Space Development And Earth's Future

apsmith writes "In the New York Times' Sunday Book Review Dennis Overbye reviews British Astronomer Royal Martin Rees' new book: Our Final Hour - A Scientist's Warning: How Terror, Error, and Environmental Disaster Threaten Humankind's Future In This Century--On Earth and Beyond. The book paints an exceedingly grim picture of our future - Reese gives humanity only a 50-50 chance of surviving the 21st century, with all the potential for calamity we have unleashed (and that nature may have in store for us too). But the book isn't just doom and gloom - we CAN do something, and the answer lies in space. But NASA has been doing it all wrong. Interestingly enough, this coming weekend is the International Space Development Conference in San Jose, where you can find out the latest ideas on how we really should be settling space."

Comments

Conflict is human in nature

[egoff]

We can't assume that just because we go live somewhere else, everything will be okay. Granted, that's a simplistic argument, but humans will tend to carry conflict with them, or create new conflict elsewhere.

Re:Conflict is human in nature

[BrynM]

Ahhh, but in space there is more room to blow stuff up without exterminating humanity as collateral damage (no, orbit doesn't count - we can do a LOT of damage in orbit).

Re:Conflict is human in nature

[Strange Ranger]

It's not about living somewhere else. It's about living in lots of somewhere elses. Such that if one somewhere else were destroyed there would still be humans left in the universe/galaxy.

You're statement seems to miss the point. Of course you're right that any other place will likely eventually have huge problems similar to those we now have here on earth. The point is that earth is a single point of failure. We should work to fix that. AKA, we shouldn't keep all our ova in one basket.

Re:Conflict is human in nature

[egoff]

We'll carry any conflict that does happen on Earth to where we go next, Mars, asteroids, etc. Look at how the Napoleonic wars in Europe led to the French/Indian wars in North America. The War of 1812 was also started by European politics. At the time, colonists tried to escape those issues. Any nuclear war would surely spread to the colonies.

Overpopulation is also a critical issue. But the vast majority of people involved in the population boom couldn't afford cost-prohibitive colonization. The option of forced colonization is inhumane, as was effectively argued by free blacks in opposition to the American Colonization Society in the pre-civil war United States.

The only serious concern left is an astronomical disaster, such as a meteor strike. It seems that the reasonable thing to do would be to focus resources on a defense system for that.

I'm not arguing that all off-planet development is bad by any means, but it isn't the answer to all of our problems.

Re:Conflict is human in nature

[barawn]

The only serious concern left is an astronomical disaster, such as a meteor strike. It seems that the reasonable thing to do would be to focus resources on a defense system for that.

No matter what you do, you are never going to develop a defense system against resource depletion. While many people constantly say that there's plenty of X on Earth for humans to use (where X is anything consumable), they're crazy. Helium, for instance, is a decidedly depletable resource, and one that is being used up quite rapidly. It's doubtful that the Earth's helium supply will last much past the end of the 21st century - and yes, this is true, even with people using helium to lift balloons.

There are plenty of other resources that're being heavily depleted as well. Yes, there are more sources for them, but it will not be economically feasible to recover them. Which, of course, means that they might as well not exist.

Plus there are other disasters to be concerned about: a magnetic pole reversal, an Ice Age, a sudden rise of the sea levels, etc. - none of which you can reasonably protect against. Earth is fragile, and it will always be fragile. It's also not permanent. It will die. It has a finite lifespan in the neighborhood of a few hundred million years left before the oceans boil off. The reasonable thing to do is get the hell off the planet.

Once people migrated to North America, suddenly oceanbound travel started to explode. And likewise, ship technology increased dramatically. There's no reason to believe that the same thing wouldn't happen here.

There's also no reason to believe that colonization wouldn't provide the same benefits it did in the 1600s-1700s: a fresh view of the world from a different perspective.

There've been many people that have said that the reason the Internet boomed so well in the US was due to free local phone access, because the phone infrastructure in the US is so good. This is because the US is a large country with lots of open land - certain technological advances started here because it was best suited for them. There's no reason to believe that a Martian colony wouldn't be subject to the same pressures.

