Frankly ... Posthuman  Would We Colonize Other Planets Soon?

After the first moon landing in 1969, mankind was certain that we would inhabit other planets long ago. As we all know, this did not happen. Now this idea is again within reach.

On September 11 2019, scientists from University College London announced that they had found water vapor in a super-Earth’s atmosphere. Although the planet, K2-18b, might not be suitable for humans to live on, this exciting news woke up our imagination of human colonization of other planets again.

On July 20 2019, we celebrated the 50th anniversary of the historic moon landing of humans. This event also reminds us that since that exciting, grandiose moment, humans have not visited any other planet for half a century. The whole world used to believe that we would be colonizing other planets by now. But we haven’t. Why?

The Cold War of the Stars

It has something to do with the end of resource allocation. The space projects were given priority and benefited from heavy investment because they were at the core of the competition between the US and the Soviet Union. After the Cold War, astronomical investment into the space projects was no longer “justifiable”. Leading countries have changed their focus. The consequence, as famous sci-fi writer Cixin Liu summarizes: “Instead of an exploration of the real space, which is full of difficulties, people now just prefer to experience virtual space through VR. Just like someone said, ‘You promised me an ocean of stars, but you actually gave me Facebook.’

But things have changed in the past decade. 2019 has also some encouraging news showing that we are still inching towards the outer space. NASA is working to get astronauts to Mars in the 2030s, and American presidential candidate Newt Gingrich is pushing for a 2 billion project of setting up a base on the Moon. NASA’s Artemis program has already planned to set up a crewed moon outpost near the lunar South Pole by 2024 and establish a long-term, sustainable presence on and around the moon shortly thereafter.

Changed situation

This time, commercial companies are also taking the lead. Space X, run by Elon Musk, is building a 100-passenger spaceship called Starship and a huge rocket called Super Heavy, which could start flying missions as early as 2021. And Blue Origin, run by Jeff Bezos, recently unveiled its Blue Moon lunar lander, which will launch atop the company's big New Glenn rocket. NASA has selected 13 companies to partner with on 19 new specific technology projects it’s undertaking to help reach the Moon and Mars.

With the joint efforts of governmental institutions and commercial companies, the chance for our generation to see the first extra-terrestrial colonization seems real and imminent.

First extraterrestrial colonization in sight

But of course, we need to be careful not to repeat the same mistakes like we have done on earth. Until today, humans have left 181,000 kilograms of trash on the moon, including five moon rangers, poops of NASA astronauts as well as other rubbish from crewless missions from space-exploring agencies of Russia, Japan, India and Europe. It would be very unwise to damage other planets just like we have done to earth.

Space colonization is not only beneficial to the rise of new technologies for better human lives, but it also helps humans to deepen their understanding of our situation. As Space Philosopher Frank White has described: only by viewing our earth from the space can we deeply understand how inter-connected and inter-dependent we humans are to each other and to the fragile and beautiful eco-system of the earth. Hopefully, these early colonization projects would teach humans this lesson from a different perspective.
 

October 2019