Meteorite Tango

Look to the skies, the heavens are falling! The Perseid meteor shower is swiftly reaching its peak. So those of us in the northern hemisphere, who look toward the sky this evening, will be rewarded with a spectacular sight!

Between 60 and 80 meteorites travelling at speeds of around 135,000mph will carve up the night sky in one of the most impressive and regular meteorite showers visible to the naked eye. Unfortunately I happen to be living in a region forecast to be cloudy, so it is unlikely that I will see anything. Fortunately this event, having already been witnessed for around 2000 years; is likely to occur for at least another 2000 years to come, due to the current orbit of the meteors parent body around Jupiter. So I may have better luck next year.

I find it interesting to look at how far we have advanced since the first sighting of the meteors, and how our understanding of the universe has grown with the development of technology. It’s strange to think that even with the knowledge we currently possess, we still only know about 1% of what makes up the universe.

I wonder how much further humanity will have advanced in another 2000 years. Perhaps some of our descendents will monitor the Perseid meteors from colonies on the moons of Jupiter; Europa and Ganymede, whilst others explore the outer most regions of the solar system. Where ever they may be, I am sure they will be paying close attention to the parent body of the meteors; the comet Swift-Tuttle, because in around 2000 years time its orbit will bring it very close to Earth. But having had such an advanced warning I have to believe a defence toward any potential impact would have been developed.

Any sort of large scale planetary defence would require cooperation from world governments, but what would Earth’s political landscape look like in 2000 years? We are already seeing the beginnings of change, as economies such as India and China continue to grow at a faster rate than those in the west. Will the ever decreasing supply of natural resources and growing dependence on eastern markets lead to a complete shift of power? Even if it doesn’t, surely those countries with the strongest economies will have the resources and capital to develop strong space programs and potentially win the race to develop and deploy the technologies needed to claim off world territories.

It would be nice to think that the prospect of taking humanity out into the stars would give people a common goal to work toward and unite. Unfortunately I cannot see personal greed and desire for power having been overcome by that time, and feel another arms race would actually be the motivation for advancement. The goal being for every capable nation to claim as much as they can before their rivals make landfall.

It would be an interesting time to be alive, if only I had the means to survive that long!