Should Humanity expand to the Stars? II

[The Knockout Gun Gals]

It advances a variety of technology in a variety of ways, and has a net economic benefit to the nation operating the space program. So yes, space programs are beneficial.

And solving world hunger is a meme.

I do not really care about the nations operating those space programmes as I do not consider them responsible guides of our societies.

To someone who has never experienced it perhaps it is.

Well, we have to. Chinese's space programs has been one of the fastest-growing in the recent years.

[Arkeyana]

Martian and Lunar colonies'll be the first step. We will have to start with sleeper or generation ships 'till we get FTL.

In my opinion, the only viable use for the moon is as a shipyard for larger and more long range spacecraft.

[Equality of Nations]

You may be right. But, to increase our chances of discovering a way for a rapid interstellar transportation, i think we still need to use our resources more efficiently.

And how do you do that if you have no idea as to what the hell youre doing?

By allocating our primary resources to scientific purposes, and providing the consumer community with only the most efficient products that are durable, effective and recyclable.

[Equality of Nations]

Martian and Lunar colonies'll be the first step. We will have to start with sleeper or generation ships 'till we get FTL.

In my opinion, the only viable use for the moon is as a shipyard for larger and more long range spacecraft.

That might mess with the lunar orbit and rotation speed though. Orbital shipyards seem more likely to happen.

[UniversalCommons]

The moon has a number of uses. It has Helium 3 in abundance which is supposed to be useful for potential fusion energy. It could be used for low gravity manufacturing, plus space tourism.

[Bluelight-R006]

Just heard that the US’ space agencies are going back to the Moon. So excited for what’s going to happen. I guess that’s one step to the future.

Where did you hear that? If it's true, that is probably one of the coolest things that could happen in my lifetime.

US Vice-President Mike Pence announced in early October this year, in which, we are late for the news.

[Iebrelara]

Stay in your corner. We don't want you. *Pushes Earth away with a very long stick*

But, in all reality, I feel like it'd just be filled with Military spaceships and constant conflicts over planets. Not to mention just how many colonies would decide 'Hey, we're just going to break away now' and then we'd have the issue of interplanetary diplomacy and trade. Also, colonizing other worlds would mean Evolution would begin to take place, and over time we'd become so very unrecognizable from each other that we may just become a large slew of aliens to each other, and if the communication between Human planets died, we could eventually forget about each other and then have Civilization restart on these worlds. So, we'd have an unending cycle of Colonization, Failure, Isolation, and then Regression. In short, we'd need to go full Space-Opera mode for that.

[Rusozak]

Stay in your corner. We don't want you. *Pushes Earth away with a very long stick*

But, in all reality, I feel like it'd just be filled with Military spaceships and constant conflicts over planets. Not to mention just how many colonies would decide 'Hey, we're just going to break away now' and then we'd have the issue of interplanetary diplomacy and trade. Also, colonizing other worlds would mean Evolution would begin to take place, and over time we'd become so very unrecognizable from each other that we may just become a large slew of aliens to each other, and if the communication between Human planets died, we could eventually forget about each other and then have Civilization restart on these worlds. So, we'd have an unending cycle of Colonization, Failure, Isolation, and then Regression. In short, we'd need to go full Space-Opera mode for that.

Besides the war part, that doesn't sound all that bad actually. It beats dying in our cradle (Earth) because we're too scared to crawl out of it.

[Pax Nerdvana]

Where did you hear that? If it's true, that is probably one of the coolest things that could happen in my lifetime.

US Vice-President Mike Pence announced in early October this year, in which, we are late for the news.

I don't think I heard about that. I hope it's true.

[The Federal Kingdom Of Zuhi]

That's a good idea, but I have no idea how to do a poll.

Go and edit your first post on this thread (starter post) and you should see a option below the ‘type in message’ table to create a poll. If you don’t see it, it’s okay. You don’t have to make one.

If we can stop destroying this one, of course.

Good news is that nations are attempting to reverse the current effects of the planet such as Global Warming and Climate Change. Bad news is that we’re still doing what causes the effects. We can only hope the future is better than now.

I do hope you're right.

[Pax Nerdvana]

I got a poll set up.

[Arkeyana]

So I'd imagine we'd have stations like The Ark from The 100 that take care of moving people from orbit to ground?

[Pax Nerdvana]

So I'd imagine we'd have stations like The Ark from The 100 that take care of moving people from orbit to ground?

Maybe something like that.

[Northwest Slobovia]

The President signed a directive to "lead an innovative and sustainable program of exploration with commercial and international partners to enable human expansion across the solar system and to bring back to Earth new knowledge and opportunities." (There's not more at the end of the link, the directive mainly sticks those words into an existing policy document.)

A couple of comments:

As the directive notes, it's "subject to the availability of appropriations", so until or unless Congress budgets some money for this, it means very little. It has about the practical effect of me saying the same thing. Since the federal government has been kept running by continuing resolutions for most of this year, don't get your hopes up for cash any time soon.

Note the slippery wording: "lead an innovative and sustainable program of exploration ... to enable human expansion". It doesn't actually say anything about actually putting more flags and footprints anywhere off Earth. Sending more probes -- at least with the right missions and instruments -- "enables" human expansion at some later date. Sending a bunch more probes is a good idea anyway if we want hypothetical off-world colonies to survive.

[Pax Nerdvana]

The President signed a directive to "lead an innovative and sustainable program of exploration with commercial and international partners to enable human expansion across the solar system and to bring back to Earth new knowledge and opportunities." (There's not more at the end of the link, the directive mainly sticks those words into an existing policy document.)

