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From: KFL@MC.LCS.MIT.EDU ("Keith F. Lynch")
Newsgroups: net.space
Subject: Long-Term Viability
Message-ID: <[MC.LCS.MIT.EDU].830796.860225.KFL>
Date: Tue, 25-Feb-86 22:28:11 EST
Article-I.D.: <[MC.LCS.MIT.EDU].830796.860225.KFL>
Posted: Tue Feb 25 22:28:11 1986
Date-Received: Fri, 28-Feb-86 06:41:22 EST
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    From: brahms!gsmith@ucbvax.berkeley.edu  (Gene Ward Smith)

       I'm confused -- do you have a high faith in scientific and technical
    advancement, or a very low one? It seems you adopt either point of view
    to suit your convenience.

  High technology without space colonization cannot save us.  If we
get all our energy by burning fuels which put carbon dioxide into the
Earth's atmosphere, we can't then simply remove the carbon dioxide
and convert it back into oxygen and carbon.  If we mine all our raw
materials here on Earth, forests and other ecosystems will suffer.  If
our increasing population all lives on Earth, there will be less room
for other creatures.  If all our wastes are left on Earth, we will
have a horrible pollution problem.  This is true no matter how good
our technology.

       Oooh --- it sounds so easy! We'll just roll out to the stars (THATS not
    hard) and live forever. Why do I find it strange to think that if you have
    just proven it impossible to do on the earth, it should be so easy
    somewhere else?

  Nobody said it would be easy.
  It's not a matter of 'somewhaere else' but of 'everywhere at once'.
The solar system alone can support a population of over ten to the
twentieth.  The galaxy, perhaps ten to the thirtieth.

    ... Some of you seem to think you are going to wish yourself to
    Epsilon Eridani. "If you wish upon a star ... "

  Nobody said star travel would be easy.  Just preferable to the
alternatives.
								...Keith