Stephen Hawking - For Humanitys long-term Survival, our future is in space

http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2010/08/09/4850998-stephen-hawking-off-earth-by-2110


http://blastr.com/2010/08/stephen-hawking-says-we-s.php

I liked this:

The phrase "No ****, Sherlock" springs to mind.

you know, the more I hear about Stephen Hawking saying this or that in various articles... The more I think they should take away his type to talk thing... or disallow articles to be written about things he says outside his books and papers.

Hawking is a brilliant man. That said, this also seems like a big "no freaking duh" moment. However, while humans might be smart enough to halt our extinction, we won't.

You know. There ARE people that don't even consider what he is talking about.

It is to them he is talking. You know. The people who are too busy to even contemplate this

type of thing. He is considered an expert in his fields. If Joe Forum says it, It means nothing.

Mr Hawking says it. People in charge take note. Also think of it from his perspective. How

do you think he would feel if he said nothing and something did happen? It's the same type

of advice parents give their kids. Save your money, looks aren't everything, an ounce of

prevention is worth a pound of cure. We just nod say yes or agree and yet find oursleves

in the exact predicaments our parents tried to warn us about. Not to mention a great big

segment of mankind does not learn until after they've stuck their hand in the fire. Not stupid

just they learn thru cause and effect.

So stop one sec and reflect on the very negative or no duh auto-reflex response and realise

he's talking to you specifically. He's giving advice the way he created theories. They are

thoughts on what he feels are of some import to us.

This is why geniuses and people of intelligence don't like to talk to the masses.

All we see are the words. We don't see the worlds within the words that men/women of

intellect see.

I see Stephen Hawking values a space victory. Please let him know that Los Angeles and New York have both passed 50,000 Culture, and that we're considering Philadelphia.

By the way, check to see if he'll accept 1 Uranium and 1 Coal for a Defensive Pact.

Hawking's right, but even getting off the Earth might not be enough. Because the universe is a dangerous and inhospitable place. We'd have to spread very, very far to ensure that one supernova wouldn't wipe us all out.

Basically there's no overwhelming "payoff versus cost" related to going into deep space right now. Sure in the future it may become obvious, but right now we're like in Europe of the 1500s relative to crossing the Atlantic - we all know America exists, but no one's willing to risk a major effort to seriously go there yet.

If NASA and/or the US government in general was smart they'd figure out a way to convince everyone that a killer asteroid was coming to hit the Earth in say like 10 years. Then everyone would be willing to commit money and resources into creating ships that could at least get us to Mars or maybe beyond. Sure at the end of 10 years when nothing happens people might be upset with the original guys who masterminded the hoax, but at least we would have jumpstarted our journey to the stars. I figure the ends would ultimately justify the means in that case. *shrugs*

Since it's easier to believe Santa Claus* is going to come and carry us away on his magic sleigh, we'll never take the threats seriously enough until it's too late.


*Not a religious figure.

I think J. Michael Straczynski said it best when he was writing Babylon 5. One of the characters was asked "Is all this worth it?" meaning all the money, effort, lives and time spent to establish a space station like the one depicted in the series. The characters response:

I remember the quote from MIB, "A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it."

A person has very real short term goals that monopolize their life. What am I going to have for dinner? Does <insert name here> like me? What's on TV tonight? Is my boss going to be impressed by my presentation? What's opening on Friday at the theater?

Very long term goals need the collective will of a society, of a government, of a nation. Or people wealthy enough to know what needs to be done. We went to the moon because we had an enemy, a competitor and once we won that race we've been phoning it in. The best thing that can happen is another space race. The Chinese want to get to a man to the moon within 10 years. Let's see if we can beat them there.

SpaceX unveiled plans for the Falcon X and XX that can lift 140 tons into orbit, slightly more than the old Saturn V. Yea, they only got one Falcon 9 off the ground so far but at least they have a plan.

Bigalow Aerospace, which bought the inflatable TransHab module from NASA, is skipping the 2/3rds scale test platform after their two successful 1/3 scale tests in orbit and is looking to launch and test a full scale inflatable test habitat. Each one is self contained with power, cooling, life support and is more than 20% the volume of the ISS yet only has a launch mass of 10 tons. It's big brother has more than twice the volume. They have designs clustering them together and adding a propulsion system to move it into a lunar or interplanetary trajectories.

A former NASA astronaut has developed an electric plasma drive that would provide serious thrust for interplanetary travel. Japan currently has a solar sail in interplanetary space now and they just proved that they can steer it.

And the US just canceled it's shuttle replacement after one partial test flight.

We as a society need to be motivated to do this. I'm all for a BIG lie about a catastrophic threat 25 years into the future that would require the long term investment to avert it.

The problem is, we have a very hard time creating a cost/benefit analysis of unlikely events with severe consequences. It's the same phenomenon that led us to under-prepare for the oil leak in the gulf. The more unlikely the event the less we prepare for it relative to the damage it could cause. The fact that an oil blow out would inevitably occur and do immense damage isn't relevant to our minds. It's the same problem with extinction.

An extinction-level event will eventually happen, it's a certainty. However, because the odds of it occurring at any particular point in time are so low, we don't feel the need to plan for it. Even those us us who understand the severity of the situation have trouble working up a sweat over it. I think about it and go 'meh', personally. It's a bug, a glitch in the way we think.