Colonizing Other Planets

*Originally published on 9/8/09


On the Science Channel, space travel is a frequent topic of discussion. Scientists have long been considering the idea of expanding man's habitation past the limits of this planet and setting up colonies elsewhere. The two big candidates for colonization are the moon and Mars. It's said that this would be the first step to exploring further into space and getting a better understanding of our galaxy and universe.

Some say that we shouldn't bother, that it's not feasible. It's going to be a challenge, I'll grant you that. Space is huge! Ships only have so much fuel and adding more fuel only makes the shuttle heavier, which means it will take more fuel to launch. We need to come up with some sort of self sustaining energy source. We would also have to figure out a way to generate food in the shuttle itself lest the astronauts run out of supplies.

This is one reason why the moon and Mars are such strong candidates for colonization. They're pretty close. If we can colonize those bodies, we can leap frog further and further out with each successive trip.

Tempting as it may be for me to make a "Uranus" joke, I'm going to try to maintain a modicum of professionalism and just move on.

I'm surprised people are so against this idea. I think it's great. If I could go to the moon or Mars and live there for a period of time, I would. Besides, it's for SCIENCE! So you know it's a worthy goal to pursue. How are we going to find out if there is life beyond Earth if we just sit here and wait for it to come to us? We have to go out and explore.

I'm always hearing about how the Earth is overpopulated and how there are so many starving people. Even grimmer people state that the Earth can't sustain us all and it's only a matter of time before everything collapses. Colonizing other worlds gives us more room to spread out. If the colonies can actually sustain themselves, that would provide food and water to a large section of people, leaving supplies on Earth for people who may not otherwise get to eat. I don't really see humanity's population dwindling anytime soon so this seems like a more feasible option.

One argument I've heard is that we destroyed this planet and we'd only do the same to others. I don't know if I buy that. If we were to establish a colony on another world, we have the technology to generate energy in a cleaner, more efficient manner than we've had previously. We'd have a head start and wouldn't need to start from square one as we did on Earth.

People write off space travel as a waste of money. I, on the other hand, see it as a great investment. The benefits of such are limitless, who knows what sort of things we'll find out there? Setting up colonies elsewhere is the first step. We've made it to the moon before, with the technology we have now, we can actually do something with that ability.