Why Space Should be Kept a Nice Place

Why Space Should be Kept a Nice Place
By Loki

If we are destined to live in space in future, as we have so befouled and besmirched this once-beautiful Earth of ours that we can no longer live in serenity and peace on it, then it is necessary to keep in mind that we do not do a whole spate of things that we have been doing down here below. First of these would be that we should all live far closer to the source of our produce than we currently do. After all, what is so wonderful about living on top of one another in an urban environment? The rural landscape is far more spiritually regenerative, and if one has ready and ongoing access to the Internet, then one is not even missing out on the concourse of which the average human being is so fond. In space, I can visualise us all having our own veggie patches grown hydroponically, for starters.

Another aspect of our current existence that we should avoid like the plague, which it most definitely is, is the tendency to litter. OK, OK, in the developed world, you tend to have regulated this one more or less out of existence, but in the developing world (like here, in South Africa) every fence, bush and park, unless it is kept under constant surveillance, tends to be bestrewn with garbage of all description. Living on the fringes of a small fishing village, as I do, one can’t even take one’s dog for a walk in the veldt without worrying that she is going to cut her paws on all the broken glass bottles lying around (partly due to some of us feeling more inclined to feed our addictions, rather than to savour the beauty of the remaining wildlife around us). So, litter should, ideally, be kept far from outer space – the answer lying mainly in valuing even that which we wish to discard. What we throw out inevitably has a use elsewhere, as long as we avoid hedonistically thinking only of ourselves. We need to think of our tomorrows, and to overcome the distorted lens of our own myopia before it is too late.

We need, too, to respect others’ personal space. For a few generations, at least, we ought to be able to get that one right in outer space, due to the, as yet, under population of that dimension (fortunately for us, despite the corporeal renderings of Baroque artists, the angelic hosts tend to take up little physical space). As one who longs for a hermit’s cell (albeit one that is linked to the Internet 24/7), the mass invasion of the cities has been viewed with an increasing sense of horror. One can only pity those who, for reasons of work (and play), choose, or are forced, to live in areas where people are so crammed together that even to claim a small cubicle for oneself is out of the question. When I was working full-time, and still constrained by my enforced urban existence, I loathed those open-plan offices with their obligatory camaraderie – far better for me the joy of at least having one’s own office, which I did, eventually, obtain. Call me a grumpy curmudgeon, if you will, but I like my space. Hopefully, in outer space that possibility will remain for a long, long time.


Image Credit: Microsoft

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