What Are the Odds of Us Getting Off This Rock?

According to this piece by Princeton astrophysicist professor J. Richard Gott, not much.

More at the link, and its a bit depressing.

The world will soon end, all technology will be lost, and we will all have to start all over again!

Somewhere out there in space, there is a very big asteriod floating around, with Earths name written all over it!

There are no earth-crossing asteroids left in the solar system that are so big we couldn't deflect them. Anything bigger than Phobos or Deimos got scooped up billions of years ago.

There are some that could hit earth and cause mass destruction affecting vast parts, or all, of the world, but these are mostly about 5 or 6 miles across and could easily be deflected.

Even an asteroid 20 or 30 miles wide if spotted a few years in advance could be kicked off course by a succession of high-megaton nukes going off on one side.

It only remains to be seen when one eventually shows up will it be a case of "we could save the human race but it'd be too expensive". (If that be the case humanity would probably deserve it)

Technology is a sliding scale. Right now we can't, that doesn't mean we won't be able to in a hundred or a thousand years. Even if FTL travel is impossible, there's all sort of other possibilities, and I think advances in material technologies in particular hold promise.

My guess would be a bean stalk in the next 200 years or so which opens up near local space, and then expansion from there. The combination of carbon nanotubes with a laser based space elevator looks very promising - NASA held trials for rudimentary space elevators last week IIRC.

Probably not in our lifetimes, but there's big changes coming down the pike on our humble little abode.

I've seen Gott's math before - it's also been used to place upper limits on humanities survival, given mammalian species aren't known for sticking it out long term - but it makes some assumptions about society and humanity being fairly static over the next millennium, not something I think will happen.

We will leave the planet, but right now mankinds going through it's late adolescence, once we've matured a bit more we'll be ready to fly the coop.

In any given period of time for the forseeable future at least, there is more chance of human civilisation on earth ending that our constructing a colony elsewhere.

I suspect much was said about the same about colonizing other parts of the globe.

Technology and ROI considerations are the keys, if we're to keep up our lifestyles into the 22nd century then simple resource depletion will necessitate mining off world.

Hafnium and indium are likely to start running low before 2020 for example, and we've maybe 50 years before we need to start considering off-Earth sources of uranium.

I think that the idea that the resources needed to explore space in any significant manner exist on this planet is a bit optimistic.... but I've been known to be an optimist.

I've become a pessimist on the subject. I'm totally gung-ho on all the dreams of space exploration and colonization that were dreamed in the 50s and 60s. I grew up assuming they'd all come true by [reverb on] "The Twenty-First Century" [reverb off].

But the politicians have stopped caring about it. the liberal-leaning population has fastened onto the mantra of "we should solve our problems here on Earth before we go carrying our faults, wars and pollution into space " which of course would mean we'd NEVER leave this rock. And of course the last administration spent all our money on the wars, and the current admin is spending money we don't have trying to recover from the previous one spending all our money. I can't imagine the country being solvent enough to support a serious manned space program for many decades at this point.

I'm completely in favor of a vast multi-national space program where everyone on the planet pools their resources for, say, a manned Mars mission, or a permanent moon base. But I'm also pessimistic about that kind of international cooperation ever staying intact for long, even if it materializes.

And of course, I'm convinced that such a program, national or international, would be a nice juicey target for some assholic terrorist cell to dive an A380 into on the launch pad.

My idealism has taken one hell of a beating over the years.

I don't think we will get off of this rock. We can't seem to get politicians with any sense of long-term vision.

Well certainly not any longer term vision than the next election. Then someone else will show up with their own long term vision. It's too bad that space exploration can't be a non-partisan undertaking.

The recources to explore the solar system in much greater detail than thus far, in a much shorter timeframe, and to commence robotic probing of the nearest stars other than the sun within a human lifetime, all exist on earth, and are possible with present day technology, if any politician ever had the balls to dust off the orion-drive and say "yeah, we're doing that".

Nukes going off under your ass for an engine. Capable of putting payloads of tens of thousands of tons (comparable with large ocean going vessels) anywhere in the solar system in less than a month. Capable of accelerating a craft to 10% of C within 36 days of a standing start. Capable of sending probes to Alpha Centauri, Barnard's Star, Wolf 359, Lalande 21185 and Sirius all within a human lifetime. (Sirius is pushing it, at 8.6 ly from earth, 18 year olds who watched the launch would be 104 by the time it reached it, but then again there are a few thousand 104 year olds about today and probably will be lot more 80 years from now, so it works out).

If they only had the bottle to do it.

Why must it be the government that pays for it?

We're stuck on Earth. Make the best of it.

The space program is done. It was the Democrats whipping boy and now it shining beacon of what is wrong with this country.

The theoretical ability to do it is very different from having the technological and economic ability to do it. You may have a point about the solar system, but certainly not about going anywhere else.

"Even a journey of a thousand miles begins with one step."
---Somebody Who Said Wise Stuff

If you're going to take that approach, we might as well be drawing up plans for intergalactic trade routes.

The future of space exploraration lies with private industry. A google search gives one a great sense of hope. They expect sub- orbital tourism by 2012. Technologies like solar sails and other advanced propulsion systems are being researched and developed. Private industry will mine the moon and the asteroids.

It is a time of great hope for the future of space. It is merely gov't space programs that have little to no future. Let this be a lesson for "other" proposed gov't programs.

^Dan, as I said upthread, we're going to be running out of some mineable resources on Earth in next few decades. Initially we may find alternative materials or improve recycling, but eventually they won't be enough and we'll have no option but to mine off planet.

Enjoy our cheap TV's and PC's now (well I tend to use Macs, so not that cheap ), in another couple of decades it's likely prices will start to rise as easily accessible ores start to become rarer.

Yep, won by a team in Kent Washington.

http://spaceports.blogspot.com/2009/11/laser-motive-wins-900000-from-nasa.html

If anyone has NYT access, please copy and paste the article, I can't remember my password and can't find the article anywhere else.

and I say you're wrong Dan. People are investing now on research for interplanetary propulsion. The need and economic potential for off world mining, research and other things will have preliminary operations in place within 30 years at best guess, maybe sooner.

Small minded pessimist piece of crap article.

NEO is where the future is at. We cannot build the types of ships we need to explore space if it has to be dual role (atmosphere and space). The mining and manufacturing of at least a large portion will have to be built in space.

Capturing an asteroid and bringing it in as both a source for raw materials and a counterweight at the end of the space elevator is our best bet for that.

As I said, recycling will only take us so far. For example, unless you know of a way of reversing entropy, we're not going to be repleting depleted uranium...

You'll also have the carbon footprint, increased energy demands and safety measures adding to the cost.

Given how many landfills are in urban regions, in the UK certainly, and those landfills will include such charming chemicals as asbestos, bromides and mercury compounds, plus banned chemicals such as CFC's, and the regulatory framework required to mine them will be immense.

The initial costs of landfill mining vs space mining will certainly give landfill mining an advantage, however the ongoing costs will trend downwards for space mining, but upwards for landfill mining.

Why would you need a ship to bring material back to earth? We have a nice, free, gravity well called 'Earth' - you'd drop the materials into the ocean for collection. Sure, you'd need to ensure they were collectable - maybe have packages whose overall density was less than seawater for example - which would be an engineering feat.