Astronomer royal calls for 'Plan B' to prevent runaway climate change

[muriel_volestrangler]

39. It's far easier to support the extra billions on Earth

Earth has a decent amount of both sunlight and water - a combination no other planet or moon has, and the basic energy source and working fluid that life needs. The effort needed to use them here is many magnitudes smaller than doing it anywhere else.

I think the problem is that one word is given to the science-fiction process - "terraforming" - and some people think that is one task, like sending a spacecraft out of the solar system is one task. 'Terraforming' is doing what it took natural processes billions of years to do, over an entire planet, in such a short time scale that you think it's a solution to overpopulation. You think we can ship billions of people to dead, cold, airless worlds and have them live happy lives within what - decades?

It is literally science fiction. It is not in any way a feasible solution to our current problems. Pretending that it is diverts attention from real solutions.