Why Explore Space?
An exploration of the reasons for why we, as humans, gravitate to the idea of exploration. What is it that drives us? Why should we continue to be driven by any such ideals?
Over the years, as mankind has evolved, so has the culture that we build around it. This culture, this ‘history of mankind’ has unfolded over several thousands of years from the very minute that we gained cognitive function and could make sense of the world around us. There has been significant scholarly work and analysis on this history1, with countless pages having been devoted to understanding how the economic2, political, moral traditions and the pursuit of art3 has shaped through the years.
However, despite the unquestionable knowledge, wisdom and research that most historians, anthropologists and economists seem to ignore is a fifth element. For none of the four facets is more central than exploration, a concept that encompasses most of the other possibilities and arguably constitutes one of the main engines of human culture, spanning millennia. When looked at through such a lens, one may be able to view the Space Age (in its simplest and purest form) as the latest episode in a long tradition and culture of human exploration.
From the context of Space Exploration, it inevitably begs the question of ‘Why Explore?’, or framed perhaps a little less crudely, ‘Why must humankind explore?’.
I. Technological and Scientific Benefits: The Usual, Useless Candidates for Justifying Space Exploration
As a starting point, I would request everyone reading this to assume, for the pure sake of this hypothesis, that the following advancements in science and technology that came as a direct result of space exploration are redundant (referred in cumulation as ‘Useless Benefits’).
(1) The global positioning system (GPS) was originally developed by the military for precision navigation and weapon targeting purposes. Let us ignore how this technology has transformed almost every industry, as well as day-to-day life, on a global scale. Using maps and travel atlases and stopping to ask for directions are now largely anachronisms. GPS has enabled ride-hailing services, as well as package tracking and delivery. It has improved our fitness by tracking our workouts and our safety by quickly providing our location in emergency situations. GPS will be there in the future to facilitate emerging technologies such as self-driving cars and package deliveries by drone. Think space exploration is useless? Think of that the next time you try taking a cab after a night of drinking in an exotic city where you can barely decipher the language.
(2) Digital Image Processing technology was first developed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (referred to colloquially as JPL), which was pivotal for carrying out deep space exploration missions. The need for excellent digital image processing technology for deep space exploration is what provided the precursor which was later adapted to create modern CAT scanners and radiography.
(3) Satellite observation, monitoring and tracking abilities initially developed for space exploration now form the basis upon which we create frameworks enabling us to keep bugs at bay whilst providing access to clean water; to benefit agriculture through monitoring crops and any possibilities of diseases; to monitor climate change and keep the desertification of the planet in check; to provide solutions for the growing need for safe drinking water and ensure we do not die of dehydration; to create technologies and systems that can survive the most inhospitable and freakishly harsh environments on our planet.
(4) The creation of scratch-resistant, UV-reflecting lenses were borne as a result of innovators trying to come up with solutions that resulted in the coating of the lenses with a film of diamond-like carbon (DLC) that not only provided scratch-protection but additionally reduced surface friction, so that the lenses shed water more easily to reduce spotting4. Scratch-resistant glasses are now a very widely accepted and used technology.
(5) The concept of red-light therapy, based on Red LEDs, where tiny light-emitting diode (LED) chips were used to grow plants in space are now lighting the way for cancer treatment, wound healing, and chronic pain alleviation on Earth.5
(6) Space exploration is also saving lives in previously war-torn areas by employing leftover rocket fuel to create a new flare that destroyed land-mines in the very spot where they were buried, without using explosives. This technique includes placing a Thiokol-produced flare next to the uncovered land mine, with the flare subsequently being ignited through a battery-triggered electric match. Even in cases where the mine detonates before the explosive is fully consumed, the explosion was observed to be more controlled and minimized, causing less damage than other mine-disposal methods, which included deactivation by hand and deliberate detonation.6
(7) How often do we think about space exploration and astronauts when we put on a pair of our Nike Air trainers? If you are normal (and also ignorant) probably never. You would probably never give it a moments’ thought, which is hilarious, because the “blow-rubber molding” technology used to create the famed Nike Air sneakers were originally developed for spacesuits. Yep, every step you take is a direct descendant of the giant leap for mankind that Neil Armstrong took.
(8) I could go on, and on, and on, about foil blankets, the original Black & Decker dustbusters (vacuum cleaners), enriched baby formulas, packaged foods, wireless headphones, high-powered solar cells, even the Invisalign braces, among a plethora of others have come as a result of efforts towards space exploration!78
For the purposes of our argument, let’s assume that whatever the critics of space exploration say about it being a ‘wasteful expenditure’ of our resources and efforts is in fact, correct. Let us also assume that the tangible impacts including all the innovation‐related applications and benefits resulting from investments in these programmes, such as new devices and services that spin off into the marketplace are also constituents of the above-mentioned ‘Useless Benefits’. Let us actually stretch this further, and believe for a second that the Useless Benefits of space exploration which lead to advances in science and technology, and accentuate workforce development and industrial capabilities (and by a logical extension the overall stimulation of private companies and industries, all of which arguably contribute significantly to the economic progress of space‐faring nations are also included within the ambit of space exploration) are also useless and redundant. The reason I say this is because to the staunch naysayers you could throw a multitude of these and still have them refute why space exploration is important, somehow finding relief in the argument that ‘humankind’ would have found a way.
