Okay - first on the "have to colonize space" - yes quite probably we or our descendants rather will have to do it to survive. But the timescale for that is rather further away than most think.
I saw a recent survey that said a high proportion of Americans think there's a significant risk of a huge civilization ending asteroid hitting Earth before 2050.
Actually large asteroids hit the Earth only every few million years. We can tell that from the cratering record and large impacts preserved on the Earth - and also can see that other planets and the Moon get hit by larger asteroids rarely - and really huge ones - never since the first few hundred million years of the solar system.
So - that means - perhaps every hundred thousand generations or so, if our civilization lasts that long, then we'll need to do something about a big incoming asteroid.
Chances are that before the next really big asteroid impact, we have evolved into another species of hominid so that gives an idea of the timescale. Of course could happen as soon as this century - but the chances of that are tiny.
Smaller ones hit Earth more often - and we are likely to encounter many smaller asteroids before we are hit by anything civilization threatening.
Also - even then - it is not extinction causing.
There are no known natural events likely to make humans on the Earth extinct in less than a few hundred million years - especially when you bear in mind that we'd see a really huge asteroid long in advance and would be able to prepare by having at least some of our population in submarines, or underground shelters etc. with supplies to last out the firestorm and surface afterwards and rebuild civilization.
You can go through the various possibilities - e.g. gamma ray bursts - yes they are pretty threatening - but also - very rare - and not extinction causing for a technological human civilization. Immediate impact is on just one side of the Earth - and even on that side there would be people underground or in submarines who would survive and could come out and help rebuild the Earth. Going into space wouldn't help there. And again this is so unlikely again, like the millions of years asteroid impacts - but even less likely - chances are high that we've evolved into a different species before anything like this happens to us,
So - maybe our descendants will need to do something about that. Or indeed - possibly other species also - if say civilized parrots or dogs or dolphins have evolved by then.
But chances we need to do that is tiny - we'd be better putting our effort to do with dealing with problems we can cause for ourselves.
So, things like making sure that we make responsible use of biotech and of nanotech - and generally if we create new technology - to look carefully at the safety aspects of what we do.
And that applies to space colonization also. There are significant risks there also for civilization - if we get to the point where anyone can just "fly into space" say - or anyone can build spaceships from space resources using 3D printers or whatever. That gives huge power to space dwellers which they could use against each other - or against the Earth.
Same also for economic power. For instance - if you get to a stage where our finances are totally dominated by space resources - that most of the world economy comes from space - or that e.g. some element we came to rely on as much as we now do on oil - comes from space.
As for asteroids - best to deal with the smaller city and country threatening asteroids - those are small enough so we can hope to deflect them reasonably easily - so long as we know about them enough in advance.
So that's the focus of the current Space Guard activities in space. They would find any big civilization threatening asteroids if there are any - but none found and not likely to find any.
Another thing that is civilization threatening is - if we return microbial life to Earth from other places in our solar system - including Mars - if it is radically different, XNA rather than DNA say, that's something that could be potentially civilization threatening, and various other ways it could be also.
So - chance of that is tiny perhaps - but nobody knows for sure - and so - we should be really careful about doing anything that our technology permits us to do that can't happen naturally. Look at it every which way and listen to anyone who thinks there are issues with it, and evaluate what they say carefully also - just in case it is one of the potential civilization threatening things we may encounter in the future.
I think there's a lot of potential for benefit to humanity in space. But also - as space develops from its initial explorations and colonization or settlement by people with idealistic ambitions - to become something that big companies and countries and wealthy people engage in just to make money from it - I think there is potential for people to just use space resources to become wealthy themselves and hold the rest of the Earth to ransom,
Or something between the two - to hobble between disasters and recoveries due to imbalances of trade and relations with space miners and Earth.
The situation in space is very different from Earth so Earth models and solutions may not work there.
Expect the unit to be rather the settlement - with affiliation to countries on the Earth - or economic - companies or other financial groupings - rather than territorial.
And as for practicality - there's nowhere in space worth living in for its own sake - nowhere is better than Earth - so you would go into space for some other reason such as space mining indeed. Or - space tourism. Or exploration.
I think myself that putting the emphasis on exploration and scientific discovery is best at this stage. So we find out more about space - and ourselves also - and that way can be better prepared - and also - find new discoveries that could - especially discoveries about life - be of great benefit to humanity.
And - lots of interesting and exciting things to discover in space still. Especially for life -we have just started. The visit to a comet this year will be first time ever that an instrument able to spot biosignatures has been sent outside of Earth since the 1970s (only two missions then with the capability - and them with major issues also) - then ExoMars in 2018. There is no knowing what we will discover once biological exploration of the solar system really gets underway.
Let's Plan For Exploration and Discovery of Space with no End Date - NOT Escape from Earth - Opinion Piece
I saw a recent survey that said a high proportion of Americans think there's a significant risk of a huge civilization ending asteroid hitting Earth before 2050.
Actually large asteroids hit the Earth only every few million years. We can tell that from the cratering record and large impacts preserved on the Earth - and also can see that other planets and the Moon get hit by larger asteroids rarely - and really huge ones - never since the first few hundred million years of the solar system.
So - that means - perhaps every hundred thousand generations or so, if our civilization lasts that long, then we'll need to do something about a big incoming asteroid.
