Humanity Among the Stars
August 31, 2025
Carl Sagan, the American astronomer and planetary scientist, once said:
“The cosmos is within us. We are made of star-stuff. We are a way for the universe to know itself.”
This quote has always resonated with me, because it captures the essence of what space exploration really means. Which is the fact that we have been given this momentous opportunity to be able to experience the universe. I think complex life in the universe does exist but it is very rare, and consciousness of the self like we have is even more rare. I would like to begin by speaking about humanity's greatest instance in my opinion of space travel: the first.
April 12, 1961: Humanity Changes Forever
On that morning at Baikonur Cosmodrome, Yuri Gagarin awoke around 5:30 a.m. Like anyone else, he ate breakfast and mentally prepared for his day ahead. By 7:00 a.m., he was strapped into Vostok 1, calm enough to request music as the hatch was sealed.
At 9:00 a.m., liftoff occurred. A human being was launched into orbit at 17,000 miles per hour. For 108 minutes, Gagarin circled Earth before returning home. The first human explorer to reach the heavens.
It was the Cold War: the Soviet Union and the United States locked in what can only be described as two deer bucking heads. It was a battle of ideologies—communism versus capitalism—with space as the proving ground. But beyond that struggle, Gagarin’s flight marked the start of humanity’s long history among the stars.
Today’s Muted Dream
Today, that dream feels muted—and maybe for good reason. Wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, political divides across the West. All of it makes space exploration feel less urgent, because it is. And it’s understandable: how can we conquer the stars if we cannot conquer our problems at home?
- How can we conquer the stars when about 1 in 11 people go hungry?
- How can we conquer the stars with half of all child deaths linked to malnutrition?
These are not just issues to solve before space exploration—they are issues we must solve to move forward as a species in every way. Humanity is not ready for the stars until we are ready to take care of ourselves.
And yet, I wouldn’t be human if I couldn’t dream. Through war and pain, I still see a future among the chaos of the universe, a future where curiosity drives us outward once again.
Mars: The Next Frontier
If humanity is to push further beyond our Earth and Moon, Mars is the next frontier.
NASA has long argued its importance: it is the only place in our solar system where life might have existed as we know it. Within the next 50 years, humans may finally embark on the 50–200 million mile journey to reach our red neighbor.
The first Martian explorers will plant flags, establish small settlements, grow food, and search for organic molecules beneath the surface. Visual evidence already suggests Mars once had oceans, a cradle for complex life. A 2024 UC Berkeley study used seismic activity to probe Mars’s interior, revealing vast underground reservoirs of liquid water. NASA’s InSight lander even estimated enough groundwater exists to cover the planet in a mile deep ocean.
Mars, 4.6 billion years old, holds countless mysteries. While we have yet to find proof of life, the building blocks are there. Over centuries, Mars will become our first interplanetary hub. With permanence will come permanence’s consequences: greed, mining, and monetization. Just as on Earth, businessmen will race to exploit resources. Just as on Earth, governments will race to take land and claim it in the name of their nations. Wars will be fought.
And yet, with all the ugly we will also see beauty. Children will be born. The first Martians may grow up dreaming of Earth’s gray mountains and green forests—things they have never seen. Physically shaped by weaker gravity, they may become something different from Earth-born humans. A thousand generations from now, we might even see the birth of a new branch of humanity: Martians, who will never know Earth as home.
Beyond Mars
Beyond Mars, the possibilities are endless. We will mine asteroids. We will see trillionaires emerge from space industries. We will fight wars with unimaginable weapons in the great expanse. Language, culture, and life itself will change as humanity pushes further into the solar system and the universe.
The frontier never ends.
The Spark of Creation
Sometimes I feel small looking out into the black abyss. Humans fear what we do not understand. I have always wanted to believe in a god and in many ways, I do.
But perhaps God is not a being at all, but a spark. Maybe before our Big Bang there was another universe, governed by rules and regulations we just cannot imagine. Maybe there have been infinite universes, each ending as stars die, fading into red dwarfs, white dwarfs, neutron stars, and black holes. Until it all goes dark.
And maybe, from the darkness, another spark begins again. That spark ,the force that reignites creation, is what I think God might be: the true all-powerful nature of our universe.
But what do I know? I am just an accident of the universe experiencing itself.