While reading the Times of India, November 7, 2017 online edition, I got deeply concerned about the fate of our dear planet Earth and the fate of this intelligent carbon-based life-form called Human. According to Dr. Stephen Hawking, just within mere 600 hundred years from now this planet will turn into a sizzling fireball. This extraordinarily brilliant man, commonly called Einstein of 21st century, predicts that we have come to a point of no return and the only way human civilization can survive, is to migrate to another planet of a nearby star. Out of desperation this legendary man is backing a venture named Breakthrough Starshot who are working toward technology that will enable near-light-speed travel so that in reasonable time we can reach closest star to our solar system ie Alpha Centauri in search of human habitable planet orbiting our neighbour star. In the last century, scientific community has miserably failed to achieve any significant progress in rocket propulsion technology after it invented cryogenic engines. Cryogenic engine is made of liquified oxygen stored in ultra-low temperature when burnt can give a big propulsion. Though we reached Moon and Mars using this technology, our space travel speed is miserably low compared to the mind boggling distance that one need to travel in order to survive complete human extinction from this planet. Just to give an example to the readers, the distance of Mars from planet Earth is 54.6 million kilometers. And we already know with near-certainty that no planet within our solar system is naturally habitable with the kind of biology humans have. Our ardent hope is a planet named Proxima B orbiting Alpha Centauri which shows signs of human habitable environment. Distance of this planet from Earth is 4.22 light-year which converted to kilometer turns out to be 40 trillion km. For novice readers allow me to tell A trillion is 12 0’s after 1. If you are rolling your eyes in desperation, that is exactly the condition of today’s scientific community. We are dangerously running against time to find a suitable technology that will make us travel this distance before we permanently leave our last mark in planet Earth. Out of curiosity, I researched on Breakthrough Starshot initiative that Stephen Hawking supports. They are working on a light-powered space travel technology. This involves a ground-based light beamer pushing ultra-light nanocrafts – miniature space probes attached to lightsails – to speeds of up to 100 million miles an hour. Their plan is to launch a mothership carrying thousand tiny spacecraft (on the scale of centimeters) to a high altitude earth orbit and then deploying them. A phased array of ground-based lasers would then focus a light beam on the crafts' sails to accelerate them one by one to the target speed within 10 minutes, with an average acceleration on the order of 100 km/s2, and an illumination energy on the order of 1 TJ delivered to each sail. The spacecrafts will try to be as close as 1 Astronomical Unit (AU), which is 150 million km from Proxima B. From this distance, a craft's cameras could potentially capture an image of high enough quality to resolve surface features to study whether the planet is naturally human habitable or not. This fleet will have 1000 tiny spacecrafts weighing few grams each and will be propelled by a square kilometer ground based lasers with a combination output of 100GW. A swarm of about 1000 unit will compensate for the losses caused by interstellar dust collision en route to the target. This ultra light robotic nano-crafts are planned to travel at 20% to 30% speed of light and reach Alpha Centauri solar system in about 20 to 30 years and will take 4.5 years to communicate back to Earth its findings. Here I am assuming my readers know that physics of this universe prohibits particles with even a tiny amount of mass to travel at the speed of light since the faster a body with some mass travels, the more it “experiences” resistance from the space-time continuum and more the “perceived mass” of the body increases such that by the time it reaches the speed of light, its mass becomes infinity. Hence one needs infinite energy to accelerate a particle to reach speed of light. Physics of this universe is painstakingly rude to us. Isn’t it? Similarly since nothing can travel faster than light (except few recently discovered no-mass particles not yet definitively proved), all our communication back with Earth cannot happen faster than light. This is why I said previously that it will take 4.5 years approximately to communicate back from Alpha Centauri about the findings of the nano crafts since this star is some 4.5 light-year away from us.. Even if we overcome all technological challenges and make our nano crafts travel near Proxima B and take pictures, rest assured we are not even close to human transportation. First, because this technology only could transport nano crafts weighing few grams. Even if we find out a way to transport tons of mass that is necessary to support human life inside it, under the gigantic “perceived mass” human cells will simply break down. Sadly, we are nowhere close to transport living human to other solar systems. Will human colonize Mars with artificial life-sustaining weather in a closed area? May be. But even if that is the case, my near-certain guess is, only few astronauts will be sent as a seed to start habitation on Mars. Most of us will be left behind to die with other non-human living species.
