Should People Begin to Think About Colonizing Space?

This question has been around since space travel actually became a tangible concept in the mid-20th century. After John F. Kennedy proclaimed “We will go to the Moon”, the space race was in full swing. As time has passed, the depth of the space race has continued to increase, as the US and other countries have continued to push the “Final Frontier” and explore as much of outer space as possible. With inventions like the Mars Rover and the Hubble Telescope, exploring space has become a more realistic opportunity. But what happens in the event that Earth is no longer inhabitable? Should humans try to colonize space, and even if they tried, would they be able to?

The first place to find the answers to a question like this is NASA. The organization has already put out information for those who are looking to settle in outer space. While mostly mentioned in a joking manner, some of the information could seriously be useful if humanity were to find itself one day having to find real estate in outer space. Even if space colonization were to happen, would a different type of person have to exist to be able to survive?

Business Weekly decided to look into this issue for themselves. They remarked about how a number of scientists think human colonization will be inevitable. For this to occur without spacesuits and various other parameters that current humans would have to work around, some scientists think that humans will be forced to evolve. “These people will become an offshoot of the human tree, they will probably evolve into something else,” said Chris Impey, a professor at the University of Arizona quoted in the article. While his ideas might be a bit far-fetched, he has much more knowledge on this subject than most.

Between NASA, astronomy professors, and other speculators on the subject, the possibilities of the future are endless. Whether they involve NASA and other space travel associations across other countries, contingency planning is certainly underway. Between those who are merely speculative conspiracy theorists, and those who have extensive knowledge on the subject of Earth’s future, both might be on to something when it comes to space travel and potential space colonization.

typical-colonization-of-moon

A future Manhattan on a different planet? Link: http://bruceleeeowe.files.wordpress.com/2010/04/typical-colonization-of-moon.jpg

Bibliography:

Dickerson, Kelly. “Moving to Mars Could Create a Whole New Breed of People.” Business Insider. Business Insider, 12 June 2015. Web. 21 Oct. 2016.

Globus, Al. “Space Settlement Basics.” Nasa.gov. NASA, 2016. Web. 21 Oct. 2016.

One thought on “Should People Begin to Think About Colonizing Space?

  1. Brian Cunningham

    I’ve always been interested in the idea of space travel. Though I’m curious about the points that were made about the evolution that would occur. Just by speculation, I think the changes to the environment would be fairly extreme and hard to adapt to slowly in order to subtly evolve over time, as opposed to changes like going from a hot environment gradually up to a colder climate, or no longer needing wisdom teeth over time. Also, technology sort of seems to step in between us and evolution, by giving us the traits that we’d be evolving to have, instead of allowing us to “need” them before evolving. If space suits are needed at first, people aren’t going to gradually take them off and suddenly adapt to the atmosphere. The space suit is sort of taking the place of adaptation. And again, to go from using a space suit to suddenly not using one would be far too extreme to allow any evolution. People would just die almost instantly. I wonder if there would be a plan to effectively allow for a gradual change, instead of relying on technology. Overall interesting topic.

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