On October 13, 2021 William Shatner embarked on a real-life trip to the edge of space on a rocket owned by Amazon founder, Jeff Bezos.
Once it reached its maximum distance of over 100 km, Shatner had an opportunity to peer into the blackness of space. It wasn’t at all what he expected.
Instead of looking into a heavenly expanse of stars and galaxies and experiencing an overwhelming sense of awe and connection with the universe, he said all he saw was a deep, encompassing blackness that felt like death.
Looking back at the earth, he realized very profoundly, that this is all we have. Earth is life and there is nothing for us outside of that, except the cold, harsh, deep black vacuum of space.
He talked about the profound sense of sadness he felt at the fact that we are not looking after our only home.
I won’t get into that right now, but it’s a fact that if we are stewards of the earth, we are certainly doing a piss poor job.
What he experienced was something called The Overview Effect. Essentially, it is a feeling that is experienced by many astronauts once they see our planet against the dark vacuum of space. It makes one realize how we all rely on that thin layer of atmosphere to shield us from the harshness of the universe; our oasis that provides everything we need and allows us to exist.
It’s my personal opinion that we are not meant to travel into space. Our home is here, and the earth is more than abundant enough to support us. It is teeming with life and has been for billions of years. Outside of our thin atmosphere, there is nothing but trouble. Space is so inhospitable that it’s beyond comprehension. It defies logic as to why we would want to explore it.
The mission to Mars is a classic example. If Mars ever harboured life, that time has long passed. Today, it’s a barren planet with nothing but rocky plains and mountains. Its atmosphere is made up of 95% carbon dioxide and only trace amounts of oxygen; not a good thing for oxygen breathing humans.
It also receives less solar radiation, so it is colder than earth with lows going into the -80’s regularly.
From what we can tell right now, the only water on Mars is locked in the polar ice caps. Some theorize that there could be water under the surface, but it’s undetermined at this point.
It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that we are not ready to send real people to another planet – we’re not even close. Yet, there is this rush to get people to Mars. Why?
Look, we just sent an unmanned spacecraft to the moon and we thought that was a big accomplishment.
Are we really going to colonize a barren world so far away? What’s actually in it for us? Maybe it could become it’s own self-sustaining colony in a thousand years, but what kind of life would those people really have? Maybe in a thousand generations, we will have the technology to terra-form it into something resembling earth.
The initial manned journey to Mars is going to be extremely dangerous and with our current technology, we won’t be able to respond to many emergencies as they come up. Essentially, they will be on their own.
But we humans love to explore and we’re determined to colonize it. I can’t, for the life of me, figure out why. I also can’t imagine why anyone would sign up for such a risky/hazardous adventure.
Maybe we should invest in our own planet first. Take the “Mars money” and sink it into developing commercial fusion energy or other green technology that could literally save the planet. I don’t get it.