A couple of comments:

As the directive notes, it's "subject to the availability of appropriations", so until or unless Congress budgets some money for this, it means very little. It has about the practical effect of me saying the same thing. Since the federal government has been kept running by continuing resolutions for most of this year, don't get your hopes up for cash any time soon.

Note the slippery wording: "lead an innovative and sustainable program of exploration ... to enable human expansion". It doesn't actually say anything about actually putting more flags and footprints anywhere off Earth. Sending more probes -- at least with the right missions and instruments -- "enables" human expansion at some later date. Sending a bunch more probes is a good idea anyway if we want hypothetical off-world colonies to survive.

I heard about that. Considering the fact that Congress barely ever manages to agree on anything, it's unlikely that anything will actually happen.

[Vallermoore]

1-we don't have the tech
2-if we did, what happens when we meet intelligent aliens with less tech then us? Do we wipe them out and take their planet from them?

[Pax Nerdvana]

1-we don't have the tech
2-if we did, what happens when we meet intelligent aliens with less tech then us? Do we wipe them out and take their planet from them?

We can easily develop the tech, if everyone works together. Aliens? Try to make peace with them.

[Salandriagado]

1-we don't have the tech
2-if we did, what happens when we meet intelligent aliens with less tech then us? Do we wipe them out and take their planet from them?

Based on our track record so far, this seems plausible (with "technology" referring specifically to the weapon-applicable variety):

1) If they're technologically superior to us, try to steal said technology. If we catch up by doing so, proceed to step 2. If not, die.
2) If we're at roughly equivalent levels of technology, get into an ultimately pointless war over something irrelevant, and either die, commit genocide, or proceed to step 3 or 4 as appropriate.
3) If they're technologically inferior to us but still useful as slaves, enslave them.
4) If they're no use as slaves, commit genocide and maybe keep a few in a zoo.

[The Knockout Gun Gals]

We probably should secures our own solar system first.

[Eclius]

1-we don't have the tech
2-if we did, what happens when we meet intelligent aliens with less tech then us? Do we wipe them out and take their planet from them?

We can easily develop the tech, if everyone works together. Aliens? Try to make peace with them.

That's true, I mean who knows, aliens might be friendly and be willing to coexist with sapient

[Pax Nerdvana]

We can easily develop the tech, if everyone works together. Aliens? Try to make peace with them.

That's true, I mean who knows, aliens might be friendly and be willing to coexist with sapient

Exactly. We should only kill the aliens if they're hostile towards us and attack us first.

[United Imperial Systems]

Wh---Why bother asking?
Obviously we should! It will safeguard us from asteroids and other cosmic events, because, let's be honest, by the time we do get the ability to go to the stars, first, the government is going to be global, second, famine isn't going to be a thing, and third, no disease will wipe us out, no matter how much it tried to.
So, we should go there, but first, we should make sure we can co-exist with each other, make life on Earth a heaven first, then turn to the starts.

[Pax Nerdvana]

Wh---Why bother asking?
Obviously we should! It will safeguard us from asteroids and other cosmic events, because, let's be honest, by the time we do get the ability to go to the stars, first, the government is going to be global, second, famine isn't going to be a thing, and third, no disease will wipe us out, no matter how much it tried to.
So, we should go there, but first, we should make sure we can co-exist with each other, make life on Earth a heaven first, then turn to the starts.

An international coalition is the best idea.

[Northwest Slobovia]

2-if we did, what happens when we meet intelligent aliens with less tech then us? Do we wipe them out and take their planet from them?

Based on our track record so far, this seems plausible (with "technology" referring specifically to the weapon-applicable variety):

Given the distances and plausible technology for building starships (sub-light), our ability to project power over long distances matters more. It doesn't really matter if the US has ten armored divisions and the locals have just pointy sticks, if we have no ability to move lots of armed soldiers over many light years.

2) If we're at roughly equivalent levels of technology, get into an ultimately pointless war over something irrelevant, and either die, commit genocide, or proceed to step 3 or 4 as appropriate.
3) If they're technologically inferior to us but still useful as slaves, enslave them.
4) If they're no use as slaves, commit genocide and maybe keep a few in a zoo.

All of these make the big assumption of compatible environments. (I'm going to ignore all the obvious problems with slavery.) There's really no reason to worry about people who can't live where we can and vice versa. Or even won't live. (Humans can live in the Sahara and the Antarctic with enough equipment, but very few even bother to try.)

Compatible environments seems unlikely. Mars is theoretically in the Sun's "habitable zone", where water is potentially liquid.* But it's much colder, and has a little more than a third of the gravity. If there were Martians, they likely couldn't live here because Earth has almost three times their normal gravity, and probably wouldn't want to because it's so much hotter. It's not clear we can, for example, have children on Mars and have them develop normally, and even if we can (and we hand-wave the existance of air we can breath) we will always need some sort of technology to keep us warm.

*: "Habitable zone" is loosely defined as where a planet's black-body temperature would be between 0℃ and 100℃, making the assumption of an Earth-like atmosphere, which we don't know. That definition puts Venus just inside the Sun's habitable zone, but it's just a touch warmer than that. Because of the definition, it's more likely there are "habitable" worlds where it's too hot for us, because we can't survive for any length of time without very fancy cooling if the outside air temperature above 50℃ (122℉).

[Northwest Slobovia]

Wh---Why bother asking?
Obviously we should! It will safeguard us from asteroids and other cosmic events,

There are cheaper and far easier ways to do that, if that's all you want.

More importantly, the compatible environment issue (in my last post) is a big problem, and likely the big problem. We need some place to go before we get all excited about going.