Letter: Does Stephen Hawking propose abandoning us?

From Iain Murdoch, Marton, Warwickshire, UK

Stephen Hawking proposes sending colonists to other worlds (20 May, p 22). How will this contribute to the future of our species or our current civilisation?

Sending a privileged few to try to build a sustainable existence elsewhere seems rather pointless when we haven't yet learned how to do it on Earth. Is there also a sub-plot that the rest of us are being abandoned to perish?

If the collapse of civilisation and perhaps the extinction of our species is regarded as inevitable, that is surely a self-fulfilling prophecy. Instead, the resources required for colonies could be well spent learning how to sustain our planet's ecology and the civilisation it supports.