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Seems unlikely to be the first choice of destination on that basis. By the time the technology exists to reliably transport people (or equivalent amounts of mas
by exratione 13y ago
Seems unlikely to be the first choice of destination on that basis. By the time the technology exists to reliably transport people (or equivalent amounts of mass) to other planetary systems in a usefully short amount of time, then the technology will also exist to cost-effectively (a) make everything habitable for baseline humans via habitats and other forms of engineering, and (b) engineer sentient entities that can live comfortably in native conditions near anywhere in a star system.
So whether or not the system has habitable zone planets will be irrelevant. Our descendants will go to the closest one first.
- GotAnyMegadeth 13y agoBut it depends what is cheaper...
- prawks 13y agoI think you're underestimating the importance of not living in bubbles for a) and opening a can of worms by assuming b).
- nnq 13y agoand what would that can of worms be? :) ...really, if there is a "can of worms" to open here, we'll open it quite soon, well before any such voyage, by starting to do cosmetic-human-genetic-engineering, economic-oriented-human-genetic-engineering and warfare-oriented-human-genetic-engineering, and I'm pessimistic enough to bet on the third one as the first to crop up (nothing better than: "supper smart military engineers", "super smart, fit, sociopathic and fanatic - ie. unbreakable - spies" or any other such combos that I'm sure make up some twisted folks' wet dreams...).
- mtgx 13y agoCould still be useful in case anything ever happens to our solar system. But 22 lightyears means it's still going to be one-way trip, even with matter/anti-matter engines. Unless we develop immortality by then of course...
- Aardwolf 13y agoOr procreating on the space ship.
- Fargren 13y agoHow is that not a one way trip?
- cryptoz 13y agoStaying on Earth is also a one way trip then.
- chucknelson 13y agoI think the point was more about a one-way trip for a single person. I'd agree that it's not a one-way trip for humanity, though. Once some of us get there (e.g., progeny of the original crew), eventually some of us could get back to Earth too (at some later date). Assuming Earth isn't destroyed by that point...
- hnriot 13y agoProbably by the time the progeny get back to Earth the current species will have self-annihilated and the earth would have returned to a more peaceful place, the atmosphere recovered, the vegetation replacing the asphalt and the oceans clean and pure. A few thousands years peace is exactly what the Earth needs.
- obviouslygreen 13y agoWithout the "trip" part.
- ceejayoz 13y agoIt's not even a one-way trip unless you count procreation. It's likely a part-of-the-way-then-die trip.
- 13y ago
- kijin 13y agoHabitable zone planets are interesting primarily because there might be alien life on them, and only secondarily because we might want to colonize them. Our descendants will probably not allocate billions of dollars on a mission to a ball of dry rock when the alternative is a planet with a potential for life.
- VladRussian2 13y ago>Our descendants will probably not allocate billions of dollars on a mission to a ball of dry rock if our descendants will still be thinking in billions of dollars ...
- leishulang 13y agoSame goes why goto the moon when we are not colonizing the sea. We will go there simply to proof our technology advancement.