From: mrw9e@kelvin.seas.Virginia.EDU (Michael Robert Williams)
Subject: Re: Justification for the Space Program
Organization: University of Virginia
Distribution: usa, world
Date: Fri, 18 Dec 1992 18:22:22 GMT


I love being asked this question, especially by people who are
against the space program for reasons like "we have people starving
in the streets..."

I read an article in the British Interplanetary Society Journal about
a guy named Forrester (or was it Fisher?) at MIT who had done some
predictive world modelli, tracking several variables like population,
pollution, natural resource usage, standard of living, etc. Some of
his assumptions may have been...incorrect, buI didn't see anything
that looked grossly unreasonable. He projected the world 500 years 
into the future toee what trends we could expect (yeah yeah, I know
don't trust computer numbers at first glance, especially extrapolations
that far in the future, but even with that caveat, the numbers are
scary).

Assuming we do nothing to change our ways, and do not expand into space,
in about 100 years society will start to decline, as pollution, over-
population and dwindling natural resources take their toll. In 300
years we will have entered a new Dark Age from which it is extermely 
unlikely that we will escape. Our resources will be so scant that they
will not be able to support our technology base, and the environment
will be so poisoned that we'll have a hard time feeding ourselves.
Forrester's model projected a world population of just under a billion
(stable) and a standard of living worse than during the middle ages.

Assuming we recycle everything we can, drastically cut our birth rate,
conserve natural resources and enact stiff environmental protection
laws, all we can do is forstall the inevitable. I think, though, that
we can last another 1500 years or so before The Crash.

However, if you assume that we behave like our normal selfish selves,
BUT expand into space to a) dump our garbage, b) prospect for resources
c) find someplace to live, and d) house our dirty industries, then in
500 years time, according to the models, we can be living in a golden age
of plenty and wealth, able to support a population roughl5 times
what it is now with a standard of living much higher than it is now.

Now for the bad news. If we delay space utilizatn for 50 years, at 
that point we will have passed the point of no return; at that point
we will not be able to afford (in terms oscarce resources, manpower,
industry, etc) to save ourselves, and the Big Crash gets us anyway.

Now, was Forrester a visionary or Malthusian-doomsayer? I d't know,
nor do I care. Much like Descarte's argument for why you should worship
God, even if you don't believe in him, I think we should pay attention
to Forrest, because I would hate to find out the hard way that he
was right.

I'm going to be out of town for the next month; e-mail flames, comments,
etc. and I'll get back to you when I can.

In Real Life:Mike Williams     | Perpetual Grad Student
e-mail      :mrw9e@virginia.edu|   - It's not just a job, it's an indenture
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"If you ever have a world of your own, plan ahead- don't eat it." ST:TNG
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