A thought for 2011 from the smartest guy on the planet. OK, one of the smartest …
… or as Brion Gysin wrote many years ago in The Process, “Of course the sands of present time are running out from under our feet. What are we here for? We are here to go.”
I’m not so sure I would agree with Hawking about space travel insuring our future. The symbiotic relationship between humans and the planet earth is so deep and complex that it is false to think we could ever have a long-term existence separate from it. Even the slightest differences in things like gravity or the atmosphere would, over the long-term, have massive and catastrophic effects on human populations. The earth and the human body are a single complex system that can’t be divided.
Even if the rare earth hypothesis is not true (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rare_Earth_hypothesis ), planets similar enough to the earth would almost certainly be so far away that space travel would not be the issue, but rather some sort of time/space travel. This will probably never be achieved, most likely because of the incomprehensible amount of energy that would be required to affect time/space in such a manner.
This wonderful mother planet is all that we have and all that we will EVER have. The earth IS our body. Perhaps this understanding will help people begin to take care of it.
Actually, I disagree with him for another reason, although I see what you mean about the complexity of getting out there and surviving. He says he’s an optimist and that “if we can avoid disaster for the next two centuries …” things should pan out. Well, that’s too optimistic by half — 200 hundred years from now sounds like a helluva longshot.
Your point that “the earth and the human body are a single complex system that can’t be divided” is likely true. And widely believed. (See “Avatar,” which makes that case for Pandora and the Na’vi.)
Yes, 200 years is a long shot. I am astounded when I think that civilization is only about 5000 years old. We are so young.
Burroughs and Gysin “minutes to go” a third mind project.
seconds to go. a now project.
We are already in space …
Hello anybody out there?
Calling calling???
Another planet.
Another America.
we need we need.
YOU.
It’s stupidity at its worst. bla bla bla.
water through a sieve. any old dribble at this stage sounds better than ALL the nut cases with nuclear shouting god told me so.
and all the trees that are needed to print the gazillions to pay everybody to eat the long-gone fish.
We are here to go but not on a space ship.
Unless the aliens arrive and pick us up soon Very soon.
EVOLVE. that’s the only solution. or we’re out of here one way or the other.
seconds to go.
(Whoever sent this comment has a point. EVOLUTION is the way to go. It’s what Gysin meant. Leaving the planet in a spaceship is like traveling in an iron lung, as Burroughs has pointed out. There’s not much percentage in that. — JH)