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Geek Culture / Colonizing planets... should we even try?

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Lonnehart
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Posted: 30th Apr 2010 11:58
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First off, please refrain from posting your own beliefs that involve religion as that tends to ignite and fan flames. I'd also like to ask the mods in advance to lock his thread if it strays too far into that territory... Anyways...

I'm sure we're pretty close (maybe by a few hundred years or more) to having the technology to colonize other planets. Mars is the easiest choice as we only have to build domes on the surface. Venus on the other hand require that we build colonies that float in the atmosphere. Heck... we can even colonize the Jupiter moon Ganymede (inside a deep crater to protect us from Jupiter's radiation). However, are we humans responsible enough to even colonize those places?

I'm pretty sure that once we're able to do so environmental groups will come out demanding that we don't (not even for our survival) and will cite the condition of our current world as the reason why we don't have the right to do so. What do you all think? What would your reasons be as to why we should? Or shouldn't?

In the beginning there was nothing. There'll be nothing in the end...
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charger bandit
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Posted: 30th Apr 2010 12:24
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We could even colonize the Moon,astronauts have been there,theres nothing that could harm us there,its just far. We could build a big complex there,then organize space shuttle flights. Each passenger gives like 5000 dollars,you go to a rent-a-suit,fly to moon,be there and come back on a return flight of a trip.

Would be fun.


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Morcilla
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Posted: 30th Apr 2010 12:40
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Humanity is doomed if we don't.
Maybe we are a plague, but it is already getting late, and surviving is a must.

If we knew that the Earth should be evacuated in, let's say, a couple of centuries, right now we would be catched with the 'pants down'. How many humans would survive?

Expanding to another planets should be a high priority for human kind, and not to improve our living here on Earth.

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NickH
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Posted: 30th Apr 2010 12:45
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The moon would be easy but only useful for a long range launch pad. A place to service craft, before a long range mission as it doesn't take much energy to take off. I think teraforming Mars (if it's actually possible) would be a massive engineering challenge but it'd be worth it. We'd have to have a lot of regulations on what can be done where on Mars though otherwise it'd be mined to death in 5 minutes

As for going to the Moons of Jupiter, I don't think any of their moons would be that great, apart from small mining stations.
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Dr Tank
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Posted: 30th Apr 2010 15:28 Edited at: 30th Apr 2010 15:28
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For sure we should. If what you say is true and some environmentalists have a problem about it, it should be explained that there will be a whole lot of recycling going on on the moon.

I imagine we'll have sorted a lot of our domestic energy problems with fusion generation and stuff before we colonise other planets properly. Hopefully it'll be a while before we start running out of deuterium.
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zeroSlave
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Posted: 30th Apr 2010 17:37
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Ahh... ogame. I had a pretty strong force going there for a while, but I got bored with it when I found xerogame (no longer around ), and they deleted my account.

And I say, Yes! We should colonize other planets. I would oppose any actions on colonizing planets that are already inhabited, but if they are empty, devoid of life, and uninhabitable, we should. Not only would it get us closer to other possible galactic civilizations, it would also allow us to not overwhelm the earth with people.

With medical breakthroughs happening everyday and length of life increasing, we are going to overpopulate this planet at some time and some strict rules are going to have to go into play if humans want to maintain a (somewhat) civil culture. So, if we want to keep our species going, we should spread out. Just as long as we don't terraform LV-426, we should be fine.

My green thumb grew the tree my Trojan War horse was crafted from. With roses in our pockets we rally round the tombstones. Ashes to ashes, we all fall down.
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Benjamin
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Posted: 30th Apr 2010 18:35
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I'm rather hoping for some deadly virus to thin the population instead. It's more viable than colonising other planets.
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Monk
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Posted: 30th Apr 2010 19:09
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It would be a waste if we developed the technology to colonise other planets, but didn't...

I think we wouldn't have any problems with the environment if we give the scientists ample time to study and learn as they set up, and only then should we let anybody else up. It's this way that we can keep control on a colony and make the most out of it. IMO.

