Rules For Space Exploration Rules, all civilized societies need them. We had better get ours in order, because we are getting nearer to a time when nations and companies will be staking their claims to asteroids and maybe meteors. Why would they do this you ask? This question is easy to answer. The answer is some of them contain incredible riches in minerals and we have to be ready so we are not going to get into a situation where it leads to two or more countries or companies claiming the same object. Take the object 16 Psyche for example, which is said to be worth 10,000 Quadrillion dollars because of gold, nickel and iron ore. This object, an asteroid, is just one of many asteroids. There are estimated to be 822,000 known asteroids so who knows how many valuable ones there will be? I believe in the beginning there will be a rush by countries and companies to dig this stuff and get it back to earth, but I also think as the ore becomes less valuable because so much of it may be found, digging for gold and silver may stop and those minerals could become just more ores to use in structures or such and may eventually not even have any value as they become common place unless the market is somehow controlled like the diamond market is. Our entire idea of what is valuable and what is not may change in the future. If we find something very rare, say on an asteroid or another planet, that item may become the new gold. If we find some mineral which could allow us to make incredible breakthroughs in technology that too may become very valuable for that reason. While it would be used in the same way as a gold substitute, it could become incredibly expensive to purchase. We are also going to need rules for planets and moons. We don’t want people, companies, or countries claiming them for themselves, or even claiming an entire planet. We also want to protect any indigenous beings from having their civilizations destroyed. We don’t want to happen to them what happened to the native Americans. If an indigenous race is on a planet or moon the rules should say it belongs to them and no interference with their culture should take place except for peaceful trade. I believe this is very important for our relations with aliens. There may be a time when we try and make contact and are rebuffed. If that culture is sufficiently advanced, they might even fire upon us. We don’t want to get into a war with beings who just want to be left alone. It could mean we might lose some people. We have to have rules for this and how we would react. Going to other planets and moons and meeting extraterrestrials could be very dangerous to us and them even if it is peaceful. Either race could get infected by the other with a new type of germ unfamiliar to them. This would make contact very risky. We have to have rules on how we would make contact so both sides are protected and what we would do if it happened. Would we help the aliens, would we go into quarantine, or maybe they would have a cure for us if we were infected. We need rules for what type of ships can land on another planet or moon. There has been a lot of talk in the last few years about nuclear powered ships. The last thing we would ever want to do is irradiate a place. If the ship crashed it could be a disaster not only for the crew, but for beings living on the planet. It might even lead to hostilities. We should plan on only using shuttle type craft which have conventional engines to avoid this possibility. The main ship which was nuclear powered could remain out in space, but not in orbit. The rules should also state we have to develop some sort of artificial intelligence which could interpret a language it never heard before. This might be a Herculean task and take a long time to perfect, but it would be worth it. Another device which we could also try and develop is some sort of thought transfer device. We have already developed devices that allow people to control computers with their minds so this may not be as impossible as it seems. Until this happens, we will be trying to muddle through. We also need rules on what to do if somehow, we insult an alien without realizing it because of the differences in our cultures. Even on earth there are some words from some countries which are acceptable but have completely different meanings in another country. Just think how much worse it might be trying to talk to an alien. How could we make an alien understand what happened was a mistake? We are on the verge of spreading out into space. Rockets are getting cheaper to build and launch, although you wouldn’t know this if you looked at NASA’s Space Launch System and the Artemis rocket. With printed spacecraft coming online and multiple use spacecraft, we are getting closer to human exploration of space, but there are still a few very important things we need. One is a way to travel so fast space exploration becomes practical. Another is a way to shield us from the deadly radiation in space and all those micro meteors. As far as speed is concerned the answer may lay in Spooky at a distance. That is the method which allows for an instant change from one atom to another no matter what distance they are away from each other. This would give us instant transportation. The shielding is a different problem but might not even be needed if we can perfect the first thing, because we would not actually be flying through space. Yes, I know, this sounds incredible. For now, shielding would be necessary and some sort of plasma shield may be necessary. This is being worked on as I speak and has been for a few years now. Lastly, there might already be rules in place we don’t know about yet. If there are advanced alien races out there who travel through space, they may have an organization which already has the rules the alien races have agreed on, and what we would have to do was become a member of their organization and abide by their rules. I have to think this is probably the case.
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