Now the reason I started this article is not to educate you on interstellar travel and its related complications. This article is for an entire different reason. I tried to paint a sorry picture of our condition as human race at face of this tremendous danger that is lurking in our near future. Fossils of early human dates back to 2 million years. Civilized humans as we see today started from around 3000 BC. I am sure none of you can savour the fact that our 5000 years of art, history, poetry, human invention will go to its grave in just about 600 years from now. In last hundred year alone, 50 percent of species that used to thrive in this planet has gone extinct. Our tremendous greed in last hundred years has brought about unprecedented climate change. Growing population of massively resource-hungry humans is turning to be the their own greatest predator. Humans need to be saved from themselves not because few religious terrorists kill from time to time, not because few psychopaths shoot in public gatherings but because our own need of energy is going to deplete this planet from all forms of energy. Even if we find some indigenous ways to extract and use new forms of energy, the climate change alone will kill not only human race but every other form of living species in near future. I know, your first reaction is “That can’t be possible. I have complete faith on scientists and technologists to find a solution so that we survive beyond that.” Unfortunately the scientific community does not share your view on this and not at all confident as much as you are. Today Delhi, the capital of India recorded PM 2.5 carbon particle density as 703 where the maximum healthy limit that human can breath is 300. This means it has already crossed 200% of allowable limits and humanity is in frantic search of practical measures that can bring those down. We are already practically breathing poison. Imagine what will happen 600 years from now, that is just 15 generations maximum! Will bio-technological advances in this coming 600 years will make us immune to these poisonous air and shearing heat waves? Some sort of protective cover over our skin and some sort of air filter installed in our lungs? May be. May be not. Even if we invent such technology, humans will never be the same with those artificial organs inside him. I am sure, just like me, you want your future offsprings to thrive in this beautiful green planet, flourish its art, poetry, literature, science, technology, spirituality.
Is it too late? May be. Can we start doing something? Fortunately yes. What can we do? Simple. We need to contain our greed. We need to start living in harmony with the nature, with mother Earth. It does not matter you are a theist or an atheist, you believe in God or not. But you must believe that we need to slow down in our usage of resources. We need to live a life of an ascetic, if you allow me to use that term. Can we use bicycle for shorter distance? Can we use public transport instead of our car for longer distance? You will reply, well I can do but no one else will do it and I don’t want to be fooled and sacrificing my comfort while others do not. It needs only a seed to make a big banyan tree. It needs only one man named Copernicus to propose a heliocentric model of solar system when infallible religious scriptures and powerful church were of the opinion that Sun revolves around Earth. Moreover, again I am near-certain, hundred year from now, your future generation will be compelled to take such measures since it will be prohibitively taxed in every country to drive a private vehicle or it will be outlawed except in case of an emergency. Say no to paper and plastic. Is it so difficult to carry a bag to bring back your groceries? Do we really need to go empty handed and come back with many plastic or paper bag full of loads? Replace your old light bulbs with energy saving fluorescents. Use your washer/dryer only when there is a full load. Believe me you will save 100 gallon of water a month. Can you imagine how much saving it will be if every resident of this planet does it? Try shortening your shower by 1 minute. You will save 150 gallons of water/month. Set your fridge to 36-38 F and fridger to 0-5 F. Eat no meat at least one day in a week. It is estimated that 1 pound of beef is equal to 460 gallons of water. Now factor in the methane and other greenhouse gas emission of the cattle! One day of vegetarian diet is good for your health and the Earth. Buy used furniture and repurpose it. You will save trees this way. Plant trees as much as you can. There are many more thing you can do. A little googling around will educate you or follow one of the resource links below. I will not extend the list since you are probably already thinking this is a little too much to do. But believe me, by just following some basic guidelines to live a harmonious life with mother nature, our lives will not be terribly different that what it is now. Plus we can extend the life of human race in earth by another couple of hundred year and hope that it will give a breathing time to scientific community to find a practical solution to sustain life on earth as it is. Greatest gift, human as a species possess is, it can think and appreciate reason. It can delay its gratification for greater return. If not for Earth, at least for our offsprings, can we start doing few small changes to our lifestyles today? What say, my dear readers?
Last but not the least
“Living within the means of one planet is technologically possible, financially beneficial, and our only chance for a prosperous future”
We used all resources that we will be able to replenish throughout the year by August 2, this year. August 2 is the overshoot day for year 2017.