If we colonise the moon, would that make it cheaper to launch into deep space?

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lazerus
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Posted: 30th Apr 2010 19:32
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It has been stated that a virus would be a best to bet on. Super bugs are all the rage and will most likly kill us and leave the immune. That said it sounds like the premise to about 50 or more scfi plots lol.


http://lazerus-reborn.deviantart.com/
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Darth Kiwi
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Posted: 30th Apr 2010 20:32
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Surely there's no ethical or moral environmental problem with colonising Mars? After all, it's not like anyone else is using it.

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CoffeeGrunt
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Posted: 30th Apr 2010 21:11
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One thing noone's considered is colonial rebellion...

What if Mars gets colonised, then the "Martians" born there begin to differentiate themselves from the Earth born. It'd be like the American civil war almost, except planetary...

Also let's be honest, no matter what the tree huggers say, we'd colonise the crap out of whatever we could find. What're they gonna do, tie themselves to the ships' hulls? Enjoy the radiation you strange people...

The moon would make a good spaceport in that it would take much less energy to launch from orbit or the Moon than Earth...

Maybe we'd give it a nice CO2 atmosphere?

http://dystopiawipb.blogspot.com/
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Lonnehart
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Posted: 1st May 2010 00:46
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One thing I'm sure of... Despite the life our our Sun lasting for the next 5 billion years, we may have less than 1 billion. That star is steadily heating up and if we don't learn how to colonize space soon we're all fried.

In the beginning there was nothing. There'll be nothing in the end...
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Indicium
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Posted: 1st May 2010 01:08
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The human race won't exist in 1 billion years imo. so that's irrelevent :p

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Neuro Fuzzy
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Posted: 1st May 2010 01:16
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Quote: "Humanity is doomed if we don't.
Maybe we are a plague, but it is already getting late, and surviving is a must."


I totally agree with that. I think humanity has a long road ahead of itself.

I love the sci-fi, kinda horror stories about self-reproducing robots, that spread like a scourge across the galaxy (or whatever), and then humanity has to fight for survival. How is a self-reproducing machine worse than something biological doing the same thing?

But meh, only time will tell. I wish I could live forever. See what stuff is like a million years from naughow.


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David R
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Posted: 1st May 2010 01:22 Edited at: 1st May 2010 01:23
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Quote: "One thing noone's considered is colonial rebellion..."


<digital sounding male voice> Drone riots </>


Kudos to anyone who gets this reference

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DJ Almix
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Posted: 1st May 2010 01:41
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We really, really do need a virus or something to kill a lot of us off. For the colonization, sure as least if we work together, but all it would really be is is a bunch of corporations trying to get the profit out of it. We will one day probably unite as a planet, but only at the last second and only when the money will be destroyed. Although I really hope if we find aliens they don't arrive in America, we would screw it up and someone would "accidentally" shoot them.

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Neuro Fuzzy
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Posted: 1st May 2010 01:49
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Quote: "We really, really do need a virus or something to kill a lot of us off."


would be positive except whatever would need to be administered through a totalitarian government. It would be more of a step back than forward, I think.

Quote: "Although I really hope if we find aliens they don't arrive in America, we would screw it up and someone would "accidentally" shoot them."

drug traffickers in mexico would dress them up and stuff them with drugs to get them across the border!


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DJ Almix
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Posted: 1st May 2010 02:25
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Quote: "Quote: "We really, really do need a virus or something to kill a lot of us off."

would be positive except whatever would need to be administered through a totalitarian government. It would be more of a step back than forward, I think.

Quote: "Although I really hope if we find aliens they don't arrive in America, we would screw it up and someone would "accidentally" shoot them."
drug traffickers in mexico would dress them up and stuff them with drugs to get them across the border!"


Strike that we just should not meet aliens at all!

