Agnostic Paladin
First Post
The longer humans live, the faster the population increases, and some people think that we're already beyond the Earth's long-term capacity.
As for going to the moon, to mars, to Triton, Titon, and Alpha Centauri; we must. Humans explore and expand, it's what we do. It's what all (terran) life does.
Earth's only so big, we can and will fill it up (not physically, but in terms of how many of us can be fed here on a long-term basis). Unless you can find a way to create a society where no one procreates except to replace themselves (which is nearly not at all if we become effectively immortal), you can't have a static population level.
And of course, unlikely as it is at any one given time, sooner or later, the Earth will be hit. Extinction Level comets aren't that big, and the solar system is surrounded by a cloud of trillions of comets that fall into the system from time to time. Shoemaker Levy left scars on Jupiter that took months to disapear and were bigger than our planet. We're living in one basket, and it's isn't all that well defended. (Actually, on a side note, Jupiter and Luna are very important to life on Earth - they suck up a lot of rocks that might otherwise have hit Earth.) The longer we sit on one rock, the more likely we are to either be obliterated or at the least fall into another dark age. And once we get onto other planets, we need to get to other stars, because there are threats that can take out a star system (Novas, nearby Supernovas, quantum bursts). Eventually, to truly be safe forever, humanity needs to get into multiple galaxies.
Never mind the safety issues though. No one really cares about the miniscule chance that we'll get taken out in any given year. All human advancement comes from expansion. If Europeans hadn't bothered to explore the world to try and find cheaper ways to get more Asian merchandise, and instead said, no, let's worry first about improving the lives of the peasantry, the world would've not yet been to the point where the typical (first-world) lower-class worker has a home, a vehicle, various electronic and mechanical devices that make his life safe, comfortable, and enjoyable. The research that will come out of any efforts to expand to other worlds, and the resources that come from those other worlds will make the average life better more effectively than trying to micromanage the distribution and use of those resources we have now.
As for the more practical matters, I expect that ultimately, someone's going to have to use a Mars Direct approach, because in the short term it's cheaper, and no one really wants to care about space these days. The governments don't. Modern coperations don't believe in long-term gains, they believe in making each quarter's profits as big as possible by slitting the throat of the quarter five years down the road and marketing images instead of products or services. Mars Direct can probably work. Of course, with so little backup, it can go horribly wrong. If the first mission there finds themselves unable to make fuel, or unable to make enough, no one will want to go back for a long long time. Orbital facilities or Lunar facilities will be needed at some point though. Low and Zero Gravity manufacturing has advantages in and of itself, and not having to climb out Earth's gravity well makes everything cheaper. If we could send things from Earth's orbit instead of from Earth, it wouldn't be that big a deal to send probes to Saturn whenever we felt like it. Let's get some telescopes on the dark side of the moon. No atmosphere, no terran light pollution, and we'll have something vastly more useful than hubble for understanding the universe. Lets get orbitial refineries into orbit, and start bringing asteroids in from the belt. The metal in those will make a great many ships. Hell, we can just use the larger ones as ships if we wanted to (just hollow them out first). Mine duterium on Luna. Fusion will be a reality sooner or later, and a good supply of that will get it going even quicker. Let's try to terraform Mars. It'll take forever and a day, but so what? Why must we only start projects that will be finished in our lifetimes? Five years isn't long term. Send probes to nearby stars. Eventually, send people, first to the ones we know have planets.
Let's get out there before there's no us left to do it.
As for going to the moon, to mars, to Triton, Titon, and Alpha Centauri; we must. Humans explore and expand, it's what we do. It's what all (terran) life does.
Earth's only so big, we can and will fill it up (not physically, but in terms of how many of us can be fed here on a long-term basis). Unless you can find a way to create a society where no one procreates except to replace themselves (which is nearly not at all if we become effectively immortal), you can't have a static population level.
And of course, unlikely as it is at any one given time, sooner or later, the Earth will be hit. Extinction Level comets aren't that big, and the solar system is surrounded by a cloud of trillions of comets that fall into the system from time to time. Shoemaker Levy left scars on Jupiter that took months to disapear and were bigger than our planet. We're living in one basket, and it's isn't all that well defended. (Actually, on a side note, Jupiter and Luna are very important to life on Earth - they suck up a lot of rocks that might otherwise have hit Earth.) The longer we sit on one rock, the more likely we are to either be obliterated or at the least fall into another dark age. And once we get onto other planets, we need to get to other stars, because there are threats that can take out a star system (Novas, nearby Supernovas, quantum bursts). Eventually, to truly be safe forever, humanity needs to get into multiple galaxies.
Never mind the safety issues though. No one really cares about the miniscule chance that we'll get taken out in any given year. All human advancement comes from expansion. If Europeans hadn't bothered to explore the world to try and find cheaper ways to get more Asian merchandise, and instead said, no, let's worry first about improving the lives of the peasantry, the world would've not yet been to the point where the typical (first-world) lower-class worker has a home, a vehicle, various electronic and mechanical devices that make his life safe, comfortable, and enjoyable. The research that will come out of any efforts to expand to other worlds, and the resources that come from those other worlds will make the average life better more effectively than trying to micromanage the distribution and use of those resources we have now.
As for the more practical matters, I expect that ultimately, someone's going to have to use a Mars Direct approach, because in the short term it's cheaper, and no one really wants to care about space these days. The governments don't. Modern coperations don't believe in long-term gains, they believe in making each quarter's profits as big as possible by slitting the throat of the quarter five years down the road and marketing images instead of products or services. Mars Direct can probably work. Of course, with so little backup, it can go horribly wrong. If the first mission there finds themselves unable to make fuel, or unable to make enough, no one will want to go back for a long long time. Orbital facilities or Lunar facilities will be needed at some point though. Low and Zero Gravity manufacturing has advantages in and of itself, and not having to climb out Earth's gravity well makes everything cheaper. If we could send things from Earth's orbit instead of from Earth, it wouldn't be that big a deal to send probes to Saturn whenever we felt like it. Let's get some telescopes on the dark side of the moon. No atmosphere, no terran light pollution, and we'll have something vastly more useful than hubble for understanding the universe. Lets get orbitial refineries into orbit, and start bringing asteroids in from the belt. The metal in those will make a great many ships. Hell, we can just use the larger ones as ships if we wanted to (just hollow them out first). Mine duterium on Luna. Fusion will be a reality sooner or later, and a good supply of that will get it going even quicker. Let's try to terraform Mars. It'll take forever and a day, but so what? Why must we only start projects that will be finished in our lifetimes? Five years isn't long term. Send probes to nearby stars. Eventually, send people, first to the ones we know have planets.
Let's get out there before there's no us left to do it.