This brings us to the rather troubling, if not philosophically and metaphysically inclined, question of why human beings explore. The question may be a little deeper, and more ingrained in us than we would like to believe. Surveying the vast panoply of history, we can often find symmetries in the narrative arcs of the various ages of discovery; when traced even further back to say the Paleolithic Era, we can find global historical context for the Space Age, the latest in the ages of discovery that humankind has embarked upon. The Paleolithic Era aside, prior to the Space Age, historians often distinguished two modern Ages of Exploration, the Age of Discovery in the 15th and 16th centuries associated with Prince Henry the Navigator, Columbus, Magellan, and other European explorers, and the Second Age in the 18th and 19th centuries characterized by further geographic exploration such as the voyages of Captain Cook, underpinned and driven by the scientific revolution.
In this sense, the Space Age can be seen as the ‘Third Age’ of Exploration, chronologically marked by the launch of the Sputnik and the act of triggering the space race between the then-USSR and the United States, the first generation of space powers.
If one accepts this framing, it makes sense to compare one age of exploration with another, constantly keeping in mind the differences as well as the similarities and with full realization of the unlikelihood of any predictive ability. It would, therefore, not be entirely asinine to compare the Age of Space with the somewhat presumptuously titled European Age of Discovery, and we can also hope to find certain revealing symmetries and differences and casting in a new light. It would also perhaps lead us to viewing some of the chief characteristics of the Space Age in an entirely, previously unthought of, mold. But that is perhaps a topic for later discussion.
II. A Pursuit of Humanity’s Faustian Ideals
The tale of Doctor Faustus comes from the seminal work of many a great scholar, those of note being Christopher Marlowe9 and Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, which is often considered one of the great literary works depicting the conflict between human and divine knowledge. Whether or not the fictional character was based on German alchemist, astrologer and magician (note: I use this term extremely loosely given my own beliefs in logic and science) Johann Georg Faust from the late 15th century is something that I would be daft to get into10, for I am neither the best placed (read: most interested) person in that debate nor does it matter to the larger point I would like to address here.
The character of Faust, capable of consideration to be a literary figure comparable to the Don Quixotes and Robinson Crusoes of the annals of fiction, clearly falls into the polymathic tradition of a Renaissance Man, as is particularly evident in the first scene of the play, where he discusses and dismisses his many academic studies, considering the purpose of every discipline; logic, medicine, law, and divinity. He resolves, in full Renaissance spirit, to accept no limits, traditions, or authorities in his quest for knowledge, wealth, and power. If this idea evokes a sense of how most people in contemporary times view ‘ambition’ (especially as a quest for wealth, power and knowledge), I would not call your interpretation absurd.
Returning to the point, the gist of Goethe's and Marlowe’s classic(s) goes something like this: Dr Faust, is an erudite scholar, alchemist and a polymath who is highly successful yet dissatisfied with life (and perhaps this is a theme among successful people that we see emerging more and more as time goes on), and constantly laments how he has reached the end of his knowledge. Despite being one of the best placed intellectuals of his time, decides to accept a “deal with the devil.” The “deal” being that he gives up his moral integrity, acquires whatever worldly pleasures he desires; but then, upon death, must hand over his soul to the devil (in the oldest original tale, forever or, in Goethe’s most famous play, forgiveness from God for Faust’s being such a fool). The primary motive behind Faust 'making this deal' with Mephistopheles / the Devil was gaining more knowledge, in a bid to alleviate his feeling that he had come to the end of all knowledge that could be acquired owing to his intellectual capacity. In that sense, Faust's foolish ideals may mirror a lot of desires and issues that I believe contribute to the dissatisfaction and unhappiness we experience - he embodies the futility of our actions; of how we still rejoice in our own selfish gains and feel a sense of self-entitlement to want even more, everything more, than we really need to live a happy life. More than anything, Faust is the tragic tale of man’s (equally woman’s) ever-restless spirit, one of wanting for more - more money, wealth, even more knowledge and nowadays, more and better technology.
The legend of Faust carries with it many interpretations, across different contexts and through a panoply of lenses that I do not believe we can articulate well enough during the course of this article. What I believed captivated everyone's imagination was how Faust articulated an outlook on life which stressed on an individual's position within a long, boring, seemingly never-satisfactory life that most seem to live. (I would rather not venture into why it seems even more fitting in contemporary times and open a seemingly nasty pandora’s box)
I believe Faust can be seen as a representative of humankind as a whole, ever more pertinent when juxtaposed with the Space Age for humans. Faust's dissatisfaction and striving may also be interpreted as an unconscious manifestation of man's potential to improve himself; to challenge the limitations of our existence, even though Faust is frequently misguided by his obsessive efforts to rise beyond man's natural sphere. It is our effort to not just merely accept our place in the vast cosmos for what it is, and rather question it for why it is. It is our quest for reaching out beyond our mere existence and trying to understand, acquire and inherit knowledge that the medieval scholars would consider to be within the ‘domain of God’. It is also an unconscious manifestation of man’s potential to wish to improve himself. To my mind, there are also other parallels that may be drawn between human space exploration and the tale of Faust. For instance, Faust’s deal with the devil, although premeditated by his more idealistic, pure need for knowledge slowly transforms into a pedantic pursuit of trite desires once he does attain the ability to. I leave you with the question of whether humanity’s surge into space is reflective of a similar progression where it was once driven by pure want of knowledge to having been turned into the pursuit of fortune at the cost of truly sparking innovation.
