Category Archives: Christianity

Let’s colonise space – but for what reason?

Review of Stephen Hawking’s “Brief Answers to the Big Questions” - Part 5

Hawking is a huge advocate of manned spaceflight. He sees it as our only chance to escape the “almost inevitable . . . nuclear confrontation or environmental catastrophe [that] will cripple the Earth at some point in the next 1,000 years”, although he hopes that “we can avoid dropping the basket [currently containing all our “eggs”] before we learn how to escape from Earth”. (150)

At no point does he explain how, by going into space, we escape “nuclear confrontation” in space. This is a real possibility in the future, as it’s improbable we will become sinless this side of eternity. Hawking obviously hopes that the exploration, use and colonisation of space and extra-terrestrial objects will be advantageous for human development and flourishing. And he is probably right. However, he is not helping this cause by saying we need to do this to “escape” something. The general advice for anyone moving places, jobs etc. is that they should make sure of what they are moving towards before they start moving away from.    

Considering that, let’s see how Hawking tries to convince us of space colonisation, in the chapter titled “Should we colonise space?”

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Truth dissolving

A symptom of believing in salvation through government

“What is truth?”, Pontius Pilate, the governor of Judea, mockingly asked Jesus Christ shortly before condemning Him to death (John 18:38). The Lord didn’t answer him. Pilate had reacted to Jesus’ claim that He had born into the world “to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me.” (John 18:37, NIV) He had already told his disciples: “I am the way and the truth and the life.” (John 14:6, NIV)

Against this background, consider this entry by economics professor Thomas DiLorenzo yesterday:

On page 163 of his infamous The Road to Serfdom Friedrich Hayek wrote that in totalitarian societies:

“The word ‘truth’ itself ceases to have its old meaning.  It describes no longer something to be found, with the individual conscience as the sole arbiter of whether in any particular instance the evidence (or the standing of those proclaiming it) warrants a belief; it becomes something to be laid down by authority, something which has to be believed in the interest of the unity of the organized effort [to enforce totalitarianism] and which may have to be altered as the exigencies of this organized effort require it.”  This last segment reminds you of Anthony Flipflop Fauci, doesn’t it?  (“Masks are useless,” then “Masks are mandatory”, bla, bla, bla).

This is the passage from The Road to Serfdom that I was thinking of in my blog in response to Google’s cutting off the ad revenue for the site, accusing us of contradicting “authoritative” consensus (aka the pronouncements of Biden, Fauci, Pelosi, Schumer, and all of their other commie comrades).

Hayek was right in seeing that “truth” and “totalitarianism” are irreconcilable. He was wrong however in thinking that the “individual conscience” is the “sole arbiter”. Our consciences need something to measure against, when considering an action or non-action. This standard is something that needs to be discovered. It was, arguably, discovered a long time ago and “set into stone”, so to speak. I’m thinking of course of the Ten Commandments. Jesus came to testify to the truth revealed in the Old Testament. That is what governments around the world and throughout history find so uncomfortable about Jesus and the Bible. Not just governments – but also those who hope to profit off them; and of course habitual private wrongdoers.