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Deathead
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Posted: 1st May 2010 03:31
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I think we should start colonizing, pretty soon, due to us Earth will be a barren wasteland, if we were to colonize we will get alot more resources then what we have back on earth. But I agree with Stephen Hawking, if humans ever got into contact with aliens, we have to expect violence, as they are probably like us, just wanting to live longer then the planet lives out to be... Not so sure of the big ship idea off of him...


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xplosys
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Posted: 1st May 2010 04:31
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I hope we colonize the moon. Then we'll have a never ending supply of cheese.

It is made of cheese, isn't it?

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DJ Almix
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Posted: 1st May 2010 04:32
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Quote: "I hope we colonize the moon. Then we'll have a never ending supply of cheese.

It is made of cheese, isn't it?
"


Er, I hate to disappoint, but it's not made of cheese. It's made of gray cheese.

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Happy Cheesecake
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Posted: 1st May 2010 08:24
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Happy Graycheese to be more specific.

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Herakles
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Posted: 1st May 2010 08:27
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The human race as a whole is too fractured to be able to colonize other worlds. We seperate each other into groups like "race" or "religion" based on our own prejudices, and we oppose anyone who belongs to a different group. The only way we'll ever be able to progress as a species and colonize other worlds is to put these petty differences behind us and respect each other as human beings.

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Neuro Fuzzy
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Posted: 1st May 2010 09:12
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Quote: "The human race as a whole is too fractured to be able to colonize other worlds. We seperate each other into groups like "race" or "religion" based on our own prejudices, and we oppose anyone who belongs to a different group. The only way we'll ever be able to progress as a species and colonize other worlds is to put these petty differences behind us and respect each other as human beings."


While I'm by no means claiming that the world is perfect, homogeneity is a way to accentuate errors. Fighting and differences promote evolution. Sameness and lack-of-conflict is, to a point, an enemy.

Also... What about space elevators? I think we need ta get on 'dat. Space elevators, or shuttle loop, or whatever, it should be the first step into space travel being common.


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NickH
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Posted: 1st May 2010 12:35
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Quote: "Er, I hate to disappoint, but it's not made of cheese. It's made of gray cheese."


...but I watched that documentary Wallace & Grommet made and it was definatly yellow
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Aaagreen
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Posted: 1st May 2010 14:24
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But it's not cheddar, or wensleydale.

Your signature has been erased by a mod.
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TheComet
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Posted: 1st May 2010 14:53
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What's the point of colonizing the moon? There's nothing there... And every flight that goes up or down will cost a fortune and tons of material and gas...

The same with mars. There's nothing there that humans can feed on or form an equilibrium with nature. IT'S EMPTY.

If we were to colonize planets, we need natural resources and food on the planets, or there would be no point.

TheComet

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David R
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Posted: 1st May 2010 15:38
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If you colonise the Moon you can launch rockets from low gravity, which would cost a lot less than from Earth

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Quik
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Posted: 1st May 2010 16:11
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Quote: "The same with mars. There's nothing there that humans can feed on or form an equilibrium with nature"

'
think i watched some program where they said that we could live there, only needing something to eat =P possibly some air aswell


[Q]uik, Quiker than most
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Code eater
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Posted: 1st May 2010 18:18
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Quote: "How is a self-reproducing machine worse than something biological doing the same thing?"
Well, because we understand how robots work (we made them) they themselves will be able to understand how they work and hence they can "self evolve" very quickly. How the brain works and such is still largely a mystery and we arent' amazing at changing our genes. Also, Robots will be a lot more logical and will see the advantages of "updating" themselves where as we have ethical issues with modifying ourselves.

Quote: "think i watched some program where they said that we could live there, only needing something to eat =P possibly some air aswell"


Um.... isn't that really all we need to live (except water but that kind of goes as food). Its like saying we can teleport, we just don't have the technology (rubbish analogy but all I could think of at this time).

I personnally feel that we are basically locusts. If we leave this planet and completely mess it up we are being irresponsible to all those millions of years of evolution that went into the fish, the bird, the reptile, the amphibean and the mammal.

