Should humans colonize other planets?

[jay gw]

Why would you slow down humanity waiting in vain for people in the many backward countries to get their act together? Most of mankind will continually be left behind by the frontrunners.

So resources shouldn't be wasted on the slow, right?

A question for you: why is there public education?

 

[Complexity]

jay gw - Public education exists to install a standard set of government-approved memes in as large a population as possible.

I'm not a fan of public education. I think it does a lousy job very expensively on my dime.

I'm a libertarian - I'll decide where I spend my resources (whatever is left after statist scum steal from me) where I see fit and I'll leave you to spend yours where you see fit. I need neither your blessing or permission.

Iacchus - The problems on this planet are most of the people on this planet. I have no responsibility for cleaning up your mess.

Both of you - Cut out the moral outrage. It isn't appropriate and you can't carry it off. You don't have anything to teach me on that front.

 

[KingMerv00]

Yeah, it's too bad we couldn't learn how to take care of our affairs on this planet first.

Do you think think Earth will ever be perfect? I'll bet you a zillion dollars that the sun will turn red first.

 

[KingMerv00]

Oh no, you are turning into Kilik!

 

[Floyt]

Bad luck, jay_gw - you seem to primarily have got the attention of the "might makes right" school with this thread.

I wonder why so many people find it it such an outlandish notion to extend some sense of responsibilty (of caring, actually) to things that you do not control/exploit. There is an ethical question about colonization. That hasn't changed since Columbus' times. Do you guys really think that everything just becomes clean-cut when there are no indigenes about? Should we just drill Antarctica to bits and to hell with those lifeless wastes?

ETA, I voted "strongly agree".

 

[Soapy Sam]

I'd just like to know who let the kid into my spare room?
But thanks for tidying up, kid. It's a big improvement on how I left it.


If we do colonise Mars. No Freemasons and no tea.

 

[asmodean]

I think this quote from B5 sums it up pretty well:

"WAsk ten different scientists about the environment, population control, genetics and you'll get ten different answers, but there's one thing every scientist on the planet agrees on. Whether it happens in a hundred years or a thousand years or a million years, eventually our Sun will grow cold and go out. When that happens, it won't just take us. It'll take Marilyn Monroe and Lao-Tzu and Einstein and Morobuto and Buddy Holly and Aristophenes .. and all of this .. all of this was for nothing unless we go to the stars."

 

[Zep]

 

[sparks]

Floyt: There's very little good evidence as yet for life on Mars. Colonize like hell. We'd better or it's just a matter of time before Earth is re-started by a NEO strike. As for Antarctica, there's all kinds of life there, and if we go mucking around too much in the single most productive ocean on the planet, we may not have to wait for the NEO object

 

[uruk]

Don't know about your job but teachers usually require pay before they'll work.

Some people here don't seem to be understanding that colonizing other planets would be a little easier if every nation were able to contribute to research. That's not possible at this point. You're only holding the program back with your attitudes.

I am a teacher. And I do require pay before I'll work. I am not saying to shift our entire or even a significant portion of our budget to colonization. Things like this need to be taken in small steps. And I don't think anybody is suggesting that any one single nation is capable of doing so by themselves.

Colonization will not happen over night or within the next four or five decades or even possibly within the next century or two. There still are many technological and biological obstacles that need to be addressed. Colonization will eventually be a global effort. But just like the European nations during the discovery of the New World, there will be a few nations who have more resources and better technology who will be the first to establish those colonies. By necessity they will be joint efforts but the countries that can afford more will no doubt carry more of the burden.

 

[uruk]

Do you guys really think that everything just becomes clean-cut when there are no indigenes about? Should we just drill Antarctica to bits and to hell with those lifeless wastes?

ETA, I voted "strongly agree".

Well I think the answer comes down to what is necessary for survival. If it is necessary to drill the hell out of antartica in order for us to survive, Then I say why not. If it is not necessary, then I say it's always up lifting to our spirit to have unspoiled wastelands to look at.
It comes down to what you deem is more important, and I don't see population control coming around anytime soon (especially in the U.S.). Even the Chinese are having problems enforcing thier population control programs.

 

[drkitten]

And there's a whole lot that we don't yet know, and can't fully exploit without some serious advances in technology.

That, to me, is the big reason for answering "no."

We shouldn't do it, because we can't do it. We can't even plan out a research program that would let us do it at some definite point in the future.

Should we take the One Ring and destroy it in the fires of Mount Doom?
Should we establish the International Kryptonite Repository as a safeguard against a takeover by General Zod?
Should we offer Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry national educational funding?
Should we start an intensive search of the moon for a black monolith?

If no, then why should we waste time and effort on an even less realistic idea?

 

[EricD]

Should we take the One Ring and destroy it in the fires of Mount Doom?
Should we establish the International Kryptonite Repository as a safeguard against a takeover by General Zod?
Should we offer Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry national educational funding?
Should we start an intensive search of the moon for a black monolith?

I really have to object to your straw man argument. There is no reason why we can't get to space because of some popular novels.

The only way to go forward is going forward. Of course, our problems down here will surely be taken up there, but maybe (a big maybe perhaps) up there is were they can be solved. Necessity makes man creative after all.

