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yes - but it doesn't capture our imaginations in the same way. (the idea of) colonising the stars is glamorous and exciting.

edit: additionally some people with a lot of influence are (incorrectly) convinced it's too late to save the Earth, and that our best hope is to "start over" somewhere else

Different groups of people do different things, there's absolutely people working on making desert hospitable for plants and crops. It just sounds less impressive than making a rocket and going to a different planet. So it's shown less in the news, you have to remember, the world is run by money, and most companies will absolutely choose making more profits over being more ethical or whatever. And news anchors are one such company. More impressive news = more clicks/reads = more money.

We are not. As humanity we can do several things at the same time.

Putting resources into pushing space technology has a strong potential to help you control your own climate, even.

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I hear you. I think the creative minds promoting space exploration can be so singleminded they forget how massive and undiscovered our own planet is, not to mention how much damage we’ve already done to it. I guess it’s man’s nature to ponder life on other planets, but goddamn I wish we could at least focus on containing all the friggin plastics we’ve unleashed on this place. if humans didn’t “imagine” we would not have progress I suppose…

Hmmmmm....... My assumption, peasants and commoners need something to be occupied by, such exploration being one of the reasons out of, race, politics, sports, traditions, economic status, etc.... Just my assumption, or it might be for new studios for MCU to film on.

Why not both? This is what currently happens. And science on a distant location drops some knowledge, that can help us on earth.

The important part in our live is, to gather information and share it. So we can generate insights and come up with solutions. So it's important to research an many tasks, not only on a single branch.

Can’t we work on both things at once?

because 'the economy' is based on endless expansion forever. Fixing the ecosystem is just kicking the can down the road a few years.

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But terraforming planets allows for this always hungry monster to be fed either indefinitely or far enough that it may as well be forever.

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Well for one thing there are a thousand times more resources spread throughout the solar system then there are on our planet. Entire oceans of hydrocarbons. Asteroids that are 30% platinum. Would seem kind of silly if we ended up killing one another for access to resources when they are vastly more available beyond the gravity well of the earth.

Learning to exploit those resources leads into the idea of moving our heavy industry off planet. Would sure be nice to turn earth into one big nature preserve without losing our capacity to produce the goods we want.

Thirdly you don't just start building a generational ship to get to explore the nearby habitable exoplanets when we find them. We need to have an entire industry devoted to mining, refining, and construction in space if we want to be able to build such a thing.

I think you are putting two inequitable objectives together.

The primary goal of interplanetary colonization isn't to save the world. There might be some selling points to "save the species," but we aren't really at that point. I view it more as a challenge to see if we can, not that it's a necessity.

It's "cool" to be able say the human race was able to colonize multiple planets, and to be apart of the team that accomplished the feat.

Why would they want to colonize the ocean floor, when there is still plenty of land to develop?

The idea of being an adventurer is so romanticized that it’s way more appealing to discover something new than fix the old. The idea of a new world is appealing to some, they don’t give a shit about the current any more. Everything here is claimed.

We only have one house with only so much food in the cupboard, we’re also currently doing a very good job of trying to burn the house down and eat all the food.

Getting more houses would help prevent this, and in doing so pave the way for more scientific & technological developments.

Also trying to terraform your back garden would be very bad if it goes wrong, you won’t really get a do-over.