In defense of space colonies and mining the high frontier

When President John F. Kennedy gave his famous speech at Rice University defending the Apollo moon race in 1962, he invoked a historic figure who was famous for founding one of the first European colonies in North America. “William Bradford, speaking in 1630 of the founding of the Plymouth Bay Colony, said that all great and honorable actions are accompanied with great difficulties, and both must be enterprised and overcome with answerable courage,” Kennedy remarked.

The sentiment is evocative of a simpler time in America, when most people regarded the settling of the New World as a heroic process, leading to the founding of new nations, not the least of which was the United States. Naturally, JFK could view the exploration of space in much the same way as the exploration and settlement of the Americas was regarded in his time.  

Over 60 years later, attitudes toward America’s past and her future have changed. Many historians regard the settlement of the Americas as an unrelenting atrocity against the indigenous people who resided there before the arrival of the Europeans. The truth about whether the settling of the Americas was heroic or an atrocity is now a matter for debate, although some validity exists for both points of view.

Unfortunately, the more caustic view of America’s past has tainted some opinions about America’s future. According to The Guardian, at least one scientist, astrobiologist and planetary scientist Pamela Conrad, would like any thought of founding colonies in space and exploiting the resources of celestial bodies to be dispensed with entirely. Humans, if they venture into space at all, should do so for only the “pure” reasons of science and exploration.

Conrad, of the Carnegie Institution of Science, recently spoke on a panel on the ethics of space exploration at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) meeting in Washington, D.C. She stated, “that rather than setting out to own or take resources from space, humans should endeavor to be ‘gentle explorers.’”

She went on to assert, “Because if something that’s not here [on Earth] is seen as a resource, just ripe to be exploited, then that [perpetuates] colonialism.”

Conrad even invoked the “Star Trek” guiding principle of the “Prime Directive,” prohibiting interference with the natural development of the worlds the Starfleet explored, to support her opposition to space colonies and the exploitation of the mineral and energy resources of other worlds. That invocation would likely have come as a surprise to the late “Star Trek” creator and screenwriter Gene Roddenberry, whose imagined future included colonies in space and the mining of space-based natural resources. The “Prime Directive” referred to noninterference of alien cultures that had not yet achieved faster-then-light travel. No such cultures exist anywhere in our solar system. Colonies on the moon and Mars would not oppress anybody.

The idea of cordoning off the high frontier of space from economic development is a bad one even in the context of scientific exploration. Future explorers on the moon and Mars will need to live off the land, mining other worlds for water, oxygen and building materials. Otherwise, if future astronauts must take everything they need with them from Earth, space exploration will be prohibitively expensive.

Exploiting the natural and energy resources of the moon and asteroids can spark a space-based industrial revolution that could be a boon to all humankind. Pure science alone will be enough reason for the people who pay the bills to finance space exploration. Accessing the wealth that exists beyond the Earth is more than enough incentive for both public and private investment. Science will benefit. Someone will have to prospect for natural and energy resources in space and to develop safe and sustainable ways to exploit it.

Conflict between scientists and commercial space is already happening. Astronomers complain that SpaceX’s Starlink satellite internet constellation is ruining ground-based observation. Some critics fear that commercial exploitation of the moon’s resources will impede the operation of telescopes on the far side of the moon.

The way to resolve these conflicts is not a blanket and unenforceable prohibition of economic development in space. The Artemis Accords, which forbid interference in the activities of member states on other worlds, point the way. The matter will take ingenuity, the willingness to listen to the concerns of all parties, and the ability to compromise.

Scientists, business entrepreneurs, tourists and others will live side by side in space colonies. If the term “colony” is too fraught, try “settlement,” “community” or even “village.” Whatever one calls it, space colonization will be to the unalloyed good of all humankind.

Mark R. Whittington is the author of space exploration studies “Why is It So Hard to Go Back to the Moon?” as well as “The Moon, Mars and Beyond,” and “Why is America Going Back to the Moon?” He blogs at Curmudgeons Corner.