A letter to a local Victorian newspaper with an unusual proposal has sparked heated debate about the future of science, space travel and even humanity.
Maureen Sharpe from Bittern, which is 80 kilometers south-east of Melbourne’s CBD, wrote to her local publication to express her grave concern about where the world is heading.
«About 60 years have passed since man first set foot on the Moon. “What an achievement that was at that time,” Mrs. Sharpe wrote, delving into the subject.
“Since then, hundreds of spacecraft have been launched at great expense, not to mention astronaut training costs running into billions of dollars.
‘What benefits has this provided to us humans here on Earth? Has any cure been found? The common cold? Cancer?’
Then the letter leveled up with a suggestion no one saw coming.
‘I was thinking that a group of scientists and experts in their field should blast off into space with enough chemicals to create a big explosion and start a new world for humans.
‘You could have seasons, cheap food, of course a new sun, and rain and seas to provide food. The cost would be irrelevant. Anyone interested?
A letter to a local Victorian newspaper with an unusual proposal has sparked heated debate about the future of science, space travel (pictured) and even humanity.
Maureen Sharpe from Bittern, which is 80 kilometers south-east of Melbourne’s CBD, wrote to her local publication (pictured) to express her grave concern about where the world is heading.
When a photo of his letter was posted on Reddit, the response was swift and mostly cruel.
“Maureen seems like someone who hasn’t studied or read enough and doesn’t understand the world,” one person wrote.
Others played with her name, with one writing “More like Maureen Dull” and another saying “She certainly wasn’t the smartest.”
Another wrote that: “This is the kind of thing one would expect to see in a 1950s sci-fi pulp magazine, not a newspaper from 2024.”
Some people refuted his suggestion that the Space Age had not benefited humanity.
“I would have thought that satellite positioning and communication systems would have been very beneficial to modern society,” one wrote.
Another said that “reliable weather predictions” were the result of human space exploration.
But there were some who took Sharpe’s suggestion at face value, although they suggested some adjustments.
‘Scientists and experts in their field should blast off into space with enough chemicals to create a big explosion and start a new world for humans’
“She really hasn’t thought this through very well,” said one commenter.
‘You could speed up this whole process by taking the chemicals to Mars and simply creating stations and oceans there. A completely new Big Bang is not necessary.
Unfortunately, in the midst of a cost-of-living crisis, one commenter noted that “in your utopia you still have to pay for food.”
Perhaps anticipating that her suggestion would not be received with the reverence she expected, Mrs. Sharpe ended her letter by writing: “What fools we are.”
But even that was met with ridicule, with one person writing: “She got something right, what a fool she is.”
That person, however, should have read your post before hitting send; The word ‘a’ is missing between what and fool.
