fields and disciplines.  Latour argued that society has never really been modern and promoted nonmodernism (or amodernism) over postmodernism, modernism, or antimodernism. His stance was that we have never been modern and minor divisions alone separate Westerners now from other collectives. Latour viewed modernism as an era that believed it had annulled the entire past in its wake. He presented the antimodern reaction as defending such entities as spirit, rationality, liberty, society, God, or even the past. Postmoderns, according to Latour, also accepted the modernistic abstractions as if they were real. In contrast, the nonmodern approach reestablished symmetry between science and technology on the one hand and society on the other. Latour also referred to the impossibility of returning to premodernism because it precluded the large scale experimentation which was a benefit of modernism.  Latour attempted to prove through case studies the fallacy in the old object/subject and Nature/Society compacts of modernity, which can be traced back to Plato. He refused the concept of "out there" versus "in here". He rendered the object/subject distinction as simply unusable and charted a new approach towards knowledge, work, and circulating reference. Latour considered nonmoderns to be playing on a different field, one vastly different than that of post-moderns. He referred to it as much broader and much less polemical, a creation of an unknown territory, which he playfully referred to as the Middle Kingdom.  In 1998, historian of science Margaret C. Jacob argued that Latour's politicized account of the development of modernism in the 17th century is "a fanciful escape from modern Western history".
Question: what is important about his work
Answer: Latour attempted to prove through case studies the fallacy in the old object/subject and Nature/Society compacts of modernity, which can be traced back to Plato.

Background: Dafydd Rhys "Dave" Williams OC (born May 16, 1954) is a Canadian physician, public speaker and a retired CSA astronaut. Williams was a mission specialist on two space shuttle missions. His first spaceflight, STS-90 in 1998, was a 16-day mission aboard Space Shuttle Columbia dedicated to neuroscience research. His second flight, STS-118 in August 2007, was flown by Space Shuttle Endeavour to the International Space Station.
Context: He is a member of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario, the Ontario Medical Association, the College of Family Physicians of Canada, the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada, the Canadian Association of Emergency Physicians, the Aerospace Medical Association, the Canadian Society for Aerospace Medicine, and the Canadian Aeronautics and Space Institute. Past affiliations include the Society for Neuroscience, the New York Academy of Science, and the Montreal Physiological Society.  Williams was awarded the Commonwealth Certificate of Thanks in 1973 and the Commonwealth Recognition Award (1975) for his contribution to the Royal Life Saving Society of Canada. Academic awards include the A.S. Hill Bursary, McGill University, in 1980; the Walter Hoare Bursary, McGill University, in 1981; and the J.W. McConnell Award, McGill University, from 1981 to 1983. He was named Faculty Scholar in 1982 and University Scholar in 1983 by the faculty of medicine at McGill University. In 1983, he also received the psychiatry prize and the Wood Gold Medal from the Faculty of Medicine and was named on the dean's honor list by the physiology department, at McGill University, for his postgraduate research. He was twice awarded the second prize for his participation in the University of Toronto Emergency Medicine Research Papers Program, in 1986, and 1988, and received top honors in that competition in 1987.  in 2011, Williams was inducted into the Canada's Aviation Hall of Fame. The following year, Williams was made an Officer of the Order of Canada in 2013 for his work in space exploration.
Question: did he receive any other awards for space exploration?
Answer: