After the Successful Colonization of Mars: Interstellar Politics in the 21st Century

By: 刘珺滔 (Juntao Liu, MPA ‘21)

Now human society seems to have entered the period of warm war again from the cold peace of 1991 to 2016.

There may be three main reasons for this. First, the dissolution of the Soviet Union ended the violent Cold War and created a period of relative peace. However, it also thawed ethnic conflicts, historic frictions, and religious antagonisms that were temporarily suppressed during the Cold War. Second, the market role has greatly improved the efficiency of social development, but it has also aggravated the global gap between the rich and the poor through the Matthew effect (Merton). Automation has pushed the unemployment rate to new heights, and the possible birth of unmanned factories will end the traditional working class. Third, humans are using their brains to domesticate artificial intelligence; alternatively, it’s possible that human brains are being domesticated by artificial intelligence (Jennifer Kavanagh, Michael D. Rich). 

When a human organization is large enough, there will be information asymmetry in internal communication. The Internet has not really solved this problem. A large number of low-quality information explosions have increased the cognitive burdens on ordinary humans. Sophisticated preference algorithms push you to the content you are interested in throughout the day but, in reality, make people completely immersed in their own world. The tolerance of people is undermined. Humans are becoming extreme, arrogant, and divided. 

In the foreseeable future, high-quality information on the Internet will continue to be surrounded by barriers. The free and unimpeded Internet world is like a world without a passport system before World War I. It was just an accident in the early days of birth. Completely different perceptions of the truth or the lack of consensus will bring human society from order into chaos, and this disorder may cause a new round of human involution.

The decline of the Roman Empire shows that human civilization does not progress linearly  (Gibbon). Generally, for the matters under heaven, those closely involved cannot see as clearly as those outside. We may have missed the last chance to prevent the disorder of the world, and the specific point in time can be left for future historians to discuss. If human society has entered a global version of the Middle Ages, space exploration will be a new Age of Discovery. The success of commercial-manned spacecrafts has made interplanetary migrations possible in this century.

However, space exploration may also intensify the vicious competition between various countries and expand the scope of human war. The balance of terror kept humans relatively sensible after World War II. A full-scale nuclear war may destroy human civilization on the planet, and economic globalization has strengthened human communications and cooperation. This is the main reason why nuclear war still does not erupt in today's conflicts. 

Economic globalization is currently encountering unprecedented resistance. Even more terrifying, interstellar migration has allowed human civilization to exist on more than just one planet. This indicates that the risk of nuclear war is getting higher, and the stronger human civilization may be more vulnerable (Mearsheimer).

But human beings must explore space. This is a matter of life and death. Because there is only one earth, it is too dangerous. Going to space is to back up human civilization. However, we may have another option. For example, after the successful colonization of Mars, we can choose to actively disconnect the human society of Mars from that of Earth. Interstellar politics is the geopolitics of the universe. After disconnection, the human society of Mars will have the opportunity to evolve independently. The essence of the evolution of human society is to try in every direction, and then the positive feedback loop makes the advantages continue to accumulate. Finally, an insignificant seed grows into a towering tree (Diamond). According to the single origin of humans, when the first humans walked out of Africa, they waved goodbye to Africa. When they returned to Africa again, they were colonizers (Harari).

Mars will be a backup of human civilization. And will potential interstellar opponents inspire the great unity of humans on our planet and make world government possible again to restore and maintain the normal order of human society? Generation after generation, human beings pursue the final dream with wisdom and courage. Is the final dream Plato’s Republic, the ultimate human paradise, or the rise and fall of chaos driven by competitions and crises?

Sources:

Diamond, Jared. Guns, Germs, and Steel . 1997.

Gibbon, Edward. The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. 1776.

Harari, Yuval Noah. Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind . 2011.

Jennifer Kavanagh, Michael D. Rich. "Truth Decay." 2018.

Mearsheimer, John. The Tragedy of Great Power Politics. W.W. Norton & Company, 2001.

Merton, Robert K. New York: Columbia University, 1968.