Space Colonies ... if, when, why, how?

Question

Best description of if/when/why/how humans will colonize space.

{If} - will we? what are the critical factors (economic viability, self sufficient ecosystem, overcoming human biological responses to being in space)?
{when} - what will the timeframe be. 50 years, 100 years, 1000 years?
{how} - what will the progress be for the timeframes you describe? space station (what type)? moon? mars? terraforming?
(why) - what will the final motivation be? because we can? earth won't support the population growth? global warming? who will be the first--usa, esa, chinese, private venture?

Answer 1

I believe we will. We know that Earth won't be good place for human life in the distant future - we should never forget that those nice sunshine is not forever. And people always wanted to expand, find the new lands, extraterrestrial life, "planets of gold" or whatever. Space base (first orbital, than on the Moon - probably common project of more organizations) is necessary to explore the universe and this would be the first seed of settlement (when? Perhaps in 100 years, I think). Economic factors will be important, living in space can be very expensive at the beginning. But technologies will develop and with them also flow of money from the space to Earth (mining on asteroids, planets, new scientific findings, zero gravity technologies...).

Answer 2

Before that happens mother nature will cause some type of disaster and wipe out a bunch of people or new diseases will run rapt and kill people off or people will go nuts and the whole place will go to war or everyone will simply starve to death. If the world is so over populated that people have to be sent into space to live they will still need food and if the world can not suppport the people that are on it how would it be able to support people in space too. They sure wont be able to raise cows in space. They might get lucky and get a few plants to grow but to be able to grow enough food to feed everyone they would have to have a mighty big space colony with farm land to grow it. Also anyone that would living up there wouldnt be able to come back to earth since their bodies will have turned to jello and they wont be able to walk once they get back. I imagine that if they started having babies in space that the babies would start changing how thier insides work since there will be no gravity. There is more likelihood of the earth freezing over and wiping everyone out or everyone getting nuked allowing only a few survivors and everything starting over again. What I cant figure out is knowing that there are to many people on this planet as it is medical science is tring to find ways for people to live longer and all the artificial insemination that is done. We could learn alot from the animals, THey dont pop pills and they dont breed with any animal that is sickly. They live with the planet and not try to change it either. I bet if animals could talk they would probably be telling each other look at what idiots the humans are. In space ones body wouldnt be getting any sun which we need to survive. It doesnt matter where you put the people its how are you going to feed them. We can put people under water, in space or on stilts above the water but if there is no food to feed them it isnt going to make much sense.

Answer 3

I think that we will build space colonies. I believe that artificial gravity is the answer to some of the bone-loss problem in space.
Space colonies would have a great commercial value. Think about it, space hotels, space sports arena...these are all factors that would create a big income.
I think that terraforming is a waste of time, we should build colonies that compensate for the "hostile" environment on Luna and Mars.
Space colonies orbiting Earth would also provide a chance for a transit system to other planets, like Mars. The colony itself could be a launching station for spacecraft that are Mars-bound.

Answer 4

Human females experience rapid degredation of bone mass in zero gravity. Until we solve that, Earth is where we're gonna be.

Nasa keeps beating around the bush regarding this problem, but it is the reason why they are talking of a Mars mission, but plan to take no females along. If females made it to Mars, they would be unlikely to ever make it back to Earth.

Answer 5

I hope not... look at the mess we made of the Earth.

Answer 6

we'd have to build a giant capsule so we could breathe. chinese will first