The other day, I was speaking to an acquaintance about some real world challenges we have where humans of various nations seem to want to control other nations, or settle disputes, often trivial ones by way of force; war for instance. That’s a bummer, and for such an intelligent species wars seem like a not so smart activity. However, we all know that the best way to unite groups is when they have a common challenge. This seems to work for all species on the planet.
Did you know when there is a terrible storm animals of prey and predators, or normally deadly competitors will hold up in the same cave or safe haven until the danger has passed, normally they’d have tried to kill one another. Also, humans do this too, when two groups unite to fight a bigger enemy; “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” motif, or when there are natural disasters, humans band together in that common cause, something I was reminded of by my acquaintance.
Ronald Reagan once postulated that if humans had a bigger threat perhaps from an alien species, they’d stop fighting each other and join together to defeat the bigger challenge to the future of the human race. Also, we’ve joined in space exploration with many nations to share technology rather than building weapons of war to fight each other. So, as my acquaintance said, maybe space colonies and long-term space travel would solve that problem. Roddenberry, Sagan, Hawkings, and Arthur C. Clarke all had considered this.
Indeed, sharing space technology, or the technology at CERN is something that humanity can do together, and it opens communications for a higher purpose. The Council on Foreign Relations had also talked of sharing technology to do an off-world project, and who knows maybe private space flight could help towards that as well. NASA has done a great job with the “International” Space Station. The biggest obstacle of course is the dual-use technology with rocketry which can also be used for ICBM nuclear weapons. With rogue nations in the world, you can understand how the “trust” factor isn’t always there.
If we can trust each other, we can do this, and in the process eliminate future wars and turn the competition humans often exhibit in war to competition for future technology in space exploration. Indeed, I surely hope the human race can get beyond all this nonsense so we can make it so. Please consider all this.
