> "we should not go to mars until we've cured poverty/loneliness/inequality/evil on earth." You'll usually find such comments on any space related thread.
For what it’s worth, I used to find the arguments that we should put the brightest minds on space exploration over eliminating suffering as concrete, but nowadays.. can’t say they those arguments seem as watertight.. saying that as someone whose hands have touched some of these projects. Curious if others feel the same way or have points to make in the opposite direction
I think broad goals like "eliminating suffering" or "fighting poverty" tend to be in a hard to tackle middle ground.
We're better off approaching them either more broadly or more narrowly. IE, we can dedicate resources to tighter goals, like reducing childhood mortality... a horrendous thing that most people suffered for most of humanity. We really made a lot of progress on this.
Alternatively, we can think of it more broadly... advancing as a species, culture and society. In that sense, space travel is a good idea.
Tackling the elimination of suffering head on is likely to resolve to "be a politician/priest/lawyer" or somesuch.
In any case, I think the mistake is thinking of everything as competitive, at a broad level. Rather, people tend to see ambitious, "humanities' first" goals as competitive with "eliminating suffering" or other broad goals. It's rare to hear people think that sports or cinema are competitive with the elimination of suffering.
For what it’s worth, I used to find the arguments that we should put the brightest minds on space exploration over eliminating suffering as concrete, but nowadays.. can’t say they those arguments seem as watertight.. saying that as someone whose hands have touched some of these projects. Curious if others feel the same way or have points to make in the opposite direction