I think also "Sentry" a short story by Fredric Brown is relevant here. I cant find a link but it is meaningful on this topic. Would much advise reading it.

Thanks,,,

Codeeater
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Xarshi
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Posted: 1st May 2010 18:53
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See, space itself is a much more viable concept for colonization. Just create a city that orbits Earth or something like that.

Also, for true exploration and colonization, we'd probably need some very fast methods of transportation. This would require something like the Alcubierre drive, or a method for us to open up wormholes artificially. If we did all this, getting supplies to the colonies in a very small amount of time wouldn't be out of the question.

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Gil Galvanti
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Posted: 1st May 2010 20:34 Edited at: 1st May 2010 20:41
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Yes, we should definitely be working towards the colonization of the Moon, and, subsequently, Mars. Over the past few months I've become very interested in astrophysics and astronomy and such (Carl Sagan, Stephen Hawking, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Richard Feynman, etc.), and I've been watching and reading a lot about it, and it's amazing. It's sad how boring our education system can make science, because only now that I'm out of school am I beginning to appreciate it and learn more on my own. There are some brilliant and very inspiring scientific minds out there. Colonizing another world would do a lot to help the survival of the human race.

There's a great music video series where some guy has autotuned and compiled some lines from some of the greatest scientists in the world to make songs about the universe:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSgiXGELjbc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGK84Poeynk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Cd36WJ79z4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOLAGYmUQV0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vioZf4TjoUI

They have some very thought-provoking and inspiring lines in there ("A still more glorious dawn awaits us, not a sunrise, but a galaxy rise. A morning filled with 400 billion suns, the rising of the milkyway.")

Quote: "See, space itself is a much more viable concept for colonization. Just create a city that orbits Earth or something like that."

The problem is that wouldn't be safe from something like an asteroid impact or some other earthly disaster, which is one of the reasons we should be colonizing other planets.


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NickH
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Posted: 1st May 2010 20:57
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Quote: "It's sad how boring our education system can make science, because only now that I'm out of school am I beginning to appreciate it and learn more on my own"


I agree, I remember learning about space at school and I found it about as interesting as cutting my toe nails, but now I watch/ read as much as I can about it
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David R
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Posted: 1st May 2010 21:36 Edited at: 1st May 2010 21:36
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Quote: "It's sad how boring our education system can make science, because only now that I'm out of school am I beginning to appreciate it and learn more on my own."


Not relevant to planets etc. - but it's the same for maths I find. Programming has led me to maths (and to be interested in maths). If the education system were working properly, it should have really been the other way around. But maths back in primary school etc. was atrociously taught and seemed to lack any purpose or context.

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Gil Galvanti
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Posted: 1st May 2010 21:40 Edited at: 1st May 2010 22:11
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Quote: "Not relevant to planets etc. - but it's the same for maths I find. Programming has led me to maths (and to be interested in maths). If the education system were working properly, it should have really been the other way around. But maths back in primary school etc. was atrociously taught and seemed to lack any purpose or context.
"

Yeah, I ran across this great speech (one of many from TED) about that:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BlvKWEvKSi8 (edited to more reliable YouTube link)

Why can't all of our teachers be people like him?


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David R
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Posted: 1st May 2010 22:07
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Quote: "Yeah, I ran across this great speech (one of many from TED) about that:
http://www.wimp.com/mathbooks/"


That was a great talk - thanks for the link. I really like the part with the video of the water tank

Anyone else planning to watch that, I recommend the youtube link since it seems to be a tad more reliable at buffering:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BlvKWEvKSi8

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Seppuku Arts
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Posted: 1st May 2010 22:07
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Interesting question. If we could do it, then I say do it, it can potentially be one of the things that solves some of our problems, however, it's likely to be a long way off before we'd be capable of colonisation of other planets. I don't think it'll happen in our life-time, just thinking of the technology more than anything...assuming we managed to develop it.