III. It is the challenge that unlocks our imagination
Comparatively speaking, humans are a weak species. We are not naturally designed for a wide range of environmental conditions. Yet humans inhabit all regions of the globe. We cannot fly away from danger, hide through natural camouflage, or outrace many four-legged creatures. Despite our obvious physical deficiencies, the human species has survived and thrived. What then has been our competitive advantage? One abundantly clear answer is Ingenuity and Imagination. Humans are designed to create; what our imagination can conceive, our opposable thumbs allow us to build and our language skills enable us to communicate.
Upon a brief perusal of the story of human evolution, it becomes increasingly evident that the survival and expansion of the human species is fundamentally a story of the utilization of the human creativity and imagination. The application of creative and imaginative thinking to solve problems provided early humans with a competitive advantage; a quality that was selectively retained and passed along to subsequent generations. And I would argue that with successive generations, the applications and results of this competitive advantage, creative thinking, and imagination have only grown from stone tools to the construction of the very world we live and work in today. Indeed, without these survival-enhancing functional origins, it is unlikely that we would have the neural equipment to create art11.
In fact, I believe it is imagination operating as a cognitive phenomenon that creates a cohesive version of reality and provides us with a basis to consider how the reality that we think we live in differs from that of other sentient, but non-human entities. Imagination also imbues us with the ability to grasp and conceive of ideas, feelings, concepts that may otherwise be inaccessible to us. As Carl Sagan once said that it can “take us to worlds that never were. And without it, we go nowhere”. Consider this for a moment: All the knowledge that humans have possessed over the several millennia of our existence (let us call it the “collective human knowledge”) is absolutely tiny when compared to the knowledge that has not yet been unlocked or accessed by us. The only way to access such unknown information is through the engagement of our imaginative abilities. This interpretation of imagination’s fundamental role in humanity’s conceptions can also illuminate how we create knowledge about things that are beyond our ability to experience them. After all, how did our ancestors who painted caves figure out how to depict the representations that they do? How did Neanderthals figure out how to carve artful objects and invent some rudimentary forms of communication?
The human baseline of creativity, our ability to imagine, communicate, and collaborate with increasing prowess through complex, sometimes intuitive processes have facilitated our lineages’ transition from a cluster of medium-sized, hairless, fangless, hornless clawless ape-like beings armed with a few rocks and some sticks into the species who invented domestication, economies, cities, nations, religion, warfare and broad-scale peace.
I believe space presents the ultimate challenge to our imagination. The vast breadth of the cosmos that is still left unexplored, undiscovered and inadequately understood posits infinite opportunities for the use of human imagination. Afterall, it is only through the inception of imagination and the nuanced complementarity of our imagination-driven intelligence that expeditions of science were made possible. Only through the utilization of our imaginative prowess will we find out answers to the questions that the Universe may pose to us: how can we land spaceborne submarines on Europa where they can melt their way through miles of ice and possibly observe life swimming in a volcanically heated ocean? How can we land a robotic ‘emissary’ to fish out the possibility of strange, cold-adapted life forms on Titan and transmit the data to Earth despite being billions of miles away? How can we detect unmistakable signals that come to us from stars that are located billions of years away? How can we set up mechanisms that can detect another civilization?
IV. Our rallying effort against the violence of the universe
The nature of the universe from the comfort of our position, nestled in an insignificant speck of the galaxy seems oddly comforting and serene. However, there can be no better way to shatter this myth than in the words of the late Stephen Hawking, who put it best in stating that ‘the universe is a violent place’.
Through the billions of light-years that we know the Universe occupies, it seems to be dotted by explosions of massive stars, X-ray and gamma-ray binary stars, and active galaxies; all of which are factors related to the presence of compact objects such as neutron stars or black holes. It would not be a stretch to state that if we exist and are aware, it is because no catastrophic astronomical event has occurred around us in the last few million years. Infact, physicists and cosmologists believe that the birth of the universe itself was a violent event, and so is the current state that it exists in. The scales on which this cosmic violence is unfurling is perhaps beyond the scale of comprehension many of us possess.
For instance, take the cases of stars. At the end of its thermonuclear stage12, stars with an initial mass between 9 and 30 solar masses (a solar mass being the equivalent to 1,989 × 10^30 kg) are not capable of producing enough energy to sustain their mass. Due to this, the star collapses on itself. This collapse stops when matter reaches densities above those of atomic nuclei (~10^17 kg/m3 ) at which point their collapse instead forms neutron stars. If the star(s) involved in this process are sufficiently massive, the collapse might continue and result in the formation of a black hole. After the sudden stop in the collapse of that central compact object, there is a violent bounce that releases a (gravitational) energy of 10^46 J, in a shockwave that pushes the outermost layers of the star and produces a supernova explosion.
Sidebar 1: How much energy would that be exactly?
Let that sink in for a moment. It releases enough energy to meet the current energy consumption needs of the Earth for more than 17 octillion years, which is several magnitudes more than the age of the universe itself.
Purely for the sake of scientific absurdity, let me press on. Assuming that the average Tesla Roadster consumes 34 kilowatt-hour (kWh) every 100 miles, and that we could factor in a perfect conversion rate. Even if we were to give every human being currently alive on this planet a Tesla (not before I can go long on TSLA stock option calls), this would be the equivalent of enough energy to keep each of these Teslas powered long enough to traverse the entire diameter of the observable Universe some 1.8 million times over.
