While I’m always susceptible to any video that has been auto-tuned, this one, in particular, strikes a chord.

It seems inevitable that our species’ faculties of curiosity and a sense of manifest destiny will lead us to settle off of Earth eventually. However, the longer we wait to plant the seed of humanity elsewhere, the longer we will have all of our eggs in one basket. And that basket is an increasingly dangerous one to linger in…

The Earth is becoming a less desirable place to live by the generation. Overpopulation, environmental degradation, and resource scarcity will plague our species in the next century. While some potential technological solutions are on the horizon, we have continually seemed to overplay our hand in expecting new technologies to erase centuries of poor planning and lack of foresight.

Though it will be sacrilege to the ears of environmentalists, we may have to treat the Earth as our “practice” habitat. In the novels of Robert Heinlein, future Earth is always described as a highly undesirable place to live — a yellowed, diseased planet hosting 20 billion humans who lacked the courage to leave their planetary womb. This is set in contrast with the galactic frontier, a wonderland of new, pristine worlds to settle.

Of course, I would rather that Earth didn’t become a giant sludge ball that we are forced to abandon like Homer Simpson’s delicious hoagie left to decay behind the sofa. Optimally we would find a way to grow as a species without the massive, unending, unsustainable, growth of consumption. But that seems highly unlikely to happen without some calamity forcing our habits to change.

Perhaps it would simply be better to start over elsewhere.

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