| >Alternatively, we may become an interstellar species and circumvent these problems for an entirely different set. Don't see it. The "manned mission to Mars" merchants will sell the dream of that trip for decades to come (they have already backtracked. Which, even when eventually is done, it would be a crude, Apollo-style affair, for a handful of people and equipment, not some sci-fi travel destination. Anything further, and the hurdles are so many (plus "small" things like the speed of light limit and so on), that the only realistic thing would be "generation ships" going to some unknown place that might or might not have a habitable planet. And that of course is only feasible with major major leaps in technology which we don't seem to be making, including several "invent a whole new paradigm" style solutions. Heck, the reality is we haven't even been able to send a manned mission outside of LEO for 49 years now. Heck, basic infrastructure like roads and schools is in ruins, and people imagine being able to fund space exploration. Rather, bet on more decline. People want to leave Earth because "it's bounded", but at the same time think that our capacity for space travel/inventions/bearing manufacturing costs/etc is somehow "unbounded", or at least easily handles us being an interplanetary species. |