Notwithstanding the obvious stupidity of my argument, and the fallacy-ridden examples I have set before you to demonstrate this, it is amply clear that in terms of our own place in the cosmic balance of things, we are at the mercy of powers far beyond our own. Powers that we perhaps do not even understand completely yet. Such formations of black holes and neutrons constitute but a part of the Universe as we have come to know it, which has far more challenging and violent phenomena like Quasars, supernovas, the rather uninspiringly titled dark matter and dark energy, galaxy mergers and cosmic collisions.
Take another example of just how violent the world we occupy is: one of the biggest external threat to life on Earth today comes from the impact of comets and asteroids. This is a familiar hazard since the release of the Hollywood blockbuster movies Deep Impact and Armageddon, and most recently the DiCaprio starrer Don’t Look Up. Over time, detections have been made of hundreds of potentially Earth-intersecting asteroids, and it is now possible to produce a reasonably accurate measure of the threat we face from a chance collision. The figures can seem alarming. Expressed most starkly, the chances that a randomly chosen individual will die from an asteroid or comet impact are expressed by some to be greater than one in a million. This is more than the chance of being struck by lightning, and comparable to the threat of death from an airline disaster. Their destructive power stems not so much from their size as from their speed. Travelling at twenty to thirty kilometres per second, an object just one kilometre across hitting a planet can release more destructive power than all the world’s nuclear weapons put together13. Objects this size slam into our planet on average every million years or so. If one hit tomorrow, it would most likely fall in the ocean, raising tsunamis a kilometre high around the ocean rim. If it struck the land it would excavate a crater twenty kilometres across. The blast from the explosion would wreak havoc in the immediate vicinity, but the long-term damage of dust in the atmosphere and wild fires caused by molten rocks plunging to the ground across the globe would prove the greatest danger, possibly by creating nuclear winter conditions. The disruption to crops and economic activity would kill many more people than the actual impact. It is hard to tell how many would die from an impact of this magnitude, but estimates of a billion or more are not uncommon. So we are presented with a very small probability of a very big catastrophe.
I can already hear a fraction of the people who read this go all like “Nah, this is just some apocalypse-believing nutjob talking”. If I did not know better, I would probably be inclined to believe this accusation. While, I am not claiming that a kilometre-wide asteroid will smash the Earth and push humanity into oblivion, but smaller asteroid collisions might not be all that improbable or unreasonable. For instance, the last recorded occasion was the famous Tunguska explosion of 1908, which flattened trees for thousands of square kilometres in a remote area of Siberia.14 The Tunguska event was the equivalent of a ten-megaton nuclear bomb. What if something of that sort was to not fall into the oceans or uninhabited areas and strike a population centre instead? The thought seems terrifying. Probably time to build the ‘spaceguard’ protection systems that Arthur C. Clarke once popularized?15
There are of course, as I outlined earlier, events occurring at a cosmic scale that may be more terrifying than the thought of a collision on Earth. Luckily we have the Universe’s scaling law at work to save us: which reduces the probability of a violent event in proportion to the energy released, implying that the level of threat to Earth is comparable, whether it is an asteroid impact right here or the collision of two super-massive black holes several billion light years away. If the universe did not have this scaling law – if more violent events happened more often (increasing the probability of them occurring closer to Earth) – then intelligent life may never have emerged.
I am not undertaking these number-flexing exercises just for the sake of it (though I will admit that for someone like me who has a propensity for numbers, it is fun), I assure you that there is a point to it all. Put briefly, the point is this: Violence is the leitmotif of the universe. It was born in a big bang. Its fundamental structure was forged in the first split second, in a searing maelstrom of unimaginable ferocity, at temperatures exceeding a trillion degrees. Its history is one of cataclysmic explosions, implosions and collisions of literally astronomical proportions, of titanic forces and enormous energies. And amidst this cosmic mayhem, life has not only emerged, but flourished – at least it has on one planet as far as we know. Despite the odds actually being against us, given how inconsequential our position in this Universe may be, we have always reached for the stars. Something so delicate as ‘humanity’ has managed to create a home in this chaos and constantly push the frontier – infact, I would go so far as to say that humanity has flourished because of our deep-rooted need to express ourselves in whatever way or form possible, perhaps borne solely out of the fact that it is the only way we know to respond to the absolute (somewhat perceived) malevolence of the cosmos.
When viewed through such a notion, perhaps the reason space exploration appeals to us is the fact that it is the singular method available to us through which we can exert our control and influence, however infinitesimal, over the vast expanse of Space. Regardless of the eventual outcome that it creates in the larger scheme of the Cosmos, what really matters to us is perhaps not the end result of our efforts, but the mere chance that we get to expend it. As self-centered as it may sound, I perceive this to be an inherently human trait – to feed and express our need for control even in the most hopeless of situations. When faced with the prospect of our mortality, we can only ensure that our will is done (in this instance through the impact we have on space) through whatever means necessary.
V. But why must exploration aim at preserving mankind?
If we see a common strand amongst the reasons we have explored above, a common thread amongst them becomes abundantly clear – that we undertake these tasks to ensure the survival and preservation of the human race. To borrow from Aristotle’s First Principles (which for some reason seems to be all the rage in recent times), it is not merely something that we should assume to be true.
