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The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
bymi( 197448 ) writes:
Before a human walks on Mars, there ought to be some humans born in Antarctica [wikipedia.org] — an environment much more welcoming to our species than the red planet.
Yeah, it is only a continent, not a planet, but it is so much easier to get to and live on, that there really is no excuse to go to Mars, until Antarctica (as well as Siberia, Australian Outback, Sahara and other deserts, American Midwest, Canadian woods) are settled to a population density exceeding 1 finger per square mile.
Mars is fascinating, but a
bylaie_techie ( 883464 ) writes:
Before a human walks on Mars, there ought to be some humans born in Antarctica [wikipedia.org] — an environment much more welcoming to our species than the red planet.
Yeah, it is only a continent, not a planet, but it is so much easier to get to and live on, that there really is no excuse to go to Mars, until Antarctica (as well as Siberia, Australian Outback, Sahara and other deserts, American Midwest, Canadian woods) are settled to a population density exceeding 1 finger per square mile.
Mars is fascinating, but any attempts to spend tax-dollars on going there under the pretext of "humanity running out of room" must be rejected as mere pretence.
The pretense is that a single Extinction Level Event could wipe out our species. In order for our species to survive, we need to colonize off planet.
bymi( 197448 ) writes:
The pretense is that a single Extinction Level Event
Yeah? Is such an event more or less probable than encountering a unicorn?
bytnk1 ( 899206 ) writes:
An extinction level event has a 100% probability in the next two billion years if we don't leave the planet. And there's a high probability that something will come along before then.
Leaving the planet is absolutely necessary for the species to survive into the indefinite future. There is no doubt. That "unicorn" is at the very far horizon, and it is barely visible, but it is real and it is coming right at us slowly, but inexorably. And that's only the one big enough for us to see even from here.
Now, if
byarth1 ( 260657 ) writes:
An extinction level event has a 100% probability in the next two billion years if we don't leave the planet.
Who is this "we" you talk about? What excursions we do now will be as relevant to our descendants two billion years down the road as what excursions the eukaryotes did two billion years ago is to us.
Two billion years is enough time for our descendants to develop as much as we did from Homo Erectus days until now, four million times over. And that's assuming it's all back-to-back and no parallel evolution.
Even if you said a thousand years and not two billion, it would still be too long term. Evolution doesn't care about long term goals. Anything that has an adverse effect on the next generation will be selected against. Individual specimens that waste resources on planning numerous generations ahead will be less competitive than those that don't, and will go extinct before the future descendants can reap the benefits, losing the competition to those that spend their resources on their immediate offspring.
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bytnk1 ( 899206 ) writes:
Evolution and development does not require us to ever leave the planet. And you'll note that in that amount of time, no species has ever left this planet other than what we have managed to do. We might be completely different in two billion years or even 1,000 years, but if we never leave, we're toast, whatever we are.
While I understand that two billion years is an absurdly long point in the future, the point to be made is that we know it is coming. There is no "if" about it. The Earth is going to be en
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