It’s dangerous to think humans have a destiny outside Earth • Hacker News Board

Re: It’s dangerous to think humans have a destiny outside Earth

#41

Post by peteradio » Thu, Oct 29, 2020, 3:55 PM UTC

save_ferris wrote: post #12

GenerocUsername wrote: post #3

I've seen more anti-space rhetoric in the last few weeks than ever before in my life. What gives? Great advancements have cost. That doesn't make them not worth doing

It's not that great advancements have cost. The argument is that focusing on space exploration deflects from facing the realities of climate change on our planet. If people start to think that space exploration could yield a solution to an increasingly uninhabitable climate on Earth, it could create a scenario where we spend even more on space exploration and less on addressing Earth's climate.

Perhaps the intense focus is the only thing that drives the price. By focusing instead on a greater ambition you might deprive the "real problem" of the cancerous solutions that the political lime light brings.

Re: It’s dangerous to think humans have a destiny outside Earth

#42

Post by wrs » Thu, Oct 29, 2020, 3:56 PM UTC

MereInterest wrote: post #24

save_ferris wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not that great advancements have cost. The argument is that focusing on space exploration deflects from facing the realities of climate change on our planet. If people start to think that space exploration could yield a solution to an increasingly uninhabitable climate on Earth, it could create a scenario where we spend even more on space exploration and less on addressing Earth's climate.

I've posted this before, but I see terraforming other planets as a necessary step to learn how to take care of the Earth. Large-scale geoengineering will be necessary sooner or later on Earth. However, it almost certainly has failure modes that we don't know about, and won't know about until we can experiment with it. Testing the effects on Earth, with nearly 8 billion people, is wildly reckless. Testing the effects…

I agree in a very theoretical and academic way, but practically speaking, how long will this testing take? We already risked the 8 billion lives with the accidental geoengineering we’re doing now.

Re: It’s dangerous to think humans have a destiny outside Earth

#43

Post by save_ferris » Thu, Oct 29, 2020, 3:56 PM UTC

dqpb wrote: post #26

save_ferris wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not that great advancements have cost. The argument is that focusing on space exploration deflects from facing the realities of climate change on our planet. If people start to think that space exploration could yield a solution to an increasingly uninhabitable climate on Earth, it could create a scenario where we spend even more on space exploration and less on addressing Earth's climate.

The opposite is true. Investing in space exploration improves our ability to face climate change on our planet.

I think investing in space exploration improves some people's ability to face climate change on our planet. It's hard to see a scenario where everyone in the world would benefit from it, given the incredible advancement of private space flight. Don't get me wrong, it's amazing what those companies have been able to accomplish. But we can't pretend like the entirety of humanity benefits from it when access to that kind of technology is restricted to those with obscene amounts of wealth.

Re: It’s dangerous to think humans have a destiny outside Earth

#44

Post by jellicle » Thu, Oct 29, 2020, 3:56 PM UTC

MereInterest wrote: post #24

save_ferris wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not that great advancements have cost. The argument is that focusing on space exploration deflects from facing the realities of climate change on our planet. If people start to think that space exploration could yield a solution to an increasingly uninhabitable climate on Earth, it could create a scenario where we spend even more on space exploration and less on addressing Earth's climate.

I've posted this before, but I see terraforming other planets as a necessary step to learn how to take care of the Earth. Large-scale geoengineering will be necessary sooner or later on Earth. However, it almost certainly has failure modes that we don't know about, and won't know about until we can experiment with it. Testing the effects on Earth, with nearly 8 billion people, is wildly reckless. Testing the effects…

Alternately: we can't even stop the anti-terraforming transformation of our own planet into an unlivable hellhole, despite the tremendous benefits of doing so, so why would anyone think we could possibly spend enough money to terraform a planet a zillion miles away that is inherently hostile to human life and where there is no financial benefit to doing so?

Re: It’s dangerous to think humans have a destiny outside Earth

#45

Post by jcrubino » Thu, Oct 29, 2020, 3:57 PM UTC

GenerocUsername wrote: post #3

I've seen more anti-space rhetoric in the last few weeks than ever before in my life. What gives? Great advancements have cost. That doesn't make them not worth doing

You would think Trump & Company could capitalize on "This Earth First".

Technology has a cost in that people expect to be paid for their participation in the sector. Economies built on "defense" have huge technology capital in terms of knowledge and skill workers. This begs existential questions on the goals of productivity shared as nations and humans.

Tangentially, if the captains of Space really believed in life on mars or the moon, why aren't terraforming efforts being undertaken as center peices to the master plans to inhabit the moon or mars?

Re: It’s dangerous to think humans have a destiny outside Earth

#46

Post by slg » Thu, Oct 29, 2020, 3:57 PM UTC

tingol wrote: post #33

slg wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe the last several months of what is going on here on Earth has made people reconsider if the massive investments required for space exploration would be better spent on something else.

Really? The first thought they had was fuck NASA and they completely ignored the trillions being spent on the US military complex?

I'm not sure why you are forcing a choice between the two. People can be against spending on both NASA and the military. Also NASA isn't completely separate from the military industrial complex.

Re: It’s dangerous to think humans have a destiny outside Earth

#47

Post by wow_yes » Thu, Oct 29, 2020, 3:57 PM UTC

This is a political puff piece mostly about Twitter

Re: It’s dangerous to think humans have a destiny outside Earth

#48

Post by dwheeler » Thu, Oct 29, 2020, 3:58 PM UTC

What a garbage argument. We can do both. We can look outside Earth, and take care of what we have. There is no reason we can't do both, so let's do both.

Re: It’s dangerous to think humans have a destiny outside Earth

#49

Post by peteradio » Thu, Oct 29, 2020, 3:58 PM UTC

grawprog wrote: post #37

MereInterest wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've posted this before, but I see terraforming other planets as a necessary step to learn how to take care of the Earth. Large-scale geoengineering will be necessary sooner or later on Earth. However, it almost certainly has failure modes that we don't know about, and won't know about until we can experiment with it. Testing the effects on Earth, with nearly 8 billion people, is wildly reckless. Testing the effects…

>I've posted this before, but I see terraforming other planets as a necessary step to learn how to take care of the Earth. This thinking seems backwards. How can we learn to take a totally dead planet and make it living when we can't even figure out how to keep this one healthy?

I doubt the person you are replying to is suggesting that full scale terraforming is possible in a fraction of a million years. But perhaps smaller scale insightful experiments might be done without fear of wiping out life in our solar system.

Re: It’s dangerous to think humans have a destiny outside Earth

#50

Post by bryanlarsen » Thu, Oct 29, 2020, 3:59 PM UTC

arcticbull wrote: post #15

save_ferris wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not that great advancements have cost. The argument is that focusing on space exploration deflects from facing the realities of climate change on our planet. If people start to think that space exploration could yield a solution to an increasingly uninhabitable climate on Earth, it could create a scenario where we spend even more on space exploration and less on addressing Earth's climate.

IMO there's 8 billion of us, we can do both.

Not only can we do both, but there is significant overlap.

To give two examples among many:

SpaceX's next major goal after making Starship capable of flying to Mars is to develop the infrastructure to refuel Starship on Mars. They plan to manufacture their fuel using the Sabatier process, which is also a form of carbon sequestration.

Research and development into Martian food production pushes the envelope in many agricultural research areas like vertical farming, high efficiency production with few inputs, et cetera.