To arrive at the true reason, i.e. to get to the heart of the matter requires the challenging of common beliefs about such ethical questions. For instance, Socrates discussed common beliefs about ethical questions through a conversation that involves the systematic cross-examination of an interlocutor and her/his intuitive beliefs16, exposure of the puzzles they raise, and several attempts to solve the puzzles by modifying the initial beliefs17. Grounding our logic in Greek belief brings us to another of his kind, as Aristotle himself states that “in the science of nature as elsewhere, we should try first to determine questions about the first principles. The naturally proper direction of our road is from things better known and clearer to us, to things that are clearer and better known by nature; for the things known to us are not the same as the things known unconditionally (haplôs).” In a philosophical sense, in so far as Aristotle claims that objective first principles must be known by nature, he commits himself to a metaphysical realist conception of knowledge and reality. For he claims that the truth and primacy of a propositional first principle is determined by its correspondence to non-propositional first principles. What is ‘known by nature’ is not something that happens to be adapted to our cognitive capacities, or to play a special role in our theories or beliefs. It is known by nature because it is a primary feature of the world, and it is known to us only if we are in the right cognitive condition to discover what is really there.
The belief we hold when we are in the right sort of cognitive condition does not itself constitute our grasp of an objective first principle; for it is logically possible for us to have coherent, simple, powerful, well-tested theories, meeting all the canons of proper inquiry, without having found objective principles. The primacy of the objective principle makes our belief the grasp of a principle, not the other way round. This would then, from the perspective of a first principles lens, beget a deeper question beyond all that we have explored thus far and perhaps one that in true Aristotelian spirit challenges a belief that we do not think of deeply enough – Why save humanity? To frame the question to the best of my ability, and albeit still a little crudely: “Why must we preserve humanity in the first place and not allow it to extinguish?”. This question would then tackle the a priori reasons for why we must do so, instead of merely accepting that it is just somehow something worth saving.
I believe that there are two approaches to justifying this – one consequentialist, and the other non-consequentialist. The consequentialist idea at the heart of it is one grounded in utilitarianism. The foundation of such a belief being that if we can prevent the premature extinction of humanity, it will increase the net balance of happy lives over miserable lives that are ever lived. The goal for a consequentialist therefore would be to ensure two things: (a) that more people live, predicated on the assumption that there is inherent value in the survival of more humans; and (b) as a logical consequence, that it is somehow virtuous to have ad additional number of happy lives. I do have an issue with this in that this embodies a totalist utilitarian stance which believes that the addition of an extra happy life to an existing population (say ‘x’) makes the world better, all things equal, since it increases the net total of pleasure (from x to x+1) minus the pain that it contains. I take issues with this line of reasoning for a few peculiar reasons, mainly: (i) I am a little uncomfortable making the assumption that
On the other hand, the non-consequentialist one, I believe, does a relatively better job at describing why saving humanity may be a worthwhile endeavour. A non-consequential argument for ensuring the continued existence of humanity would be based on the fact that humanity, with its unique capacities for complex language usage, enhanced (as far as we know) cognitive capabilities, curiosity and rational thought, its sensitivity to moral reasons, its ability to produce and appreciate art, music, and scientific knowledge, its sense of history, and so on, should be deemed to possess some intrinsic value.
It is also possible that we tend to value the survival of future generations of humanity for a myriad of different reasons that are more ‘emotional’ than we realize, including aspects such as attachment, the desire for propagating our values (mostly looked at from a cultural paradigm) and the feeling of reciprocity. Perhaps a small part of it also comes from our dawning realization that a substantial amount of the things that we value depends on human activity and such things will be lost when human beings become extinct. No more art, or intimacy, or music, or humour; it would mean the end of all emotions and experiences that we hold so dear to ourselves. Other things that we value—physical artifacts, for example—may survive for a while, but with no one to appreciate their value, for in addition to the disappearance of valuable things, the extinction of the human race will mean the disappearance of valuing from the Earth.
There is also I believe, a deep interconnection between the prospect of the survival of humanity with our own ability to lead lives that we perceive to be valuable and fruitful. I believe that the survival of the future humankind itself is what lends a sense of value and worthiness in our activities. There is then, a causal effect that runs both ways – atleast in a temporal sense – where our actions impact the survival of humankind and the survival of humankind impacts our actions (and the value we see in them). Of course, it would be rather silly to state that this causality is direct – no human existing 30,000 years in the future will have a direct, verifiable impact on how I live my life, or how you live your life unless the very basis of our understanding of the laws of space and time is massively incorrect. However, there is an indirect impact.
Although I do agree with these strands of reasoning, I am about to take an approach that might seem a little bit of a ‘cheat code’ to some in justifying my stance for this argument. To date, humanity seems to be the only one of its kind: a species capable of deeply considering morality. This ability to tell right from wrong and recognize good and evil is of moral value because moral value itself cannot exist without it. Nihilists and adherents of error theory might still assert that humankind’s existence is irrelevant or insignificant, but they could not assert a moral “ought” to their argument. In opposition to those who have no problem with the death of humanity, those who see moral value in the existence of moral value see people as precious and rare in an otherwise non-living, non-moral universe. With no current evidence of other morally-capable life anywhere in the observable universe, humanity is apparently burdened with a gift that exists nowhere else in the universe. Given this possibility, the extreme danger to which that gift may be subjected if we are to let humanity perish, the survival of humanity becomes a moral and ethical mandate. Think for a moment, is it not true that the ‘imperative of responsibility’, the responsibility that humankind ought to exist, is the first ethical priority of all, since it is the premise upon which any kind of subsequent moral argumentation is founded? I do agree that it can seem highly self-referential to justify the existence of humanity using morals based on the reasoning that we must exist so that morals can exist and remain a possibility in the universe.