The point is that human beings do best in adversity - "necessity is the mother of invention." There are surely people working on radiation treatments, space health issue, space transport mechanisms, etc., but there's no real need for them now. If there IS a need, then those sectors of science will literally explode, and the secondary benefits will be very hard to imagine.

It's important to realize that one can -never- estimate the benefit of a colony to the home country, virtually by design - a colony is a new settlement, with new needs, and new ideas. And nothing - nothing - is more valuable to the human race than new ideas.

So maybe you're right. Maybe off-planet colonization isn't the answer to all of our problems. But it might be the answer to a whole, whole lot of them. You simply don't know until you go there, and find out.

Talk of the Nation

[PD]

NPR had a show on Talk of the Nation Science Friday about this too. The link to the show is here. The segment is in the second hour, so scroll down.

Martin Rees

[ralian]

I just got a new interview with him in my email from edge.org, where he speculates on multiple universes, alternative formulations of physics and the Matrix (hehe). It's here, for all of youse enjoyments. (N.B. RealPlayer format)

A solution to many problems

[BrynM]

I've long felt that getting off the planet is the solution to many of our problems. Manufacturing/refining pollutants? Thanks to being a vacuum, pollutants can be better contained or cleaned up after leakage. Overpopulation? We've run out of room on our planet, but the rest of space is out there. Defense? Stuck on Earth, we're sitting ducks for our own devastating conflicts or if some other advanced species reaches us before we reach them (improbable, but theoretically possible). Someone too dangerous to detain? I bet Georgie Boy would LOVE his own orbital prison or prison colony. Stagnant empiracal growth? There's lots of rocks out there for countries/powers to plant a flag in and claim.

Let's face it, we've just about used some natural resources on Earth up. We're making it mor un-inhabitable every passing moment. Humanity is not getting smaller. We could all be wiped out with a good size chunk of iron ore hurled into our atmosphere. The only way for humanity to survive in the very-long-term is to diversify our holdings ;)

Then again, we could just sit here and live up to the name we've given our sun: SOL.

Re:A solution to many problems

[PD]

Thanks to being a vacuum, pollutants can be better contained or cleaned up after leakage.

And that's a good thing too. We wouldn't want to turn space into a lifeless place full of radiation and harsh substances that would require a person to wear a protective suit just to survive.

Re:A solution to many problems

[Igor47]

The problem is, where do we go and how do we get there? The planets around us are mostly uninhabitable. We need some place with water and an atmosphere, and even mars, the topic of much speculation, doesn't really have much water on it. The closest system is light-years away. Our technology is still barely able to get is into orbit and back. And it doesn't look like anyone is taking any of this seriously - we'd much rather spend billions on weapons research then on the space elevator (which is think is the first step to utilizing the resources of space). I think we had better stick to more realistic measures here on earth then wistfully dream of a life in space.

Re:A solution to many problems

[BrynM]

"The problem is, where do we go and how do we get there?"... "we'd much rather spend billions on weapons research then on the space elevator (which is think is the first step to utilizing the resources of space)."

You've just answered your own question. We need to inch our way off the planet. We've gotten used to orbit, now let's get used to being on the moon (I know, some of us are quite used to being "on the moon" ;) ). Then we pick a planet in our solar system, or build some type of solar orbiting station. Right now, we've been so wishy-washy about the international space station. Why? Because there's no public pressure to make it work. The knee-jerk public just wants it to work or get scrapped. They have no idea that it's a step among many.

Rees is a rip-off artist!

[Anonymous Coward]

He says, in fact, that he has bet $1,000 that an instance of bioterror or bioerror will take a million lives before the year 2020.

Only $1,000 for a million deaths! What a rip off. You can make more for hacking an XBOX!

Amen.

[maddogsparky]

The reasons you mention above are the exact reasons I'm leaving my current job and going back to school for Aerospace Engineering. It's a little scary to give up a secure, well paying job to go back to grad school, but it is even scaryer to think about what the world will be like for my 3-year old when he is my age.

It's time to take action instead of being wistful and just talking about it...

