Everyday we face the possibility of illness, fatigue, injury, and even death. When we drive a car, fly on a plane, or even walk, we assume the risk that nothing will happen to us. We hope that a car doesn’t hit us, a tree doesn’t fall on us, our pilot doesn’t nosedive into the ground. Yet with all these possibilities, we all still live our lives by risking it. Why? Because that is how we live.
We may be extremely lucky to make it to the next day, but we are even more lucky that we are here in the first place. Of all the planets and exoplanets we know, only Earth is known to sustain life. Even more lucky, the conditions are just right for space travel. Our current rockets can only deliver about 10% of their liftoff weight into orbit and even less to deep space. This is because our chemical rockets are just barely powerful enough to do so. The gravity on our planet is just weak enough to allow us to send small payloads to orbit and just strong enough to prevent us from launching like and X-Fighter.
This implies that we live on a borderline planet. Borderline from being stuck on the ground and borderline from being in a galaxy far far away. But hasn’t mankind always crossed borders? The ancients crossed the Siberian-Alaskan ice bridge thousands of years ago when they had the opportunity. The Mayflower left Europe to start the America we know today. Now it is our turn to cross borders. We are extremely lucky that our Earth gives us a chance at space travel. If we risk our lives living the way we do anyways, the idea of space travel isn’t that far fetched. Given that we have risked their lives for thousands of years, it would be extremely shameful if we didn’t migrate into space. Maybe it’s destiny.
oh no rocket science! 