Some will take offense to the kind of subversive reasoning I have employed to argue for the survival of humanity, and may very well prefer the consequentialist or Scheffler-esque reasoning. I myself am tempted to adopt such an approach. Yet I must admit, that as I delve deeper into this quagmire of arguments for the survival of humanity, I cannot claim that I know which of these arguments make more sense, and whether any of them can answer the question we set out to begin with. Further, it seems highly unlikely to me that such an argument for an a priori valuation of the existence of the human race can be created without the existence of a theist foundation. But think of what allowed me to construct this argument – it was my ‘sapience’ and my deductive, cognitive skills. Think of the questions, both small and big, asinine and critical, that we possess the ability to through the application of our mind.
With that being said, sapience – the capability for ordered thought and fairly sophisticated language – is, in my opinion, worth protecting. It is a natural phenomenon, but possesses a beauty in the boundless complexity it deals with. As I mentioned, given our sole position as the sentient beings thus far, Humankind (and any future races we evolve into, or computers or artificial intelligence(s) we end up creating) possesses the infinite potential to populate the universe with a myriad of intelligent and non-intelligent beings on an uncountable number of worlds. For all we know, life in the Universe may just be a random, happen-stance event wherein we seemed to draw the lotto prize. Consider this against the fact that all evolutionary changes till now have been the result of mostly random genetic mutations that happen to provide an advantage, helping humans survive amidst the laws of nature that they exist within. Human beings, however, may possess the ability to change that with science and mathematics as it unfolds right now. We have evolved to have these abilities, and perhaps the future will not deny us. Perhaps immortality will be possible, perhaps we will be able to somehow transfer consciousness, perhaps we will be able to bend the laws of Physics and the fundamental forces (as we have come to know them) through knowledge and cognition. Or perhaps we wont have the opportunity to fully develop the science that gives us these capabilities and succumb to any number of natural calamities that finally spell the doom of our civilization and species. Our life, and our consciousness has been the result of random luck and chance, regardless of what cosmological theory you believe to hold true; the result of billions of tiny mistakes that worked to put us into that ‘Goldilocks Zone’ of existence. Personally, I believe the potential of humanity to be able to affect the fundamental laws through their understanding of science and mathematics itself is a rather splendid feature that deserves protection and survival. This is by no means arguing for the fact that there is some sort of ‘biological superiority’ that humans possess – for all we know, it is as possible that regardless of the fate of the human species, some other form of biological life may develop the level of cognition that we possess, or even transcend it. It is equally possible that amongst the vast expanse of the universe (or the multiverse, based on your belief) there are other intelligent species that are capable of this. However, in lieu of any such claims being backed by verifiable observations and rooted in evidence, we are the sole observable species at this very moment that can do this. That I believe is a trait worth safeguarding.
VI. Our constant tussle between seeking excitement and quests against our desire for creating a safe society
It is our perpetual yearning to overcome difficulties and dangers, to see the hidden things, to penetrate into the regions outside our beaten track – it is the call of the unknown – the longing for the land of Beyond, the driving force deeply rooted in the soul of man which drove the first hunters into new regions – the mainspring perhaps of our greatest actions – of winged human thought knowing no bounds to its freedom. However, the societal approach to such actions has been to always balance risk and reward; to be able to mitigate risk to the best extent possible in order to undertake particularly risky endeavours.
The idea of space exploration constitutes a peculiar case, curiously, in that it is one of those types of situations where we simply are not concerned about safety, as the only motive and want is ‘to take risks in a conscious and calculated way’. Should we handle this motive as something that should be suppressed, sublimated or avoided, since it is contrary to a safety seeking attitude, or should we accept this ‘beast within’ as part of human nature and try to handle it in the best possible way? There are strong reasons why I think we should accept the ‘beast within’. One of the reasons I think lies in our evolutionary heritage.
Evolutionary anthropology shows how humans were adapted to, and formed by, shifting environments through the last millions of years from Homo habilis, or earlier, to the present human being18. The general picture given by these evolutionary approaches is very different from the picture of humans that in varying shapes have been presented in the last 200–300 years by the bourgeois culture in Europe. The bourgeois picture projected the human being as a frail and weak creature that had to compensate the lack of bodily strength through a well-developed brain and the use of symbolic powers like language, communication and abstract thinking. The evolutionary picture portrays humans as beings with considerable bodily strength and robustness. Humans developed as hunter-gatherers through 2 million years of evolution, from Homo habilis to Homo sapiens, and spread to more extreme climate zones, to more diverse environments, to higher altitudes, than other animals. Even recently we have had those that have slept naked in the snow (such as the Tierra del Fuego Indians)19. The Bushmen of the Kalahari have survived in extreme desert conditions. They have not only survived, but lead a life that the anthropologist Marshall Sahlins has labelled, after the economist J. K. Galbraith, ‘the original affluent society’20.
