How Easy is it to Press the Reset Button?
- Brian Renna
- Oct 2, 2020
- 2 min read
Significant breaks in space exploration have been surfacing lately and it is making people question how close are we to space colonization? Although this sounds like a simple question, it has been on the minds of scientists for years and they barely have a complex answer. Space colonization is the habitation and survival of a human colony on non-Earth ground. The concept of space colonization can be compared to the Jamestown colony of 1607, where the new world can be compared to a planet or moon and the sea can be compared to space.
Similar to how it took forever for the colonizers to plan and reach the new world, scientists have been planning the trip and construction of a space colony for years. Many proposals for space colonies have been made yet none have been put into place yet. When making proposals, scientists have been focusing on these main reasons for colonization: overpopulation of Earth, biological threats and natural disasters. With this in mind, comes the question of how easy is it to reset the current colonization of humans? Hitting the “reset” button is not as easy as it is in video games and comes with a significant amount of steps and processes for humans to go through.
Economically, scientists are going to have to find a way to fund not only the transportation of millions of humans but also the transportation of resources and materials in order to not land on a desolate body of land in space with no resources. Unlike how the Jamestown colony had trees, water, stone and a plethora of other resources to build out of, the potential new host planet could have nothing. Not to mention, the current spacecraft we use can only hold up to eight people. This poses a serious issue of how to efficiently send multiple groups of people to space.
Although there are no currently enacted plans on space colonization, we cannot ignore the proposals for such colonization. It can’t be forgotten that space colonization has difficulties that haven’t been thoroughly explored yet mainly for the fact that space is infinite and everywhere we look is a potential target for colonization. The questions about space colonization are simple but the answers are very opinionated. For example exactly who is going to colonize the land found most promising? Certified astronauts, government officials, or a normal everyday citizen? And in the event of a natural disaster that poses to end all life as we know it, who is going to press the “reset” button?
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