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> So be it. This is our home. It has given birth to life and sustained it till now (and it will if we hadn't messed up so badly). Do you still live at home wit

by bhaak 9y ago

> So be it. This is our home. It has given birth to life and sustained it till now (and it will if we hadn't messed up so badly). Do you still live at home with your parents? Some people grow up and move out. So will humanity if it will be responsible. > So you want to save yourself by getting out while the earth is still getting fucked? > That is like the most ungrateful thing you can do as a species. And if we are doing that, what worth are we really, as a species? We are nothing more that complete imbeciles if we do that. Let me draw a historical parallel. Should the colonists have stayed in Europe and tried to solve their social problems first before moving over the ocean to the Americas? I agree that we have enough problems on Earth that we wouldn't need to tackle other problems on other celestial bodies. But that's not how our society works. Not everybody has the same influence on the progression of things. Potential Mars colonists would be able to change things on Mars but unlikely to have any impact on Earth. And if we really fuck over the ecosphere on Earth, if we have no other place where humans are living in a self-sustaining way then it's game over. But if we have an autarkic colony outside Earth there is at least a chance that they might come back to Earth to repopulate it with at least some of the life that was lost. With likely exactly that technology that they had to use on Mars first.

babyrainbow 9y ago
>Do you still live at home with your parents? Some people grow up and move out. So will humanity if it will be responsible. Sure. But imagine you have destroyed your home by your own carelessness. Do you think it is proper to abandon your old home, for a new one. What guarantee is there that you will not mess this new home just as you did with the old one? The idea is that only if you can fix the mess you have caused in the first place, you can be expected to maintain a new home... >Should the colonists have stayed in Europe and tried to solve their social problems first before moving over the ocean to the Americas? What did it cost moving over the ocean to Americas? It did took resources that could be used to fix problems in Europe and used it for their journey? You see, here what being advocated is that massive amounts of money, be spent for a cause that extremely improbably, using a solution that is extremely unlikely to work. Now this massive amounts of money, could be allocated to implement real solution to real problems we are having right now..
- bhaak 9y ago
  > Sure. But imagine you have destroyed your home by your own carelessness. Do you think it is proper to abandon your old home, for a new one. What guarantee is there that you will not mess this new home just as you did with the old one? The idea is that only if you can fix the mess you have caused in the first place, you can be expected to maintain a new home... But the problem here is that we are not the only ones that could wreck our home. The next dinosaur asteroid that hits or supervolcano that erupts will take out us and lots of the other higher lifeforms on Earth. > Now this massive amounts of money, could be allocated to implement real solution to real problems we are having right now.. I agree that this money might be better allocated for project with a shorter time horizon and do also good. Long term, I'm not so sure though. But I also believe that it probably wouldn't be applied to other projects. Too much money is wasted on senseless stuff, at least in this case, it's going to something that inspires people and has a valuable goal.
  - babyrainbow 9y ago
    > we are not the only ones that could wreck our home. The next dinosaur asteroid that hits or supervolcano that erupts will take out us and lots of the other higher lifeforms on Earth. Sure, there are all kinds of apocalyptic events. But we don't have to luxury to address them right now. See the following from https://www2.jpl.nasa.gov/sl9/back2.html https://www2.jpl.nasa.gov/sl9/back2.html >An individual's chance of being killed by a meteorite is small, but the risk increases with the size of the impacting comet or asteroid, with the greatest risk associated with global catastrophes resulting from impacts of objects larger than 1 kilometer. NASA knows of no asteroid or comet currently on a collision course with Earth, so the probability of a major collision is quite small. In fact, as best as we can tell, no large object is likely to strike the Earth any time in the next several hundred years. To be able to better calculate the statistics, astronomers need to detect as many of the near-Earth objects as possible. It's likely that we could identify a threatening near-Earth object large enough to potentially cause catastrophic changes in the Earth's environment, and most astronomers believe that a systematic approach to studying asteroids and comets that pass close to the Earth makes good sense. It's too late for the dinosaurs, but today astonomers are conducting ever-increasing searches to identify all of the larger objects which pose an impact danger to Earth. So instead of going to mars, isn't it much cheaper and easier to detect and destroy that kinds of asteroids as early as possible? Look. I like the idea of a backup home. But I don't really think this Elon Musk character is genuine. That his intentions are really taking human beings to mars. Think about what happened with Hyperloop. I would have understood if he had attempted, ie invested in it, attempt to build a prototype, and failed. But no. He just threw some ideas and disappeared from the picture. What do you think about it? Isn't that relavant at all?

