Is it really necessary to send humans to those places just to get the knock-on benefits? Couldn’t we do those things directly, without going there?
It seems to me that, today, those who have the money to spend on these endeavors would only do so if there were perceived short-term benefits to themselves. That means they plan to exploit the resources, or increase their own power somehow.
I know the good engineers that make this happen are doing it for the challenge and in the pursuit of knowledge, and I know that’s why we poors support it, but that doesn’t “pay the bills.” What is the motivation behind the money? Why are they really doing this?
Because exploration is in the human DNA. We seek to push out further, see and learn about new places, and further our understanding. Your question is like asking “why did explorers sail ships across the Atlantic when they had a perfectly good continent already?” At first, the new world was just “Europe but worse”, or the various islands of the Pacific were just “Asia but worse” - humans have always felt the need to explore and see what’s around every corner.
Sure, the Moon and Mars may be boring compared to all the sights on earth, but space exploration starts somewhere. Just like sailing the ocean, you start with learning how to build a boat that can cross a lake or river; you don’t start by building an ocean liner.
European exploration across the Atlantic was driven by a desire for trade routes with Asia that did not pass through the intervening Islamic civilizations that were often in conflict with the explorers, it was an economic motive. After the European discovery of the American continents, they were, in fact, largely ignored for about a century.
If exploration is so core to the human experience, why did the people of Asia - much more numerous than the Europeans even back then - not undertake any large exploration or colonization efforts? Or those of Africa?
The economic motive for space exploration is rather weak. There are asteroids full of valuable metals, but they are very far away and recovery would be more difficult and expensive than expanding Earth extraction efforts. We evolved to live here, life elsewhere disagrees with our biology - reduced gravity is great for your back and terrible for your heart and brain.
We don’t need the living space, and the population looks set to decline by the end of the century anyway.
While I understand you want to ascribe some kind of moral imperative to exploration, it is a large and completely unnecessary expenditure of resources that could be better deployed to make life here better for far more people.
You have deeply disappointed Admiral Zheng He. This may cost you your head.
And then he got back and they dismantled all the boats and never did it again. Definitely had exploration in the DNA.
And meanwhile the peoples of modern-day India, southeast Asia, Korea, Japan, Pakistan, Afghanistan, etc. never did this. Curious.
You’re a member of a species that owes its entire existence to exploration and expansion. We expanded from one biome in a tiny corner of Africa to a species of billions dominating an entire planet. We explored every corner of it and adapted to every possible biome. We learned how to live everywhere from isolate islands to endless deserts to polar wastes. We’re the ultimate explorer and colonizing species.
I cannot comprehend how a human being can look at that and then respond with the most bone-headed take imaginable, “we don’t have exploration in our genes.”
China engaged in all sorts of colonization. How do you think they ended up with Taiwan? India engaged in colonization in Sri Lanka and other areas. You’re just ignorant of history.
I believe you find yourself thinking that a lot if you don’t understand why people disagree with you.
Sorry, I just can’t wrap my mind around the motivations of misanthropic trolls. I have more faith in humanity than you do. You should try and find the good in other people rather than obsessing over the bad.
Wanting to improve the lives of others is ‘obsessing over the bad’ and being a ‘misanthropic troll’?
Go read this chain again, which of us brought out the insults first?
You don’t have arguments, and are upset the platitudes you’ve swallowed don’t stand up to scrutiny.
Even if I concede ‘exploration is in our DNA’ (I do not, but let’s test the argument [btw the Chinese first came to Taiwan in the 17th century at the urging of the Dutch - but I digress]).
Isn’t war also in our DNA? We’ve had a few of those, should we have another? After all, they brought great advancements in technology.
What about genocide? Or whaling?
Doing something ‘because it is in our DNA’ is not noble. It is, in fact, the behavior of beasts and other animals we as a society consider less valuable than ourselves.
Why did the Spaniards and Portuguese colonize the new world? Gold, silver, and cash crops. All economic. The average Iberian peasant wasn’t sitting around pining for a new horizon - the monarchies wanted power and needed funds. It was a top-down effort that tremendously benefited the societal elites for two centuries. The average peasant was no better off until much later, following industrialization.
Why did the English settle North America? In the Caribbean, cash crops plantations. In New England, they were driven from their old life by religious persecution. In the mid Atlantic, the Crown wanted tobacco plantations to finance the State.
Nowhere in here is the story of the Everyman deciding to drop everything and run for the furthest hills. It is economics and the desire of the powerful to enhance their own position.
And here you are, spouting their bullshit, beating on others and airing your superiority like a gilded peacock because you want to hand every bit of what’s up there to the very people making everything worse for those down here.
No thanks.