Human beings have capabilities that make it possible to lead an elegant life in extreme conditions. Even today we witness the extreme skills and faculties of the ‘human animal’. The deepest free-dive without oxygen is down to more than 120 metres below sea level. Since Habeler and Messner first took the alpine-style climbing trip to the top of Everest without oxygen, many people have done the same. I think the quest for risk, the breaking of records, the test of human limits, the exploration of wilderness (and by extension, space) on the fringes of the unknown, is, at least partly, explained by our past. Our evolutionary background made us more active than most animals; which explains why we need greater areas to explore, because we seem to feed, not only on food, but on novelty, as Staski and Marks suggest.21
One may even argue that given the heritage of humankind, which is adapted to a life that involves challenges and risks, ‘exploration’ has become hard-wired into our genes (through some selective evolutionary mechanism). There is scientific backing for this claim, the risk-taking gene being the first personality-related gene to have been identified and studied during the Genome Project22 indicating that there may be a genetic predisposition to taking risks, among other behaviours. This necessitates that the idea of challenges is something that is inbuilt into us as humans, merely varying in sensitivity along the spectrum.
For the uninitiated, it is the D4DR receptor genes that measure risk-taking, referred to within the genetic sciences community as the ‘Novelty Seeking’ (NS) gene. In itself, the D4DR gene is an acronym for the D4 Dopamine Receptor gene, which is present on the short arm of the 11th Chromosome23. There has found to be a direct correlation between the length of the exon (the part of the gene that is later converted to RNA) of the D4DR gene and the personality characteristics of exploration, thrill-seeking and excitement24. On a biological scale, this is relevant because the trait of ‘Novelty Seeking’ has been discovered to bear a correlation with increased blood flow in parts of the brain that affect cognition, mainly the striatum, and more specifically, the left caudate.25
Siderbar 2: The exon-III of the D4DR Gene D4DR is one of the most gene-rich as well as disease-rich chromosomes in the human DNA. The third exon marked in the photo above is the one that is directly correlated to the risk-taking and novelty-seeking behavior in most humans. It is the sequence of the 48 bp VNTR (variable number of tandem repeats) that determines this. Other than novelty seeking, it is also known to affect other behavioral traits such as alcoholism, drug abuse, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Refer: Genome Project on Chromosome 11
Studies have indicated that those with longer D4DR genes have a higher-willingness to display such exploratory, risk seeking behavior, partly driven by the function that glutamates and dopamine play in our heads26. Whether or not there is a direct correlation between the genetics of those that have historically been more ‘adventurous’ or ‘exploratory’ and the length of their D4DR genes is something I do not believe myself to be fit to answer. Is the altered brain chemistry the cause of our exploratory behaviour, or a consequence of it? I cannot surmise with certainty or even argue with the slightest taint of confidence what the answer to these questions might be. For now it seems that we have to settle for the molecular underpinning of D4DR that most biologists offer as the be-all and end-all of a bio-chemical perspective on our exploration seeking behaviour.
VII. Conclusion
Placing humanity in a cosmic context, we seem overwhelmingly puny and vulnerable (as I notice I have remarked several times over already). Earth’s entire biosphere amounts to less than one-billionth of its mass; our planet is a small body orbiting a dwarf star among hundreds of billions in our galaxy alone. Yet masses and forces are not the only measure of worth. Humans possess one property that has so far been found unique in the universe: we have a measure of understanding of the world and a degree of control over events. However, this ability to understand can lead us to great things, only if pursued solely for the satisfaction of the innate curiosity that we have in our minds. Would that be true understanding and knowledge of the universe? Emanating from a point where chaos and insecurity end, where fear is overcome and the constructiveness (of the human mind) and curiosity are allowed to roam free. This passing by man’s natural impulse should lead us towards the understanding and embellishment that we so deeply seek.
Space exploration is the great human and technological adventure of the past half century and most likely the catalyst of the future.
Above all, the quest for space exploration is mankind’s quest for infinity. I can tell you of Lucian of Samosata’s conceptualization of the first ever science fiction work back in the era of the Greeks. I can tell you of the hints of infinite space in Michelangelo’s Sistine chapel paintings. I can tell you of Leonardo giving the illusion of a distant horizon in the Mona Lisa background. And the same Leonardo also creating the designs of a flying machine – and from this, you can of course infer: if you have a machine capable of flight then the first step to the spaceship has been taken. Even as we do push the frontiers of knowledge and the edge of the known, it is a logical consequence of this act that as the boundaries of the known enlarges, so does the unknown. Is it, in that sense, a never-ending quixotic quest aimed only to provide momentary comfort for endless restlessness at the realization of the next ‘unidentified’, the next ‘ungraspable’ concept?
Many may tell you that the story of humanity, that of life, is a full circle, I however, believe no such notion. To me, it is a line – striving to move ahead, striving for the horizon. Striving to meet the vanishing point. Always active, always striving, deriving a rather paradoxical sense of rest while going to the ends of the known and venturing into the unknown! Or perhaps another way to look at it would be to consider the story of humanity to be a double helix (not unlike our DNA) where there is a constant, albeit, misunderstood synchronicity between what humanity makes of its resources on side and the resources available to it on the other – both moving towards the idea of the next stage. The next stage of knowledge, of understanding, of innovation, and of evolution.
As I mentioned in my last post – We can either look to the stars and chart our course, or be doomed to go the way that the dinosaurs did.
Disclosure: I am one of those looking to explore space through my work in Space-Tech. Do I have the risk-taking gene? Perhaps. Do I embody the Faustian spirit? Perhaps. But one thing that is clear to me is that humanity is not to be restricted to one planet, to one tiny corner of the Universe. Regardless of our position in the cosmos being remarkable or not, our sentience itself is posited on the need and the drive to explore, and to push the frontiers of the unknown!
