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I see Mars not so much as a "plan b" or "insurance". That's just a nice side effect. Humans venturing out into space and establishing colonies is a big step in
by Tepix 7y ago
I see Mars not so much as a "plan b" or "insurance". That's just a nice side effect.
Humans venturing out into space and establishing colonies is a big step in human evolution. It's a bigger step than when animal life left the oceans and ventured onto land.
If you look at all of life on Earth from far away, there would be only a few achievements you could see. Rather shortly after life began, it changed Earth's atmosphere by producing lots of oxygen.
Right now we are changing the atmosphere again (unintendedly).
When we leave the planet and venture out into the solar system we are taking the first step to establish a presence beyond the planet we started on.
The next big challenges on the same order of magnitude will be to leave the solar system and spread around the galaxy. And then make the jump to other galaxies. It's a long way to go. We don't know how long the window of opportunity remains open. It is open now. We should get moving. That's what Musk is saying and doing.
- heeen2 7y agoI think you underestimate how far apart galaxies are.
- Semaphor 7y agoI think once we manage to colonize our entire galaxy, the next galaxy won't be that far away.
- danw1979 7y agoAndromeda ? It's closer than you think ! (to the tune of The Specials' Enjoy Yourself)
- Tepix 7y agoI think we all underestimate how far apart just solar systems are. In the common projections we take a travel speed of 1-10% speed of light for granted which is insanely hard to achieve with any significant mass. If we indeed make it out of our solar system (and not just once), mankind will eventually spread all over the Milky Way. Anyway, to come back to your point: Looking at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_nearest_galaxies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_nearest_galaxies we would start with satellite galaxies, the closest one is 25.000 light years away. Unthinkable for now.