

The High Frontier, Redux (On Space Colonization) - fjabre
http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2007/06/the_high_frontier_redux.html

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fjabre
mechanical_fish:

 _I'm not at all sure that we have the means to make the Earth less habitable
than the Moon or Mars. The Moon is pretty darned uninhabitable. Mars likewise.
Assuming the absolute worst of the nuclear winter hypotheses to be true, we
could perhaps destroy most of the higher life on Earth. But even after a
nuclear winter the Earth would still have substantial amounts of water and
oxygen, and almost certainly a functioning biosphere of some sort. [1] Which
is more than can be said for the Moon or even Mars. Meanwhile, we most
certainly don't have the technology to reach an extrasolar Earth-like planet,
and spending tens of billions of dollars to have humans dork around in near-
solar orbit won't change that fact one bit. If you really do dream of settling
other planets, you need to spend far fewer dollars on far more radical
experiments. Or you need to read Charles
Stross:[http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-
static/2007/06/the_high...](http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-
static/2007/06/the_high_frontier_redux.html) Possibly both. \-- [1] Bacteria
are hard to kill. Many of them thrive on the lightless ocean floor at
extremely high temperatures. And unicellular creatures built our oxygen
atmosphere, so the loss of it probably won't bother them too much._

Originally from this thread: From this thread -
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=832280>

