Over the past hundred years of its history, humanity has made a huge innovation leap. We learned to fly (at least with the help of planes and helicopters), build gigantic machines, heal once incurable diseases, developed computers, the Internet and smart gadgets. At the same time, we continue to systematically destroy ourselves: constant wars (two of which were world wars) and man-made climatic changes - something like this can be described as a list of "interests" of current generations. Stephen Hawking, the famous theoretical physicist and popularizer of science, believes that in this situation, we have about 100 years left before the "doomsday" and we urgently need to figure out a way to leave this planet before the worst happens.
This is not the first time Hawking has made such pessimistic predictions. Over the past years, he scares us with how superintelligent artificial intelligence (AI) will put an end to humanity, and the first contact with an intelligent extraterrestrial civilization may be the last. Last November, he announced that we have 1000 years left to leave Earth. This forecast is now even darker. Now the scientist gives us only 100 years. It's really amazing what could have happened in 6 months for a person to change their point of view. Most likely, for Hawking himself, they turned out to be very disappointing, since the scientist decided to reduce the hypothetical remaining life of the Earth by as much as 900 years.
More information on how Hawking makes such predictions will be presented in a new BBC documentary, due out June 15, called Expedition New Earth. In this film, the scientist discusses the fact that humanity needs to become an interplanetary species within the next century, if, of course, it wants to survive.
Our days are numbered
According to Hawking, our days on Earth are numbered and there are many reasons for this: severe climate change, the threat of asteroids, epidemics, overpopulation and hunger, to name a few. The only way to survive? We must start colonizing other planets. The sooner the better. Indeed, a lot can happen in 100 years. In addition, we have already proven that many amazing scientific and high-tech discoveries can be made in this amount of time. But can we become an interplanetary species in such a relatively short period of time?
The founder of Tesla and SpaceX, Elon Musk, believes that this is possible. He even has a plan. Destination? Mars. At the current level of development of our technologies, it cannot be said that the Red Planet is so close to us. Nevertheless, Musk promises to land humans on Mars by 2025 and establish a colony there by 2033. It fits well with Hawking's promised time. To be honest, Musk really wants to believe, but his plan looks too ambitious. At least for now. Perhaps we will be able to get to Mars and build a stable colony there in a few decades. But by 2033? No matter how much I wanted to believe, but no.
Fortunately, Musk isn't the only one working in this direction. The NASA aerospace agency is actively researching and developing a program of manned flights to Mars. China is also interested in the red planet. Who knows, maybe together we can speed up our path to a new home.
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NIKOLAY KHIZHNYAK