Re:Amen.

[BrynM]

My hat is off to you! I've often thought about the same thing. Get more involved. Every time I think about it though, I realize that one of the best ways to get involved in exploration is to inspire others. I think the popularity of science fiction in the past 20 years or so has done some of this, but it has too much of a "eventually we'll be here" attitude. The average person has no idea what the current technology is capable of or how to implement it to further the goal of exploration. If space exploration were a popular cause, we might not be having this discussion with such a morbit (our extinction) spin. Thus, I have been looking into animation as a means of storytelling. We can't afford to let the next couple of generations grow up with a "someone else will do it" attitude.

Just another alarmist wacko

[Roto-Rooter Man]

"This is my long-run forecast in brief: The material conditions of life will continue to get better for most people, in most countries, most of the time, indefinitely. Within a century or two, all nations and most of humanity will be at or above today's Western living standards. I also speculate, however, that many people will continue to think and say that the conditions of life are getting worse." - Julian Simon

Re:Just another alarmist wacko

[frenchgates]

I'm a bit surprised that the late Julian Simon, professor and "Cornucopian," didn't predict he would never die. He would have been as correct as any other of his predictions until the exact moment of his death.

The problem with this kind of convenient optimism is the following:

Let's say you are a frog who lives in a pond. One day a weed blows into the pond. This weed is very successful and doubles in size every day. As it does so it strangles the all the other life wherever it has grown in the pond. But you don't mind because as the first few days go by, most of the pond is weed free. Even when the pond is half full of weeds you've still got plenty of space. The problem comes the day after pond is half full.

While it is true that a lot of doom-and-gloom predictions have failed to materialize, most famously the "Club of Rome" report in the seventies which predicted running out of oil ludicrously soon, it is silly to ignore the clear signs of environmental and social degradation simply because we've been fine up until now.

Re:Just another alarmist wacko

[g4dget]

"it is silly to ignore the clear signs of environmental and social degradation simply because we've been fine up until now."

Quite silly, indeed. And the solution to that is to fix the social and environmental problems, not to have unrealistic dreams of escaping into space.

Re:Just another alarmist wacko

[arpad1]

I'm a bit surprised that the late Julian Simon, professor and "Cornucopian," didn't predict he would never die.

Why? Would that have made the job of misrepresenting his views easier?

I suppose that sort of name-calling is necessary though when you want to divert attention from the uniform record of failure of the alarmists and the uniform record of success of the "Cornucopians". Does the name "Paul Ehrlich" ring a bell?

While it is true that a lot of doom-and-gloom predictions have failed to materialize, most famously the "Club of Rome" report in the seventies which predicted running out of oil ludicrously soon, it is silly to ignore the clear signs of environmental and social degradation simply because we've been fine up until now.

And there's the whole issue wrapped up in one sentence. Oh sure, sayeth the alarmist, we've been wrong about everything up until now but is that any reason not to believe us this time? After all, any minute now our losing streak might break and then you'll be sorry.

Re:Just another alarmist wacko

[Roto-Rooter Man]

Their life expectancy is also 30 years.

Rees is too much of an optimist

[Anonymous Coward]

All matter will decay. This universe will end in a big crunch or expand forever into nothingness. It won't matter if we escape the solar system. There is no place for us to go. We will all die and the matter we're made of will decay and the universe will end and there is NOTHING we can do about.

There is no human nature

[extrasolar]

And I think the point should be that in space we will have to struggle to survive again---whereas here we've become all comfortable and self-complacent. Consider your own life: have you noticed that everything you've done that is worth something was done under pressure?

Lets go to Mars!

Re:There is no human nature

[egoff]

A frontier brings out the best and the worst of people. Again, to draw from American history, e the settlers' "pioneering spirit" to create great works and the Sand Creek massacre (in addition to numerous other outrages).

In addition, a very strong case can be made for a specific human nature, and has been made by Steven Pinker in his excellent book, How The Mind Works.

