Stephen Hawking, a famed British theoretical physicist and cosmologist, called on the top space countries to return to the Moon by 2020 and send people to Mars by 2025.
Hawking made his comments at the Starmus Festival in Trondheim, Norway, which celebrates science and the arts. The scientist said that he hoped that the goal would spark new excitement in space programs, create new national alliances, and give humanity a sense of purpose, noted the BBC News.
"Spreading out into space will completely change the future of humanity," Hawking said, according to the BBC News. "I hope it would unite competitive nations in a single goal, to face the common challenge for us all. A new and ambitious space program would excite (young people), and stimulate interest in other areas, such as astrophysics and cosmology."
Hawking also warned that because of climate change and dwindling resources, mankind will have to leave Earth in the next 200 to 500 years, according to the Evening Express.
"Our physical resources are being drained, at an alarming rate," Hawking said at the festival, according to the Evening Express. "We have given our planet the disastrous gift of climate change. Rising temperatures, reduction of the polar ice caps, deforestation, and decimation of animal species. We can be an ignorant, unthinking lot.
"When we have reached similar crises in our history, there has usually been somewhere else to colonize. Columbus did it in 1492 when he discovered the New World. But now there is no new world. No Utopia around the corner," Hawking continued.
Hawking said instead of sailing the ocean, mankind will need to sail through space for its next home to expand, noted the Evening Express.
"We are running out of space and the only places to go to are other worlds. It is time to explore other solar systems. Spreading out may be the only thing that saves us from ourselves. I am convinced that humans need to leave Earth," he said.
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