Space has a strange hold over us. Star Trek and Star Wars are amongst the most-watched films of all time, while the moon landing gripped an era and was the most-watched TV event ever. Now new generations are once again hooked by a return to the moon and the prospect of Mars. But what drives us to explore space is puzzling and unknown. The closest planets are desolate rocks. More distant planets have no surface being composed of freezing gas. Earth by comparison is a spectacular paradise. It would currently take 80,000 years to reach the next star and no known future technology is likely to change this by the orders of magnitude required to make it plausible.
Is the desire to explore space not practical but psychological, an urge to adventure into the unknown and escape our current limitations? Or should we take seriously Musk's claim that we need to go to Mars to find an alternative to Earth, however inhospitable? Or is the project profoundly mistaken and the consequence of pursuing an evolutionary trait to explore when in this case there is little or nothing to be gained?
Theoretical astrophysicist Avi Loeb, astrophysicist and host of PBS Space Time Matt O'Dowd, and author of Extraterrestrial Life: A Guide to the Debates Carol Cleland debate whether space exploration is a practical answer to humanity's problems or whether it fulfills a psychological urge.
In partnership with New Scientist