So perhaps emphasise more on our current problems I think. Fuel, the environment, the economy etc.

Quote: " hope we colonize the moon. Then we'll have a never ending supply of cheese.

It is made of cheese, isn't it?"


What happens when we've eaten the moon? What about our tides?

Oh well, not that any of that matters, just so long as it's cheddar.

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Gil Galvanti
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Posted: 1st May 2010 22:12 Edited at: 1st May 2010 22:16
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Quote: "That was a great talk - thanks for the link. I really like the part with the video of the water tank

Anyone else planning to watch that, I recommend the youtube link since it seems to be a tad more reliable at buffering:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BlvKWEvKSi8
"


No problem . Yeah, I really like that part too, and the ski problem. I've edited my original post to link to YouTube now .


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Agent Dink
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I don't care if we ever colonize anything if it's not in my lifetime (for the excitement or possibility of neat vacations) because any generation stemming from me will be so distant in the future and I'll be so long gone that I really don't care what happens to the planet at that point LOL. We won't see it's demise by natural causes for a loooong time unless we get nailed by some huge asteroid and I don't think the human race will just be 100% obliterated by war famine or disease anytime soon.

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Airslide
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Posted: 2nd May 2010 22:13
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I think we really need to colonize space if we want the human race to survive.

Think about it - if we stay on Earth we are doomed to go extinct. If we don't fry ourselves with nuclear weapons or get killed of by a plague than the sun will eventually kill us. For that reason we need to go past this solar system - if we can get out there and spread out, it would be far, far less likely for the human race to go extinct. I imagine you could essentially multiply the life span of the race as a whole by every planet we colonize.

I'm a firm believer that space colonization should be a top priority. We're at a height of world interaction and technology right now, and if we don't get to it soon, we'll lose our only chance to the dark age that's probably going to follow if our governments start to collapse (be it due to revolution, economy or war).

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CoffeeGrunt
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Posted: 2nd May 2010 23:48
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THe thing is, our mistreatment of this planet is the result of millenia of misunderstanding how it works...

Because we're so set in our ways and nationalised, we can't uniformly control people's actions towards nature, but if we had colonists, they'd be:

*criminal record free - who's gonna send a criminal on a high importance colonisation program,

*A "good citizen", i.e., someone who has been picked by the corporation to be trusted,

*the government would have to be unified in order to colonise the planet anyway, so national differences would be irrelevant,

*Corporations would likely keep up the fines set by environmental bodies,

Only thing I gotta ask, when we've colonised say, ten planets, will we have to learn the specifics of every continent, country, name and capital of each? I dunno about you, but for me Geography class was hard/boring enough.

http://dystopiawipb.blogspot.com/
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Dr Tank
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Posted: 3rd May 2010 02:10 Edited at: 3rd May 2010 02:12
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Quote: "
*criminal record free - who's gonna send a criminal on a high importance colonisation program,"

Australia?

Besides, there's the whole thing about how criminal and good/bad are different things. Many people are criminals but are good members of society who do no ill to others, but that's somewhat of a digression. Others who have actually done proper bad things that harm others have never been caught.

I imagine they'd pick colonists who were smarter than your average person. Hopefully this would lead to a better society.

Anyway it's not happening that soon. Unless we want to be all skinny and weak, we have to live in centrifuge buildings/stations on Mars, in orbit, or find another Earth. We'll not get there anytime soon. Maybe it'll involve sending a robot probe to self assemble some stuff and eventually make some people from DNA information. It's all a bit pie in the sky.

But yes we should have some moonbases and stuff.
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Gil Galvanti
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Posted: 3rd May 2010 02:33
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Quote: "than the sun will eventually kill us"

I've seen a couple people say that so far, but that will likely not be for a couple BILLION years. To put that in perspective, that's almost twice as long as life has even existed on earth. If we somehow survive for another billion years, we will be unrecognizable as the human race, and will likely easily have the ability to do something like create our own sun, or even universe, by that time .


