Asternauts is a project that started to promote the cause of making humanity a multiplanetary species. 60% of the profits from your purchase will be used to create content that helps us promote this cause.
But perhaps you’re asking yourself…
Why the human race must become a multiplanetary species?
In 2021, a new era of space exploration dawned with the first privately organized flights ferrying civilian passengers across the line that separates our planet from the rest of the universe.
Much of the media coverage of the three flights launched by Virgin Galactic, Blue Origin and SpaceX has either been of the “isn’t this cool” variety or has characterized these endeavours as symbols of inequality. As such, the question of what the value of human spaceflight is has gone largely unanswered.
Supporters of space exploration sometimes suggest that sending robotic probes to the remote corners of the solar system and beyond can teach us what we need to know about the universe at less cost and risk than sending people. Yet, for the safety of our descendants and to reach humanity’s full potential, we must become a multiplanetary species.
Humans have a one in six chance of going extinct this century according to Oxford Philosopher Toby Ord. In his book, The Precipice: Existential Risk and the Future of Humanity, Dr Ord lays out a variety of long-tail risks that are both existential and very difficult to mitigate.
These include nature-based risks like asteroids, large-scale volcanic eruptions and stellar explosions. Although we can track many of these phenomena, we do not have the technology (nor are we likely to develop it anytime soon) to prevent large eruptions or redirect large asteroids.
Initial efforts to nudge space objects are just beginning. This is to say nothing of the human-created risks of nuclear war or bioweapons intentionally or unintentionally released on the public, a scenario made easier to imagine by the current pandemic.
As long as humanity is grouped together on a single planet there will always be a possibility that all of us can be killed at once. It is equivalent to having everyone in a single building: there is always a risk greater than zero of a collapse or fire that kills everyone.
By establishing, at first, small outposts and eventually larger scale settlements on other planets, the risk of our species being destroyed is significantly curtailed.
So… becoming a multiplanetary species is our destiny. The stars are the “final frontier”.