Interplanetary Man

I hesitate to address a society of experts. You know about rockets; I know about—well, once I dreamed of a magic carpet, and I failed organic chemistry. I am a dabbler in many subjects, expert in none.

But perhaps that is my qualification tonight: to bring light from other fields, to ask the questions that experts, focused on their specialties, might overlook.

Experts are necessary—we cannot do without them. But there is a danger: experts may be ignorant of everything outside their narrow province, yet feel entitled to pontificate on subjects they do not understand. Scientists are particularly prone to this. What we need are experts who are also informed citizens, and philosophers who can correlate the findings of different fields. We need civilized persons capable of seeing the whole.

My initial assumption tonight is that humanity will soon reach the planets—unless we first destroy ourselves. Haldane has suggested it may be a law of nature that any species achieving atomic power before unifying its planet destroys itself.

Consider the time scale. Homo sapiens appeared perhaps a quarter to half million years ago—a slow river of history representing one thousandth of the whole age of life on Earth. Power increased slowly. Civilization began only six thousand years ago; modern science, only three hundred. And we—we are the first atomic generation. The slow river has become a cataract.

Yet Earth may remain habitable for another two billion years. What might humanity become in that span?

I see three possible futures. First, annihilation—perhaps explaining the asteroids. Second, a totalitarian world—humanity frozen in global tyranny. Third, a new humanity that desires more than luxury and power, outgrowing its infantile diseases. This path leads to new glory, new tragedy, new horizons.

Suppose the planets are inhabited. What then? Wars between worlds?—invaders from Earth might be destroyed, or alien contact might finally unify quarreling humanity. We might exploit conquered worlds as we have exploited colonies. Or perhaps cooperation?—though this seems unlikely given how barbaric we still are.

But evidence suggests our system is largely uninhabited. The Moon has no air or water. Mercury is too hot on one side, too cold on the other. Venus appears to lack oxygen and water. Mars has lost most of its atmosphere; if intelligence arose there, its evolution was cut short.

Is another biochemical basis possible? Terrestrial life exploits the diversity of carbon compounds. Any alternative offers insufficient variety. There might be radioactive life forms, flame-like organisms in the sun itself—but such beings are beyond our reach.

If the planets are uninhabited, what then? If Earth remains disunited, we shall see imperial rivalry extended to space—America annexing the Moon. The old pattern repeated on a cosmic scale.

If Earth is unified, we might explore for adventure or natural resources. But I suggest we first improve Earth for humanity: climate modification, changed coastlines, irrigated deserts, even mountains moved. Antarctica made habitable. Though we must preserve wild places.

Mars might be terraformed—its atmosphere thickened, water introduced, heating systems installed. It could serve as a penal settlement, if we retain such institutions! The Moon's low gravity means any atmosphere would quickly escape.

Venus is more difficult but potentially more rewarding—change its atmosphere, seed it with vegetation for oxygen, and it might ultimately surpass Earth. The greater planets are hopeless for human habitation in our present form.

Rather than adapting planets to humanity, we might adapt humanity to planets. In practice we would combine both approaches.

For Mars, we might begin with Tibetan stock, adapted to thin air. For Venus, equatorial peoples adapted to heat. For the outer planets, biological modification would play a larger part. Small stature to cope with gravity—but beware reducing brain size.

Perhaps quadruped man, with projecting eyes and a manipulative nose? For worlds larger than Jupiter, a centipede-like form. For a dead sun—a flat, tripe-like creature.

The danger of unwise eugenics is obvious. We must insist on preserving good vision, high intelligence, and capable manipulation. We might sacrifice teeth, hair, other inessentials—but not the capacities that make us human.

But what is all this for? Scientific curiosity alone is not enough. I distinguish three motives.

First, increase of luxury—millionaire humanity, pleasure addicts. Movies, feelies, smellies, "sexies." Drugs for boredom. This path leads to spiritual degradation, atrophy of intelligence, stagnation, extinction.

Second, increase of power over environment. Industrialism has bred a power-cult, a craving to leave one's mark. The impulse is harmless, but must be harnessed. Formerly power-lust expressed itself as money-lust. Today it seeks key positions in the ant state. Huxley's Brave New World. The whole species may be corrupted—we would "make a mark on" the solar system, but for what?

Third, use the planets for making the best of man—for full expression of distinctively human nature. But here we face a deep question: is humanity simply an end in itself? Is the good simply what humans will? Or is humanity an instrument for something beyond itself?

No straight answer is possible. Compare the electron—is it a particle or a wave train? Both, depending on how you look. So with humanity: we are both ends and instruments.

To understand our purpose, we must ask: What is man?

First, a physical system of medium size—neither atom nor galaxy. Yet in this medium-sized creature lies the spiritual capacity of the physical cosmos!

Second, a biological organism—recent, the most developed, versatile, and complex. Basically a mammal, with intelligence, keen eyes, manipulating hands. Yet even so, we are mere pterodactyls of spirit—early, clumsy fliers in a realm we barely understand.