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Neuro Fuzzy
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Posted: 3rd May 2010 03:15
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Quote: "If we somehow survive for another billion years, we will be unrecognizable as the human race"


Aah, yeah, I've been thinking about that lately. I think a good analogy is this: Have you ever been to a foreign country, and seen something or been in a situation where you do not understand the way people are acting at all? Multiply that by a million, and that's probably how an ant views people (and to lesser/higher degrees for more/less intelligent beings). If we survive a billion years, I think we (our current selves) will be comparatively ant-like.


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Lonnehart
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Posted: 3rd May 2010 07:46 Edited at: 3rd May 2010 07:53
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Gil Galvanti said:
Quote: "I've seen a couple people say that so far, but that will likely not be for a couple BILLION years."


From what I've read, we don't even have 1 billion years. In fact, we may even have less than half of that. The sun is contracting all the time as it uses up its hydrogen fuel and is getting hotter as a result. It will be too hot to live on Earth before we know it.

As for a criminal free colony, I'm pretty sure some will somehow sneak into them to do their business. Not sure if Bioshock is an example of this, but wasn't that story about a man trying to create a closed off paradies (similar to colonizing space) only to have a criminal who somehow snuck in ruin it all?

In the beginning there was nothing. There'll be nothing in the end...
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Sid Sinister
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Posted: 3rd May 2010 10:09
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Why not? You're not putting all your eggs in one basket that way. Plus you get the added benefit of additional resources and technologies.

"If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants" - Isaac Newton
Current Project: http://strewnfield.wordpress.com/ (Last updated 06/11/09)
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Yodaman Jer
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Posted: 3rd May 2010 20:27
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Quote: "Gil Galvanti said:
Quote: "I've seen a couple people say that so far, but that will likely not be for a couple BILLION years."

From what I've read, we don't even have 1 billion years. In fact, we may even have less than half of that. The sun is contracting all the time as it uses up its hydrogen fuel and is getting hotter as a result. It will be too hot to live on Earth before we know it."


I love space, but I hate all of the doomsday theories/facts. They do need to be discussed though.

I do believe that we need to (and should) colonize other planets. As stated many times, the earth isn't going to last forever. Eventually we'll have sucked up all of its resources, and the sun will wipe it out eventually.

I personally think we should focus on building spaceships and try to perfect artificial gravity and faster means of propulsion, then explore space for suitable planets to colonize outside of our own solar system. We definitely need to create a StarFleet and send people out "...to seek out new life and new civilization". I know I just used Star Trek as my input here, but hey, someone had to do it.

So yeah. We definitely need to colonize eventually.


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Herakles
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Posted: 4th May 2010 08:43 Edited at: 4th May 2010 08:44
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Quote: "While I'm by no means claiming that the world is perfect, homogeneity is a way to accentuate errors. Fighting and differences promote evolution. Sameness and lack-of-conflict is, to a point, an enemy."


I never said we should all be exactly the same, in fact each individual's uniqueness is part of what makes the human race special. I merely said that we shouldn't hate each other and kill each other because of these differences.

If a black man kills a white man, most white men will not look past the killer's race and will blame black men in general. This is pathetic, since it was just that one man who is at fault, not all men of his ethnicity.

Until the human race can get past these kinds of petty generalizations, we won't be responsible enough to colonize other worlds.

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The Slayer
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Posted: 4th May 2010 21:11
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Quote: "Until the human race can get past these kinds of petty generalizations, we won't be responsible enough to colonize other worlds."

Yeah, I agree. The very first moment we're gonna colonize other planets, there will be fought for which part of that planet belongs to whom. We're already claiming parts of the moon as ours. If we can't live together as normal beeings on earth, we won't be able to do so on any other planet. And, suppose every race would have it's own planet, then there would be fought for the different sorts of minerals or substances that can be found on each others' planet.
We should first solve our stupid issues with each other, before going elsewhere.

Cheers

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