Is the colonization of space a worthwhile pursuit?
Extremely worthwile. Besides giving us somewhere else to be should something catastrophic happen to the Earth (War, Asteroid, Solar Flare, etc., the very proccess of learing what we would need to learn to colonize space could provide us with the technology and ability to reduce the dangers of any f those things happening to the Earth. Technological spin-offs from the tiny amount of space exploration we’ve done so far have already changed the world and saved countless lives. Imagine what we could do if we had more ambition. Suppose we put a set of solar panels in orbit, and collected the energy of the sun, beamed it to a receiving station on Earth using microwaves, and convereted the waves back to electricity. POW! Cheap energy with no global warming emissions. Amount of energy only limited by the size and efficiency of the collectors. Once online, only costs are to maintain and upgrade the efficiency of the collectors. Replace power plants with that, plus cars that run on electricity,
