-
Asked by Maia to Francesca, Laura, Matthew, Andrew, Rebecca on 11 Nov 2014.
Question: Why do we as humans want to know all about space and space travel when around a third of the Earth is still majorly undescovered, when theres still millions of unkown species that walk the paths of our Earth, that eat the fruits of our trees and that drink the water of our rivers. Anyway, If we do get into space its still pointless because one day we (as a race) will all die, there will be no-one to remember nelson mandela's speech, nor will there be anyone to remember martin Luther King Jr, or steve Jobs' phenomenal work, everything, every dream, every hope, every memory and everything that we have strived to be will one day be nothing but whispers, battling with the millions of crushed dreams that are trying to be heard, "every look Dad, look what I've done" and every "I love you" will be nothing but a shout into the void of emptyness. Everything that we ever labored over, every memory, every loved one will one day be nothing but molecules of dust floating round in the vaccum of space time. your trying to save our race, but what if we were supposed to die? What if were a faild cause? ss
- Keywords:
-
Laura Schofield answered on 11 Nov 2014:
Wow. That’s a pretty heavy hitting question!
The issue that we face is that we have the technology to go into space now and we are still struggling to get to the bottom of the seas. In reality, it is perhaps easier to go up into space because up there you are dealing with a lack of atmosphere and so everything has to be kept at higher pressure than it is outside the space station. Down at the bottom of the sea though, we would have to build something that could take much greater pressures outside than inside. Think of a bottle of coke. If you take the lid off and blow into it really hard, there’s not much of a difference in the size and shape of the bottle because it is built to withstand pressure from the inside. When you put the lid back on though, you can squeeze the bottle and make a small change in the size and shape of it because it isn’t built to withstand pressure from the outside. One day we will have the technology needed to go down into the bottom of our seas and explore the last third of our planet.
In the meantime, if astronauts did find a planet that we could live on, it would be so cool! We could all pile into a massive space station and start afresh on a new planet. Then we could work hard to build new technology and find new energy sources that aren’t as damaging to our new environment.
I don’t believe we are a failed cause. We all die, but I believe we all have a part to play before that! And in the meantime lets enjoy the “I love you”s and “look Dad, look what I’ve done”s before our time is up.
-
Andrew McKinley answered on 11 Nov 2014:
As a species, we are explorers. How many times have you looked out to sea? There’s not a lot to see, so why do we do it? It’s because we want to reach out; we want to travel to the horizon, so we can look to see what is there! Now, we know we can look at a map, but we inherently want to see with our own eyes.
Through research, we are ‘exploring’ the workings of the world around us, traveling to the horizons of our knowledge, just so we can try to look around and ‘see’ a little bit further.You are right; our time is limited – not just our individual lifetimes, but as a species, and ultimately as lifeforms. The important thing is though that we make the most of the time we do have, that we satisfy that incessant desire to learn, to see what it is we can do.
Why are we here? A very philosophical question. I would say we are thermodynamically inevitable! The point is, we *are* here. So, what are you going to do with this wonderful gift we have? That is what we call *lifeMATOMO_URL Go and live it!
-
Matthew Camilleri answered on 11 Nov 2014:
Wow, this is a pretty deep question, and at the end of it I think it can be summed up to: why do we do anything?
So, let me try and answer this question step wise.
The first part of your question was why are we exploring space when there are areas on Earth that has not been explored yet? Part of that question is technology. We are just developing new types of submarine vessel that can be submerged deep enough to explore the deepest oceans. When it comes to forests and the discovery of new species it is all about politics. A number of countries do not really let anyone in, especially scientists to do research, and lets be honest, if they block everyone they are doing the environment a favour and keeping it in its pristine condition, untouched by human development. Apart from that space exploration is still in its infancy, and we can only explore small parts of the planets that are close to us, not even all the planets in the solar system.
With regards to your second part, yes, we will all eventually be dust, molecules, and our memories might be lost forever, even great people like Martin Luther King and Steve Jobs. But it must be kept in mind that these people did not want to become immortal, they just wanted to make a difference in the now, rather then in the future, and they have succeeded in doing that, in creating better lives for a lot of people in the present day.
At the end of the day we will all perish, but if we save the human race for another million years rather then for a 100, 000 years then a lot more people can enjoy what we call life, enjoy the emotions you described when you were talking about love. This is what we are fighting for, this is why we want to be innovative, to make developments, so that more people will be able to enjoy the simple things in life, to enjoy emotions.
-
Francesca Palombo answered on 11 Nov 2014:
Nice poetry. I partly agree with you – it seems pointless and a waste of time (resources etc.). However as human beings we are unsatisfied by just sitting and contemplating nature around us. We feel we can reach up the ‘boundaries’ of the universe but then realise that the more we go deep into science problems the more complex scenarios open up! It is nothing easy to be unveiled. But still we can’t prevent ourselves from trying get to the heart of the knowledge.
Comments
Joe commented on :
I know the question is not aimed at me, but I felt I should share my opinions. When I first read your question, it came across as very pessimistic and depressing.
Time is precious. You implied that yourself. If time is precious, why should we waste it worrying about the future? Let’s live now and enjoy what’s happening! We have the technology to go to space. When it comes to science, my philosophy is “why not?”. If people die, at least we can say that we, as a race can say “So what? Life wasn’t perfect, but at least we made it better for ourselves, at least we enjoyed it.” So that’ say answer to your question. “Why not?”.
The Almighty Ginger Overlord commented on :
Look at the human races technological advancements over the past 100 years, we have gone from basic man-powered machinery to incredibly complex AI that can learn like a child. Imagine what will happen in the next 100 years, 500 or even 1000 years. What happens when humans discover the key to immortality? Discover advanced extra-terrestrial lifeforms? Become gods to a new alien civilizion? Create and suspend a stars life? The possibilities are endless, and it all happens when we expand into the universe. Ginger out.