If a person make a trip to Soyuz Space craft can he be define as an astronaut?

Answer 1

If it were flying in space at the time and he were an American then, yes. He would be called an astronaut. If he visited it on the ground in a museum then, no. He would be just another tourist.

Essentially, though, to visit his Russian neighbor in a Soyuz spacecraft orbiting in space he would first need to be in some sort of spacecraft himself. So he would already need to be an astronaut or cosmonaut just to make the trip.

Answer 2

It is not defined well. There are many astronauts that fly on the shuttle that never handle the controls or even have a window when they are in their seats. These are the mission specialists who operate the various experiments on the Shuttle. But the difference is that the mission specialists are professional astronauts; they get paid to fly on the shuttle. The space tourists are more like amateur astronauts. They have to take the same training on shuttle operations as the mission specialists but they don't have a special job to perform for NASA while in space as the mission specialists do. Some of them have done their own experiments, but it is more on the hobby level. Something similar is true for people on Soyuz flights. The space tourists are flown on the Soyuz under the "visiting cosmonaut" program where people from various countries other than Russia are sent by their government to fly in space. But these are more like the mission specialists on the Shuttle, where they get paid by their government to do jobs in space. The tourists are paying their own money to fly as amateurs. Many of the "space tourists" object to that term, saying it trivialized their role and they are not just joy riding. The space agencies are now calling them "space flight participants" and not tourists. Maybe they should be called "amateur astronauts" or "private astronauts" in a way analogous to "amateur pilot" or "private pilot". But still, they don't fly the craft. But then neither do the mission specialists or visiting cosmonauts.

Answer 3

If a person makes a trip in a 747, can he be called a pilot?

No, not in general. He would be a pilot only if he knew how to fly that plane or another (even small single engine) one.

I would call people who take paid trips into space space-tourists.

I would ONLY call those who (know how to) control a spacecraft astronauts or cosmonauts.

This does not mean one can't be both. But astronauts and cosmonauts are a subset of space-tourists. The only case of a space tourist who was also an astronaut that I know of the top of my hat was probably John Glenn.

Answer 4

No he would be a cosmonaut because that is the russian word. And the Soyuz is a russian craft.