I suppose if one day another planet was discovered where life was available, there would be a fight to “live” there? It seems logical that only people with enough money and power can afford that. Would people as greedy beings conquer their place there or would they rather live more consciously with nature? What are the chances that people would want to take their own territories and exercise power? Surely countries will want to conquer their place in scientific research of the universe?
Answer
Discovering a habitable planet is one thing, going there is another. The latter is simply impossible today. After all, it’s about planets around other stars, and you don’t just go there, it’s about journeys that typically take hundreds of years or more. In no country is anything like this technologically and socially perfect.
The reasons why countries go to war with each other are not entirely clear to me, but I have little fear that this would be one.
For a good understanding, what we are now discovering are planets in the so-called ‘habitable zone’ around their star, where water can be liquid, and life as we know it is not impossible. That is quite different from ‘life that is available’, whatever you mean by that. After all, we have no idea that life will come once it seems possible, and there is no proof yet that there is life somewhere far in the galaxy.
If this evidence comes – and we all secretly hope so – it will undoubtedly be a fact of global significance. And then nature lovers will undoubtedly have ample time to give shape to the debate of how to deal with this.
Once again, don’t be afraid of what science may find, knowledge is so much better than ignorance to move forward.
Answered by
Prof. dr. Christopher Waelkens
Astronomy
Old Market 13 3000 Leuven
https://www.kuleuven.be/
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