Third, psychologically: we share the mammalian ground plan—impulses, emotions, reflexes, instincts. But we have intelligence and discrimination, opening new universes both external and internal.

From our intelligence comes human sociality. Human love—John and Jane, as I call them—differs from animal bonding. We can love and hate consciously, knowing that we do so.

From particular love arises the generalized community will—the idealization of love extended to strangers, to humanity as a whole. One can explain its origins through survival value, the social conditions of primitive humanity. But the fully developed form cannot be explained analytically—it transcends its origins.

Humanity has a power of objectivity—the capacity to see beyond our own perspective. The lover sees the beloved as she truly is. The saint, the mystic, reaches for a vision of the whole. But beware their interpretations—language is inadequate to express what they have glimpsed.

This matters for Interplanetary Man: whatever forms we take on other worlds, we must preserve and develop this capacity for love and objectivity.

Mystical experience is relevant even for ordinary folk. The idea of "spirit"—not God exactly, but something like the Tao—points to what ultimately matters, whatever its metaphysical status.

What have mystics sought? Through self-denial and self-discipline, they achieve self-detachment for an ampler view. They speak of "waking up" to God's view, of union with the divine. Perhaps the sense of actual union is illusion—but true self-transcendence is real.

It comes through passionate concern for others and for the Whole. A vision intrudes, showing us our place in something greater than ourselves.

What is personality? "I" am aware of: my body-in-world; my psychical "me"; other persons; abstractions; and the Whole. My awareness is confused and erroneous—yet objectively valid, touching reality however imperfectly.

I conceive of rings of objectivity, expanding outward: first, my body in the world; second, self and others (love and hate); third, societies; fourth, abstractions; fifth—the greatest abstraction—spirit; sixth, the Whole itself.

Error is a kind of "squinting"—seeing objects wrongly together. The drunkard sees two moons; the imagination creates centaurs. Much of our thinking confuses things that should be kept distinct.

Values arise from the "espousal" of objective needs—taking them as our own. Personality involves community; we belong to a Church, a Party, a movement larger than ourselves.

What is spirit? It is a way of life, striving for: first, full awareness of objectivity—of things, persons, and the Whole. Second, appropriate feeling about these—without self-prejudice, or prejudice for one's nation, or even for humanity alone. Third, appropriate and creative action.

Spirit is what we are "for"—a datum, not dependent on theories of theism or materialism. Speculation is valuable and educative, but unreliable. We move between awake and less awake states. When I am most awake, spirit is disclosed.

Can we create a commonwealth of worlds? If other planets are inhabited, we should seek planetary community for mutual enrichment. If uninhabited, what should we do with them?

Use them for spirit—to make every human being a vessel of spirit, and our race a glorious example of personality-in-community.

This requires the greatest possible diversity—provided we have the imagination to understand and appreciate different forms of life. Uniformity is sterility.

The planets open up new possibilities. New human kinds—or quasi-human—may develop new expressions of spirit that we cannot now imagine. All united in personality-in-community, pooling their spiritual wealth.

Think of the analogy of marriage: two different beings creating something neither could achieve alone. Or the analogy of Russia and America—two different civilizations that, if they could unite, might surpass both. Europe might serve as mediator.

Our actions here in London may determine whether we achieve annihilation—or a Republic of Worlds.

What of the stars, the galaxies? Fred Hoyle estimates there are probably a million Earth-like worlds in our galaxy alone, and the number of galaxies may be many millions—or infinite.

Could we reach them? Interstellar voyages—by planets converted into ships using their own substance? Rockets at 80% the speed of light? Or perhaps paranormal communication—a wild dream, but who knows?

If we could make contact, we should seek community and the expression of spirit. A cosmical community of worlds.

I believe in the universality of the will for spirit. It is inherent in awakened consciousness. It is nonsense to suppose otherwise, apart from perversion. Wherever intelligence arises, spirit calls to it.

What is the ultimate goal? The expression of the objective cosmos in subjective experience and action. Or put differently: the fulfillment of the cosmos in cosmical awareness.

But fulfillment may be impossible. Intelligent races may remain forever isolated. Perhaps union occurs only in God's experience? Perhaps there is no purpose behind the cosmos at all? Perhaps "purpose" is beyond our comprehension—or perhaps there both is and is not purpose, as with the electron's wave-particle duality.

Cabbages are grown not to flower but to be eaten. Perhaps intelligent species serve some cosmic function we cannot imagine. And there is cosmical death—the law of entropy, the running-down of all things.

These are wild guesses. Thought is defeated by such immensities. Our very idea of time is inadequate—perhaps the ultimate flower is somehow the primal seed, the end contained in the beginning. Is there mythical truth in this? Is the spatio-temporal only one aspect, and superficial?

But whatever immensities beckon, our concern is here and now. What we do in this room, this city, this decade, determines whether humanity will have a future at all—let alone a future among the stars.

Interplanetary Man begins with us, tonight, choosing what kind of beings we wish to become.