Chances are that before the next really big asteroid impact, we have evolved into another species of hominid so that gives an idea of the timescale. Of course could happen as soon as this century - but the chances of that are tiny.
Smaller ones hit Earth more often - and we are likely to encounter many smaller asteroids before we are hit by anything civilization threatening.
Also - even then - it is not extinction causing.
There are no known natural events likely to make humans on the Earth extinct in less than a few hundred million years - especially when you bear in mind that we'd see a really huge asteroid long in advance and would be able to prepare by having at least some of our population in submarines, or underground shelters etc. with supplies to last out the firestorm and surface afterwards and rebuild civilization.
You can go through the various possibilities - e.g. gamma ray bursts - yes they are pretty threatening - but also - very rare - and not extinction causing for a technological human civilization. Immediate impact is on just one side of the Earth - and even on that side there would be people underground or in submarines who would survive and could come out and help rebuild the Earth. Going into space wouldn't help there. And again this is so unlikely again, like the millions of years asteroid impacts - but even less likely - chances are high that we've evolved into a different species before anything like this happens to us,
So - maybe our descendants will need to do something about that. Or indeed - possibly other species also - if say civilized parrots or dogs or dolphins have evolved by then.
But chances we need to do that is tiny - we'd be better putting our effort to do with dealing with problems we can cause for ourselves.
So, things like making sure that we make responsible use of biotech and of nanotech - and generally if we create new technology - to look carefully at the safety aspects of what we do.
And that applies to space colonization also. There are significant risks there also for civilization - if we get to the point where anyone can just "fly into space" say - or anyone can build spaceships from space resources using 3D printers or whatever. That gives huge power to space dwellers which they could use against each other - or against the Earth.
Same also for economic power. For instance - if you get to a stage where our finances are totally dominated by space resources - that most of the world economy comes from space - or that e.g. some element we came to rely on as much as we now do on oil - comes from space.
As for asteroids - best to deal with the smaller city and country threatening asteroids - those are small enough so we can hope to deflect them reasonably easily - so long as we know about them enough in advance.
So that's the focus of the current Space Guard activities in space. They would find any big civilization threatening asteroids if there are any - but none found and not likely to find any.
Another thing that is civilization threatening is - if we return microbial life to Earth from other places in our solar system - including Mars - if it is radically different, XNA rather than DNA say, that's something that could be potentially civilization threatening, and various other ways it could be also.
So - chance of that is tiny perhaps - but nobody knows for sure - and so - we should be really careful about doing anything that our technology permits us to do that can't happen naturally. Look at it every which way and listen to anyone who thinks there are issues with it, and evaluate what they say carefully also - just in case it is one of the potential civilization threatening things we may encounter in the future.
I think there's a lot of potential for benefit to humanity in space. But also - as space develops from its initial explorations and colonization or settlement by people with idealistic ambitions - to become something that big companies and countries and wealthy people engage in just to make money from it - I think there is potential for people to just use space resources to become wealthy themselves and hold the rest of the Earth to ransom,
Or something between the two - to hobble between disasters and recoveries due to imbalances of trade and relations with space miners and Earth.
The situation in space is very different from Earth so Earth models and solutions may not work there.
- Big imbalance - the resources in space for many minerals vastly out supply Earth. E.g. there is enough iron in the asteroid belt to cover the Earth to a depth of half a mile How Humans Will Mine Asteroids and Comets. Huge quantities of platinum and other resources - we could end up dependent on space resources for much of our economy -more so than we now depend on oil
- Much of space "land" is worthless for humans - just acres and acres of vacuum covered dry useless craters - only valuable when you build habitats.
- Nowhere humans can live without technology. If your house fails - or some vital bit of technology - you can't just go out into your garden and back yard and wait for a fire engine to turn up - you die. In a war, nowhere for people to retreat to, no trees, mountains, nowhere they could survive - so any war would probably end quickly with everyone involved dead.
- Space settlers would have access to immensely powerful technology. E.g. spaceships would typically travel at kilometers per second
- Habitats extremely fragile, have to hold in tons of pressure per square meter - and expensive to build.
Expect the unit to be rather the settlement - with affiliation to countries on the Earth - or economic - companies or other financial groupings - rather than territorial.
And as for practicality - there's nowhere in space worth living in for its own sake - nowhere is better than Earth - so you would go into space for some other reason such as space mining indeed. Or - space tourism. Or exploration.
I think myself that putting the emphasis on exploration and scientific discovery is best at this stage. So we find out more about space - and ourselves also - and that way can be better prepared - and also - find new discoveries that could - especially discoveries about life - be of great benefit to humanity.
And - lots of interesting and exciting things to discover in space still. Especially for life -we have just started. The visit to a comet this year will be first time ever that an instrument able to spot biosignatures has been sent outside of Earth since the 1970s (only two missions then with the capability - and them with major issues also) - then ExoMars in 2018. There is no knowing what we will discover once biological exploration of the solar system really gets underway.
Let's Plan For Exploration and Discovery of Space with no End Date - NOT Escape from Earth - Opinion Piece
About the Author
Robert Walker
Writer of articles on Mars and Space issues - Software Developer of Tune Smithy, Bounce Metronome etc.Studied at Wolfson College, Oxford
Lives in Isle of Mull
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