Re:space escapism

[BrynM]

I agree that putting all of our eggs into one basket is a BadThing(tm). Yes, environmentalism (not being liberal, but truly thinking of sustainable environment) is important to our survival, but many (scientists too) feel that we are already too far gone to save this planet or at least save it as we know it. The breadth of our ecological destruction has created ripples that will ebb and flow for centuries to come. We really don't know the extent (or lack) of what we have begun. (pseudo-proverb)Just because you are "fire proofing" a place, doesn't mean you forgo putting in a fire exit.(/pseudo-proverb)

Humanity has a lot of things to fix, so just think of space exploration as another (important) tool in the toolbox.

Re:space escapism

[g4dget]

What's far more dangerous than "space escapism" is "we-can-fix-it-ism" because that distracts us from making progress during the small window we have available (between technological ability and environmental meltdown).

I am pretty pessimistic about being able to fix it. But I'm even more pessimistic about space travel.

The only way to achieve the mandatory objectives you have detailed (controlling population growth, military spending, and pollution) is a global totalitarian government forever.

No, that's not "the only way". Many of our pollution problems could be taken care of with recycling laws, energy conservation laws, and similar laws. Free markets and free societies then come up with efficient ways to service those needs. And we have a really powerful marketing and PR machinery that can get people to kill themselves with unhealthy food and cigarettes and spend far more than they can afford; affecting reproductive choices would be an easy task in comparison.

Democracies, market economies, and capitalism can be stable, environmentally friendly, and sustainable. What will kill us, however, is leaving setting the goals and regulations under which democracies, market economies, and capitalism operate to chance.

Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.

That platitude can be used to justify anything from mass murder to perpetual motion machines

Is the colonization of space apparently unreasonable?

Well, I'm all for research in new propulsion systems, basic physics, and many other aspects of science relevant to space travel. What I'm against is wasting money on futile projects like the space station or manned exploration of the planets. We can fly around the solar system for the next thousand years with current technology and we would still be unable to achieve colonization. Unless and until we achieve fundamental breakthroughs, space colonization is a pipe dream, and those breakthroughs depend on science to be done here on earth.

Control Freaks

[Baldrson]

Central governments and even centralized asset ownership is hostile to doing anything to relieve the planet of its technological civilizations.

The fundamental problem is control freaks. These are people who have a serious problem with letting people decentralize fundamentals of life. They are the guys who convinced the GI generation to give up their farms and make their boomer kids get money, whether from central government or big corporations, to have fundamentals like food from the grocery store or a place of residence from the landlord or mortgage banker.

NASA is part of this problem and it is not therefore likely to be reformed to allow decentralization of fundamental resources like land.

Nevertheless I'm sure there are lots of guys who still want to work within the system rather than figure out how to dislodge the death-grip on the planet now held by those like NASA bureaucrats or big corporate moguls.

If you guys want to support NASA, I suggest you take a few years living in poverty so you can pass some laws reforming that organization independent of the conflicts of interest arising from any industry or government funding.

I did.

It radically changed the way I view politics, people and the world.

You could, alternatively, listen to guys who actually walked the talk.

If that sounds more appealing to you than spending years in poverty to learn some very hard lessons, then in addition to the above link to my Congressional testimony, you might want to follow the following links for more information:

• National Science Trust: Money For Scientific Information
• A Net Asset Tax Based On The Net Present Value Calculation and Market Democracy
• The First of Many Awards for Ethics Given to Morton Thiokol Engineers Who Opposed the Challenger Launch
• Robert W. Bussard's Submission of My Legislation to Congress
• My Slashdot Article About Rocketry Awards
• My ultracentrifugal rocket engine (Roger Gregory co-inventor) US Patent 6,212,876
• Circa 1990 Usenet Archive on Space Commercialization
• The Nature of Money and Government

B.S.

[barakn]

China is the only country to have made significant progress in controlling birthrates and that's because they are a totalitarian government.

You ignore a large number of countries in Europe and Japan whose birth rates have dropped so perilously low they are in danger of losing population. Eastern European countries' fertility rates, while higher than those of Western Europe, dropped dramatically after the fall of the Soviet Union, a totalitarian government. The female literacy rate correlates better than the type of government with low growth rates.