111–120 of 133 posts
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To learn more about population growth and the many misconceptions around it, I'd recommend watching something from Prof. Hans Rosling. Here are a few things: http://www.gapminder.org/videos/dont-panic-the-facts-about-p...
I would suggest this too https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-QA2rkpBSY
Frustrating to realize that perhaps only 1 or 2 years of Earth's military spending would enable mankind to achieve this (approx $1700 billion/year). Not saying we don't need to spend money on defense, merely taking one the world's expenditures as a yardstick. It would be so great if mankind is able to cooperate in the colonization of our solar system.
> It would be so great if mankind is able to cooperate in the colonization of our solar system. We already collaborate for the exploration of the solar system, via robotic probes and giant telescopes. That's good enough. Colonization is an all different matter, and a weird one if you ask me. Earth is the largest place with a solid ground in the Solar system, and it's by far the most hospitable. Settling on an other p…
Frustrating to realize that perhaps only 1 or 2 years of Earth's military spending would enable mankind to achieve this (approx $1700 billion/year). Not saying we don't need to spend money on defense, merely taking one the world's expenditures as a yardstick. It would be so great if mankind is able to cooperate in the colonization of our solar system.
> It would be so great if mankind is able to cooperate in the colonization of our solar system. We already collaborate for the exploration of the solar system, via robotic probes and giant telescopes. That's good enough. Colonization is an all different matter, and a weird one if you ask me. Earth is the largest place with a solid ground in the Solar system, and it's by far the most hospitable. Settling on an other p…
Not quite. Having the technology to live on Mars or on the Moon would enable us to settle pretty much anywhere in the habitable zone of the system. Just imagine how much real estate can be built in the form of rings or tubes with materials mined from the Moon or the asteroid belt.
Planets are nice for mining, but going up and down deep gravity wells is not something an interplanetary species would want to do regularly.
Also, keep in mind there are a lot of global catastrophes that could easily wipe out our civilisation.
Frustrating to realize that perhaps only 1 or 2 years of Earth's military spending would enable mankind to achieve this (approx $1700 billion/year). Not saying we don't need to spend money on defense, merely taking one the world's expenditures as a yardstick. It would be so great if mankind is able to cooperate in the colonization of our solar system.
Martian sunset at 1:50 is based on an actual photo: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_rover#mediaviewer/File:Ma... See also gallery here: http://www.erikwernquist.com/wanderers/gallery.html
People dropped by and asked where I took the picture. I loved to explain to them the picture was taken by a robot on Mars.
There is also another one, with a small Earth shining above the horizon. That too was my wallpaper, and that too caused countless people to be amazed.
Inspiring people is important.
“If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work, and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.”
― Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
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Explorer to Queen Izzabella (or whomever): "We'd like to sail west and find a shortcut to the Indies." Queenie: "Sorry. We've got poverty and people who are hungry here, you'll have to wait." (400 years later) Descendant of that Explorer: "Can we go now?" Queenie: "Sorry, still haven't solved that poverty stuff. Go do some farming or something." ---- A lot of the "poverty and hunger stuff" is caused by corruption and…
A man named Thomas Malthus proposed an explanation why this is and will always be the case, back in the early 1800s. Populations will always grow, even if there aren't enough resources for the next generation. As a result, some catastrophe must happen to keep the population in check: war, disease or famine. These days we like to think that we've escaped the malthusian limit, as first world nations tend to have a natu…
Ugh, that's not how we escaped Malthus' predictions. We escaped precisely thanks to scientific discoveries and technological advancements.
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There is no single social contract, but if there is, it very well has to be reviewed before we "fix" mortality. And who says that the further exploration of the universe (which is happening since a few thousand years anyway) is tempting to a critical mass with an unlimited lifespan where distractions are manifold and any simulation more convenient and less dangerous than the exploration of the universe in person.
> There is no single social contract, but if there is, it very well has to be reviewed before we "fix" mortality. Just like I said. >any simulation more convenient and less dangerous than the exploration of the universe in person We have been risking our lifes to explorer our world for millenniums. Why would it be different for space?
I'm just saying the audacity to suggest to "fix" mortality is stunning. The implications are unforeseeable, on so many levels. People might not be as idealistic as you make them out to be.
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> Another important point is that a lot of our problems here on Earth are entirely self-inflicted (e.g. inequality, pollution, global warming) and so they can't simply be fixed by throwing money at them: they need political transformation. Yes, but so long as global warming is a threat then the notion of humanity expanding to the stars is a pipe-dream. If the planet becomes incapable of supporting advanced social str…
None of that is going to happen anytime soon. Market forces (oil prices are down now, but in the long term they will go back up forcing us to move to cleaner alternatives) as well as the beginning effects of global warming (flooding) will force us to change long before the planet becomes uninhabitable.
Martian sunset at 1:50 is based on an actual photo: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_rover#mediaviewer/File:Ma... See also gallery here: http://www.erikwernquist.com/wanderers/gallery.html
I had that picture as my workstation's wallpaper. People dropped by and asked where I took the picture. I loved to explain to them the picture was taken by a robot on Mars. There is also another one, with a small Earth shining above the horizon. That too was my wallpaper, and that too caused countless people to be amazed. Inspiring people is important.
> There is also another one, with a small Earth shining above the horizon.
Do you mean a shot on Mars? Can you link to it please?