vash23n wrote:
Not sure if you know this and are making a joke, but I did hear that Obama is increasing funding to NASA and wants us to reach Mars by 2030. There may be more specifics and I may have some details wrong, but that is the gist of it. I think this is great. I am a big fan of space exploration and have always been obsessed with it. With all the issues on this planet it is practical too. If we want the species to survive long term without halting research into finding a cure for cancer and other diseases that could limit population growth, this is the only reasonable step. Personally, I am only really excited to see what mysteries Mars holds. We don't have the technology to make a livable environment for massive amounts of people on another planet anyway so I guess Mars is safe for now. Hawkings was right when he said the only workable solution is to find a planet exactly like Earth - so we need to work on faster forms of space travel unless we just set out Saga of Seven Suns or Pandorum style.
Hawkings also stated that the only way to guarantee the continuance of humanity was to colonize worlds beyond our galaxy.
Personally, I feel space has been widely neglected. I'm very interested in space colonization. I'm also interested in the growing civilian space travel market that has started seeing backing from NASA...
I think that was part of the same thing on Hawking that I read - talking of needing to find an Earth-like world since life as we know it - consisting of carbon-based lifeforms - depends on water. He did say it would be necessary to look outside our galaxy, the closest being the Andromeda galaxy. I have read that there is a planet they suspect might be Earth-like in the Andromeda galaxy. Or at least it is the same distance from that galaxy's central star. They worry about some gravity difference, however, because it has two moons or because there is another planet close to it... I forget, but whatever the cause, this may have prevented a comet from hitting the planet and giving it water, which they think happened on Earth. Something like that.