by bhaak 9y ago

babyrainbow 9y ago

>Do you still live at home with your parents? Some people grow up and move out. So will humanity if it will be responsible. Sure. But imagine you have destroyed your home by your own carelessness. Do you think it is proper to abandon your old home, for a new one. What guarantee is there that you will not mess this new home just as you did with the old one? The idea is that only if you can fix the mess you have caused in the first place, you can be expected to maintain a new home... >Should the colonists have stayed in Europe and tried to solve their social problems first before moving over the ocean to the Americas? What did it cost moving over the ocean to Americas? It did took resources that could be used to fix problems in Europe and used it for their journey? You see, here what being advocated is that massive amounts of money, be spent for a cause that extremely improbably, using a solution that is extremely unlikely to work. Now this massive amounts of money, could be allocated to implement real solution to real problems we are having right now..

bhaak 9y ago
> Sure. But imagine you have destroyed your home by your own carelessness. Do you think it is proper to abandon your old home, for a new one. What guarantee is there that you will not mess this new home just as you did with the old one? The idea is that only if you can fix the mess you have caused in the first place, you can be expected to maintain a new home... But the problem here is that we are not the only ones that could wreck our home. The next dinosaur asteroid that hits or supervolcano that erupts will take out us and lots of the other higher lifeforms on Earth. > Now this massive amounts of money, could be allocated to implement real solution to real problems we are having right now.. I agree that this money might be better allocated for project with a shorter time horizon and do also good. Long term, I'm not so sure though. But I also believe that it probably wouldn't be applied to other projects. Too much money is wasted on senseless stuff, at least in this case, it's going to something that inspires people and has a valuable goal.
- babyrainbow 9y ago
  > we are not the only ones that could wreck our home. The next dinosaur asteroid that hits or supervolcano that erupts will take out us and lots of the other higher lifeforms on Earth. Sure, there are all kinds of apocalyptic events. But we don't have to luxury to address them right now. See the following from https://www2.jpl.nasa.gov/sl9/back2.html https://www2.jpl.nasa.gov/sl9/back2.html >An individual's chance of being killed by a meteorite is small, but the risk increases with the size of the impacting comet or asteroid, with the greatest risk associated with global catastrophes resulting from impacts of objects larger than 1 kilometer. NASA knows of no asteroid or comet currently on a collision course with Earth, so the probability of a major collision is quite small. In fact, as best as we can tell, no large object is likely to strike the Earth any time in the next several hundred years. To be able to better calculate the statistics, astronomers need to detect as many of the near-Earth objects as possible. It's likely that we could identify a threatening near-Earth object large enough to potentially cause catastrophic changes in the Earth's environment, and most astronomers believe that a systematic approach to studying asteroids and comets that pass close to the Earth makes good sense. It's too late for the dinosaurs, but today astonomers are conducting ever-increasing searches to identify all of the larger objects which pose an impact danger to Earth. So instead of going to mars, isn't it much cheaper and easier to detect and destroy that kinds of asteroids as early as possible? Look. I like the idea of a backup home. But I don't really think this Elon Musk character is genuine. That his intentions are really taking human beings to mars. Think about what happened with Hyperloop. I would have understood if he had attempted, ie invested in it, attempt to build a prototype, and failed. But no. He just threw some ideas and disappeared from the picture. What do you think about it? Isn't that relavant at all?