Do aliens exist?

I think it’s impossible for them not to, the real question is how common are they? I personally answer that question very optimistically. I believe microbial life could be extremely common, and it’s possible we find microbes on our Solar System’s ice moons and maybe even on Mars or Venus. Intelligent life, on the other hand, is probably very scarce.

And based on how humans have only been around for 200,000 years out of the 13.8 billion of our universe, it’s very possible that every intelligent species out there is either extinct or thousands of times more advanced than us with very little in-between.

If we put it in context of the Fermi paradox, I think the Great Filter hypothesis is very plausible, and that great filter may lie somewhere around developing multicellular life (or even have several filters). The recipes for life are abundant all through the universe, maybe it starts up a lot but rarely ever takes off.

How do we colonize space?

I think this is a tricky question without one good answer. I believe privatizing the space industry is a good start, but it’s important to keep a healthy competition. I also believe that research purposes, while important, will not kickstart space colonization effectively.

The reasons people colonized other areas on the globe was specifically to access either new resources or resources for cheaper. In space, however, it’s much more expensive to harvest minerals from asteroids and return them to Earth compared to just mining those same minerals on Earth. They may be more abundant and less ecologically invasive, but cost is the preventing factor.

It’s important to establish space infrastructure to lower the price. It will take a massive initial investment, ideally from a collection of both companies and governments, but once the infrastructure is in place it will become the cost-effective method for many resources.

Additionally, placing stricter environmental penalties on groups that mine the Earth for resources will also pressure them to find alternatives, and invest in asteroid or planetary mining as a long-term way to save money.

What’s my favorite planet?

Neptune! It’s such a fascinating world just lingering out in the far reaches of our Solar System. Despite its true color being much paler than the original azure blue, it’s still a beautiful planet and system!

From the active surface of its dark spots and magnificent winds, to the enigma that is its magnetosphere, Neptune is a wonderfully active world often overlooked because of how little we know about it and how far away it is.

Its largest moon, Triton, is also a wonder! Its orbit, size, and composition all indicate that it was a captured dwarf planet of the Kuiper Belt, and its newly overturned surface tells an amazing story of tidal heating and cryovolcanism. How could that NOT be the coolest thing ever?