Arthur Findlay, The Curse of Ignorance: A History of Mankind from Primitive Times to the end of the Second World War (1947); Kenneth J Guest, Cultural Anthropology: A Toolkit for a Global Age (WW Norton, 2016)
Postan et. al, The Cambridge Economic History of Europe (Volumes I - VIII), Cambridge University Press
Fred S Kleiner, Gardner’s Art Through the Ages: A Global History (2018, Cengage Learning); H H Arnason and Elizabeth Mansfeld, History of Modern Art (2012, Pearson)
Read more: https://spinoff.nasa.gov/spinoff1996/43.html
Read more: https://platinumtherapylights.com/blogs/news/nasa-red-light-therapy
Read more: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/1999/11/991104171018.htm
Read more: https://www.esa.int/esapub/br/br175/br175.pdf
Also see: Spinoff materials published by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (e.g. Spinoff database, spinoff.nasa.gov/spinoff/database; Spinoff 2012, spinoff.nasa.gov/Spinoff2012)
Marlowe wrote the play titled ‘The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus’, borrowing from a German version of the story of Doctor Faust whilst incorporating elements from other works to create his version of the retelling.
G.M. Morriss-Kay, The evolution of human artistic creativity, Journal of Anatomy, 216, 158–176 at pp. 174 (2010) [available at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2815939/]
On the life-time and evolution of stars: http://ircamera.as.arizona.edu/NatSci102/NatSci102/lectures/starevolution.htm
Meteorites, Impacts, and Mass Extinction, Academic Resource for Tulane University (2018) [available at: https://www.tulane.edu/~sanelson/Natural_Disasters/impacts.htm]
Bill Napier and David Asher, The Tunguska Impact Event and Beyond, Astronomy and Geophysics Vol. 50(1) (Feb 2009) [available at: https://academic.oup.com/astrogeo/article/50/1/1.18/201316]; D Morrison, Tunguska Workshop: Applying Modern Tools to Understand the 1908 Tunguska Impact, NASA [available at: https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/20190002302/downloads/20190002302.pdf]; Andrei Ol’khovatov, The 1908 Tunguska Event and Forestfalls [available at: https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/2110/2110.15193.pdf]
Arthur C. Clarke, Rendezvous with Rama (1973) [In it, Clarke was perhaps the first to conceptualize the idea of a telescope network-based early warning system to detect Earth-threatening asteroids.]
Heda Segvic, No One Errs Willingly: The Meaning of Socratic Intellectualism, in David Sedley (ed.), Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy Vol. XIX (2000)
John Beversluis, Cross-examining Socrates: a defense of the interlocutors in Plato’s early dialogues, Cambridge University Press (2000)
Edward Staski and Jonathan B. Marks, Evolutionary Anthropology: An Introduction to Physical Anthropology and Archaeology (HBJC Publishers, 1992); David M Buss, Evolution of Human Intrasexual Competition: Tactics of Mate Attraction, Journal of Personality & Social Psychology 54(4) at pp. 616-28 (1988) [available at: https://doi.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037/0022-3514.54.4.616]
Martin Gusinde, The Last of the Fuegians, UNESCO Courier VII (8) (1954) [available at: https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000069988]; S.K. Lothrop, The Indians of Tierra del Fuego (Museum of the American Indian, 1928) [available at: https://library.si.edu/digital-library/book/indiansoftierrad00loth]
Marshall Sahlins, Stone Age Economics (Routledge, 1972
Staski, on footnote 18
The Human Genome Project was an international collaboration of the scientific community aimed at better understanding the base pairs of the human DNA from both a functional and physical POV. [available at: https://www.genome.gov/human-genome-project]; The project information archive (made public) for the same may be found here: https://web.ornl.gov/sci/techresources/Human_Genome/index.shtml
See: Chapter 11 of Matt Ridley, Genome: The Autobiography of a Species in 23 Chapters (1999)
Y Ono, H Manki, K Yoshimura, T Muramatsu, H Mizushima, S Higuchi, G Yagi, S Kanba, M Asai, ‘Association between dopamine D4 receptors (D4DR) exon III polymorphism and novelty seeking in Japanese subjects’, Am J Med Genet. 74(5) at pp. 501-3 (Sep 19, 1997) [accessible at: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9342200/]; D Buskila, H Cohen, L Neumann, RP Ebstein, ‘An association between fibromyalgia and the dopamine D4 receptor exon III repeat polymorphism and relationship to novelty seeking personality traits’, MoI Psychiatry 9(8) at pp. 730-1 (Aug 9, 2004) [accessible at: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15052273/]
Natalia Jaworska, Sylvia M Cox, Kevin F Casey, Isabelle Boileau, Mariya Cherkasova, Kevin Larcher, Alain Dagher, Chawki Benkelfat, and Marco Leyton, Is there a relation between novelty seeking, striatal dopamine release, and frontal cortical thickness?, PLoS One 12(3) (2017) [available at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5367687/]; Also see: Supplementary Materials on Analysis of Novelty-Seeking Subscales [available at: https://www.jneurosci.org/content/jneuro/suppl/2008/12/30/28.53.14372.DC1/27915_1_supp_73003_k8qrk9.pdf]
J Gallinat, D Kunz, U E Lang, P Neu, N Kassim, T Kienast, F Seifert, F Schubert, M Bajbouj, Association between cerebral glutamate and human behaviour: the sensation seeking personality trait, Neuroimage 34(2) at pp. 671-8 (Jan 15, 2007) [available at: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17123835/]