Resource:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryogenic_rocket_engine
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/science/earth-will-turn-into-sizzling-fireball-in-less-than-600-years-stephen-hawking/articleshow/61547856.cms
http://indianapublicmedia.org/amomentofscience/20-easy-ways/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakthrough_Starshot
https://breakthroughinitiatives.org/Initiative/3
Now the reason I started this article is not to educate you on interstellar travel and its related complications. This article is for an entire different reason. I tried to paint a sorry picture of our condition as human race at face of this tremendous danger that is lurking in our near future. Fossils of early human dates back to 2 million years. Civilized humans as we see today started from around 3000 BC. I am sure none of you can savour the fact that our 5000 years of art, history, poetry, human invention will go to its grave in just about 600 years from now. In last hundred year alone, 50 percent of species that used to thrive in this planet has gone extinct. Our tremendous greed in last hundred years has brought about unprecedented climate change. Growing population of massively resource-hungry humans is turning to be the their own greatest predator. Humans need to be saved from themselves not because few religious terrorists kill from time to time, not because few psychopaths shoot in public gatherings but because our own need of energy is going to deplete this planet from all forms of energy. Even if we find some indigenous ways to extract and use new forms of energy, the climate change alone will kill not only human race but every other form of living species in near future. I know, your first reaction is “That can’t be possible. I have complete faith on scientists and technologists to find a solution so that we survive beyond that.” Unfortunately the scientific community does not share your view on this and not at all confident as much as you are. Today Delhi, the capital of India recorded PM 2.5 carbon particle density as 703 where the maximum healthy limit that human can breath is 300. This means it has already crossed 200% of allowable limits and humanity is in frantic search of practical measures that can bring those down. We are already practically breathing poison. Imagine what will happen 600 years from now, that is just 15 generations maximum! Will bio-technological advances in this coming 600 years will make us immune to these poisonous air and shearing heat waves? Some sort of protective cover over our skin and some sort of air filter installed in our lungs? May be. May be not. Even if we invent such technology, humans will never be the same with those artificial organs inside him. I am sure, just like me, you want your future offsprings to thrive in this beautiful green planet, flourish its art, poetry, literature, science, technology, spirituality.
Is it too late? May be. Can we start doing something? Fortunately yes. What can we do? Simple. We need to contain our greed. We need to start living in harmony with the nature, with mother Earth. It does not matter you are a theist or an atheist, you believe in God or not. But you must believe that we need to slow down in our usage of resources. We need to live a life of an ascetic, if you allow me to use that term. Can we use bicycle for shorter distance? Can we use public transport instead of our car for longer distance? You will reply, well I can do but no one else will do it and I don’t want to be fooled and sacrificing my comfort while others do not. It needs only a seed to make a big banyan tree. It needs only one man named Copernicus to propose a heliocentric model of solar system when infallible religious scriptures and powerful church were of the opinion that Sun revolves around Earth. Moreover, again I am near-certain, hundred year from now, your future generation will be compelled to take such measures since it will be prohibitively taxed in every country to drive a private vehicle or it will be outlawed except in case of an emergency. Say no to paper and plastic. Is it so difficult to carry a bag to bring back your groceries? Do we really need to go empty handed and come back with many plastic or paper bag full of loads? Replace your old light bulbs with energy saving fluorescents. Use your washer/dryer only when there is a full load. Believe me you will save 100 gallon of water a month. Can you imagine how much saving it will be if every resident of this planet does it? Try shortening your shower by 1 minute. You will save 150 gallons of water/month. Set your fridge to 36-38 F and fridger to 0-5 F. Eat no meat at least one day in a week. It is estimated that 1 pound of beef is equal to 460 gallons of water. Now factor in the methane and other greenhouse gas emission of the cattle! One day of vegetarian diet is good for your health and the Earth. Buy used furniture and repurpose it. You will save trees this way. Plant trees as much as you can. There are many more thing you can do. A little googling around will educate you or follow one of the resource links below. I will not extend the list since you are probably already thinking this is a little too much to do. But believe me, by just following some basic guidelines to live a harmonious life with mother nature, our lives will not be terribly different that what it is now. Plus we can extend the life of human race in earth by another couple of hundred year and hope that it will give a breathing time to scientific community to find a practical solution to sustain life on earth as it is. Greatest gift, human as a species possess is, it can think and appreciate reason. It can delay its gratification for greater return. If not for Earth, at least for our offsprings, can we start doing few small changes to our lifestyles today? What say, my dear readers?
Last but not the least
“Living within the means of one planet is technologically possible, financially beneficial, and our only chance for a prosperous future”
We used all resources that we will be able to replenish throughout the year by August 2, this year. August 2 is the overshoot day for year 2017.
Resource:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryogenic_rocket_engine
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/science/earth-will-turn-into-sizzling-fireball-in-less-than-600-years-stephen-hawking/articleshow/61547856.cms
http://indianapublicmedia.org/amomentofscience/20-easy-ways/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakthrough_Starshot
https://breakthroughinitiatives.org/Initiative/3
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