Land for Sale

Anyone who knows me knows that I am a big proponent of air and space travel and research. As such, I'm a fastidious supporter of projects that are meant to improve on space travel and space exploration and likewise for earth bound travel as well. One big arguement that opponents have is that there are enough problems on this planet so why not solve them before taking our problems to another world and potentially beginning them there. It's a valid question and it is one that begs consideration before answering. It may be a question we would have to ask ourselves in the future. I hesitate to say either the near future or distant future simply because the rate at which technology is improving is not equal to the level at which we are seeing increases in the space program. Why am I bringing this up now? Well, scientists revealed this week that they have found a planet 581c orbiting the red dwarf sun Gliese 581 somewhere roughly in the constellation Lira.

What is exciting the astronomers even more is the fact that this planet seems to meet the criteria set down by scientists as factors in determining whether or not a planet will be similar enough to Earth to sustain life. Some of the basics are that the planet be of similar size and that it contain an atmosphere which can allow us to breathe. Apparently planet 581c is likely to have both. Another important factor is water and though the investigation is currently underway, there is the strong possibility that the planet may have water as well. With all of this potential, it's possible that the planet could indeed sustain life; and being a measely 100 light years away, it is one of the closest planets to Earth that has the potential to continue human life.

Therein lies the rub to this discovery. The fact that the planet is 20 light years away means that by the time any probes we sent there arrive at the planet, we'll have either developed the technology to get there faster or we'll have simply disappeared from the universe from the current exploitation of our own planet and the current lack of interest in the space program. At the height of the Cold War, the tense rivalry between the United States and Russia drove both countries to be the first to achieve what seemed impossible no more than 70 years before and that was to land a man on the moon. With 50 years of the Wright Brothers flight at Kitty Hawk, man was in space and within ten years of that, we were on the moon. There are those who doubt that man has walked on the moon, for whatever reason, but naysayers aside, the reason we haven't returned to the moon is partially because of lack of money and the fact that there are no potential 'rivals' to entering and colonizing space.

Last year, China launched its first manned space mission into orbit and returned the astronaut safely to the Earth. While it will definitely be some time before the Chinese establish a space station they do have the potential to reach space and go beyond. Perhaps they will act as the catalyst to reinvigorate support for our space program. With the collapse of communist Russia and the lack of 'competition' to achieve other 'firsts' in space, our program has stagnated. The shuttle fleet is serving its purpose but the fleet has served well beyond its expected lifespan and is due to retire. There are plans to return to the moon within the next two decades but the furor and the drive to do it again are not as strong as they once were. The world has certainly changed from the 1960's and there's a different focus and understanding of space from that time until now.

As an admitted proponent of the air and space programs of this and other nations, I can see why people don't see it as a priority. Our planet is dying due to our exploitation of its natural resources, constant pollution of its atmosphere and overpopulating it. Will the discovery of 581c make a difference? Perhaps or perhaps not. Perhaps we will continue to think of the planet as being a constant and looking to the immediate future as opposed to the distant future. Younger generations often accuse the previous generation of not caring for them. They think that they merely seek to serve themselves for the time that they are here and not worry about things how life will be impacted later on. That paradigm is changing but it will be sometime before we see those benefits. Could we export our problems to a new world like 581c? Certainly we could, after all, we're only human.