 

[uruk]

That, to me, is the big reason for answering "no."

We shouldn't do it, because we can't do it. We can't even plan out a research program that would let us do it at some definite point in the future.

Should we take the One Ring and destroy it in the fires of Mount Doom?
Should we establish the International Kryptonite Repository as a safeguard against a takeover by General Zod?
Should we offer Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry national educational funding?
Should we start an intensive search of the moon for a black monolith?

If no, then why should we waste time and effort on an even less realistic idea?

Hey just because it seems difficult or insurmountable to us now does not mean that it is impossible or that we can't do it at sometime in the future. And I have to disagree with you that it is as impossible as you make it seem. Terraforming is no doubt well beyond our present technology and understanding but enclosed habitats are not.
Alot of knowledge can be gained about biology and the environment by the persuit of colonization. You have to start out small and with small steps, but you have to start sometime. Colonization is, one day, going to become neccessary for our survival (as I don't see any population control policies that work or are enforceable with our present day understanding of civil liberty rights) The sooner we start the easier it will be in the long run.

 

[drkitten]

Hey just because it seems difficult or insurmountable to us now does not mean that it is impossible or that we can't do it at sometime in the future.

No. But we can't even see a way to "get there from here."


At our current level of technology, we have exactly the same chance of creating a self-sustaining colony on Mars via spaceship transport as we have through astral projection. (We can't even create a self-sustaining colony in low Earth orbit, in case you hadn't noticed.)

At our current level of technology, we have exactly the same chance of creating a viable enclosed habit as we do of being able to survive without food, water, and air via chi projection. (Do you remember the Biosphere fiasco?)

And even at any level of technology we can realistically expect in the foreseeable future, those chances will remain identically zero.

We are at least one major breakthrough away from any chance of succeeding. Oddly enough, we're also "at least one major breakthrough" away from warp drive, from resurrection upon demand, from human-level artificial intelligence, from teleportation, and from cheap matter replication. In fact, any of those might provide us with the necessary technology to be able to successfully colonize Mars. But spending money and effort now on an extra-terrestrial colony instead of on building the necessary technological infrastructure to make it possible is simply pouring money and effort away.

Mars colonization is the modern equivalent of a cargo cult. We have a romanticized idea of what is supposed to happen, but no possibility at all of actually making it happen. No matter how hard the Polynesians worked on making perfect models of runways and radio shacks, what they build would never work as an airfield. And the more time and effort they spend on building bamboo radio antennae, the less they're spending on learning science, technology, engineering, and such that would let them even understand why bamboo doesn't work for an antenna.

The metaphor of 16th-century colonialism is often brought up. Unfortunately, it's a false metaphor. Columbus had the technology he needed to sail the ocean, more or less at will. He had the technology he needed to survive in terra incognita for a more or less unlimited amount of time. He had the technology he needed to work with the lands that he found, to build buildings, farm crops, and so forth.

What would you have told a 16th-century explorer who wanted to take his wooden sailing ship to the moon? "Just because it seems difficult or insurmountable to us now does not mean that it is impossible?" I'm sorry, but sailing a 16-th century ship to the moon is, in fact, impossible? "We can do it at sometime in the future?" Sure -- but what technologies would he be researching to make it possible? Better sails? A more reliable magnetic compass? A deeper keel to keep the ship from foundering? Our explorer couldn't even imagine the technologies that would be needed to "sail" to the moon.

We will eventually be able to colonize Mars. But the tools and technologies we use will no more be an extension of our current space technology than a Saturn V was an extension of the Santa Maria.

 

[jay gw]

Public education exists to install a standard set of government-approved memes in as large a population as possible.

What an odd idea. The history of public education movements shows that the public believed education was a right for all people and they agreed to pay for it with public money.

 

[patnray]

Well said drkitten.

There are lots of worthwhile space exploration (and earth monitoring) projects we CAN persue now. Chasing fantasies about colonizing planets takes money away from useful projects using current technology or new technologies that can be developed in the near future.

 

[kuroyume0161]

Hey just because it seems difficult or insurmountable to us now does not mean that it is impossible or that we can't do it at sometime in the future. And I have to disagree with you that it is as impossible as you make it seem. Terraforming is no doubt well beyond our present technology and understanding but enclosed habitats are not.

Obviously you didn't follow the fiasco named Biosphere 2! Complete and utter failure - on Earth. We have no dependable means to grow food and endlessly recycle air and water.

I'm with DrKitten - send out the probes.

 

[kuroyume0161]

After seeing the poll results - to all those who strongly agree:

Pack up! We're sending you to Venus. Have a fun trip. Don't forget to pack the 10000000 UV sunblock and titanium reinforced carbon fiber steel suit...

 

[DanishDynamite]

Of course we should colonize other planets! And the faster we do so the better.

There are countless reasons why this would be a good idea, not least the survival of our species.

After reading the comments so far it seems that most agree, although there is some disagreement regarding whether this endevour could/should be launched now or at an unspecified time in the future when we are more technologically mature.

I obviously think this endevour should begin now. We have the technology to land capsules on Mars now. We have the experience of keeping humans in space for over a year now. We have people who are very willing to go now. We have almost everything now except the political will.