Humans Will Never Live on Another Planet, Nobel Laureate Says. Here's Why.

[JonLP24]

Here's the reality: We're messing up the Earth and any far-out ideas of colonizing another orb when we're done with our own are wishful thinking. That's according to Michel Mayor, an astrophysicist who was a co-recipient of the Nobel Prize in physics this year for discovering the first planet orbiting a sun-like star outside of our solar system.

"If we are talking about exoplanets, things should be clear: We will not migrate there," he told Agence France-Presse (AFP). He said he felt the need to "kill all the statements that say, 'OK, we will go to a livable planet if one day life is not possible on Earth.'"

All of the known exoplanets, or planets outside of our solar system, are too far away to feasibly travel to, he said. "Even in the very optimistic case of a livable planet that is not too far, say a few dozen light years, which is not a lot, it's in the neighbourhood, the time to go there is considerable," he added.

Mayor shared half of the Nobel Prize this year along with Didier Queloz for discovering the first exoplanet in October 1995. Using novel instruments at the Haute-Provence Observatory in southern France, they detected a gas giant similar to Jupiter, which they named 51 Pegasi b. (The other half of the prize was awarded to James Peebles of Princeton University for his work in dark matter and dark energy).

https://www.livescience.com/amp/will-we-ever-live-exoplanet.html

[exboyfil]

1. Terraforming planets is very difficult

O'Neill cylinders for space faring civilizations make much more sense.

A really good chance that the engineering requirements for interstellar travel may mean that humans will never travel to the stars. Our AI descendants on the other hand may.

Having a sufficient human presence in O'Neil cylinders to continue the human race is a really good idea for our species though. Won't see it in my lifetime though.

[gordianot]

2. Our AI descendants may be our greatest hope.

Who knows they may well be partially organic and or inherit our flaws. They may eventually forget their origins.

[Zaphod42]

3. Neat idea...

But, for a species that seems unable to adequately feed itself, or provide decent healthcare for most of it's members, or, hell, unable even to secure credible elections...colonizing another world seems to be kinda "down there" on the to-do-list....

The next "giant leap for mankind" will come from many small steps from Man; here, on Earth....

[qazplm135]

4. Of course we could

Science 1000 years from now will seem like magic to us.

[oswaldactedalone]

6. It currently seems that way to me now

but I’m old and remember phones hanging on the wall, 3 TV channels, having to get up to change the channel, and cars that didn’t have computers in them... or even seatbelts.

[Marcuse]

5. Dead end.

Now it's been ten thousand years
Man has cried a billion tears
For what, he never knew, now man's reign is through
But through eternal night, the twinkling of starlight
So very far away, maybe it's only yesterday

[Javaman]

9. ...

[SuprstitionAintthWay]

13. Lol. 2525 probably isn't a bad guess for when we're gonna be at a pretty low ebb

as a civilization, and maybe as a species.

I expect a global population and civilization collapse in the next few hundred years, driven by global warming, a plunge in food production, all the migration that will be compelled by famine, disease, and war. (Cheery, eh? But how are we gonna avoid it? (Most likely answer: Geoengineering a more refllective atmosphere. But that will create its own host of problems.))

But my guess is that whatever lower population homo sapiens collapse to, some will eke out an existence somehow and still be around 1 or 2 thousand years from now. Maybe living a lot closer to the poles, and maybe at lower standards of living. But some level of human population will inhabit Earth for a good while yet to come.

[LunaSea]

7. Good thread to cite Clarkes 1st Law:

"When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarke's_three_laws

[lastlib]

8. And another eloquent dictum from ACC:

"Any technology sufficiently advanced is indistinguishable from magic."

[SCantiGOP]

10. Exactly

Go back in time a few thousand years in a helicopter with a camcorder, a pocketful of cheap disposable lighters, and a taser.
You would be immediately and unanimously be accepted as God.

[hunter]

12. If FTL or Time travel were possible this universe would be overrun with vermin like us.

The quarantine laws of this universe are unbreakable.

Anyone who doesn't like it can make their own damned universe.

[SuprstitionAintthWay]

14. I don't believe humans will permanently live on even just Mars.

We may have stations there where people spend a couple of years at a time, but humans aren't going to be born and live out lives there. Even if nothing else about Mars would be prohibitive of that, the 0.38 G gravity alone will cause so many problems for a species that evolved in 1.00 G that living entire lives there will not be feasible.

Of course I'm talking about present human beings. If someday we get really good at editing our genetics and can design viable humans with dramatically modified traits... we'll see. That would change things.

Even at that, though, I'm with hunter in the opinion that we're not going to be traveling to extrasolar planets. We will never travel at lightspeed, the laws of physics aren't going to allow it.

And the other options for living elsewhere in our own solar system... well, there aren't any good ones.

[cstanleytech]

11. I would not claim its impossible but rather that its unlikely unless there is a major

breakthrough that leads to the ability to travel to other star systems far faster than +40,000 years.

[CloudWatcher]

15. Never is a very very long time

The headline is misleading. He's saying we should take care of this planet, that the idea of migrating all of humanity off of Earth to one we've not trashed is pretty dumb.

Which is, of course, very true.

But the idea that we might never send off a few folks to colonize another planet? That's pretty crazy too. At least until you start including the odds of our civilization dying before we get around to it.