In the office, when they heard these four words, a trace of surprise flashed in the eyes of the old man sitting opposite and Chang Huaxiang beside him.
"You mean...learn the way of the United States?"
The old man looked over, looked at Xu Chuan and asked.
If you think of external expansion, the most easily thought of is undoubtedly the hegemonic method used by the United States to plunder resources and land around the world.
To put it simply, it means external expansion to plunder the resources and economies of other countries to maintain its rapid development and strength.
Laomi has a long history of external expansion and has a complete set of methods and sufficient experience.
From western expansion in the 19th century, the occupation of Hawaii and the Philippines, to intervention during the Cold War, there are often resource acquisition motives behind these actions.
Since the end of the Revolutionary War, territorial expansion and resource collection have made the United States a superpower.
Including the Cold War between the red and blue parties in the 20th century, the United States incorporated its motivation for external expansion into the larger framework of anti-Sovietism to defend the idea of a free world.
During this period, the United States expanded its political, military and economic influence globally, aiming to curb the expansion of Red Soviet Union.
But in essence, it is also to strengthen the United States' global influence and expansion.
To put it simply, there are many ways to expand overseas, including military means, as well as economic and cultural penetration.
Military intervention has always been a prominent feature of foreign expansion.
If they want to take the path of external expansion, this may greatly change the original direction of the country.
After all, this was not the path they took originally.
Opposite the sofa, Xu Chuan shook his head gently and said: "The external expansion I am talking about is not about learning from the United States' path, but..."
As he spoke, he pointed to the top of his head.
"Space?" The old man reacted quickly and asked.
Xu Chuan nodded and said, "Well, space."
"Our situation is different from that of the United States. I believe you are in a better situation than I am."
"Putting aside other reasons, the huge gap in population alone will make it difficult for us to go back to the path of American expansion."
"And the current development of military weapons technology is difficult to support us in following the path of the United States as we did in the 19th century."
After a pause and organizing his words, he continued: "Say something outside of your personal realm."
"In my opinion, the United States' external expansion is ultimately caused by problems caused by the distribution mechanism, which makes it necessary to do so."
"Its own resources are actually enough to maintain high welfare benefits for all personnel in their country, but problems with the distribution mechanism mean that not everyone can receive the corresponding benefits."
"For example, if there are 100 resources and 100 people, if everyone gets exactly one resource, then everyone can live a good life."
"But the reality is obviously not like this. Of these 100 resources, 50, 60 or even more may have been taken away by a powerful few, such as 10 or 20 people."
"And the few remaining resources are obviously not enough to feed the majority of people."
"This also means that the United States must expand externally and obtain 200 or even more resources so that most people can have one resource."
"I believe this problem also exists in our country, but currently the situation should be better than that in the United States."
The old man nodded, obviously agreeing with Xu Chuan's statement.
The problem of distribution mechanism obviously exists in every country, whether it is the United States, China, the European Union, Japan, South Korea and other countries.
Not to mention modern society, there were so many dynasties in ancient China that went through reincarnations, divisions and recombinations. In the final analysis, most of the time it was because the distribution mechanism had failed in the final years of the dynasty.
The farmers at the bottom cannot even obtain the most basic resources to support themselves, so they will naturally rise up to resist, break the original order, and redistribute resources.
In this process, the population will be greatly reduced due to war.
When the population decreases and order is re-established, resources or productivity can allow everyone to live happily until time continues to pass and reincarnation repeats itself.
But after entering modern society, especially today when countries are stockpiling nuclear weapons in large quantities, it is obvious that it is difficult for wars like those in ancient times to break all old orders, establish new ones, and significantly reduce the population to happen again.
After all, once the three wars break out on a large scale, on the basis of possessing each other and destroying each other, the consequences can be imagined.
There is no war, but the problem of uneven distribution of resources still exists. How to solve this problem?
The United States' external expansion is obviously a path suitable for them.
By plundering the resources of other countries to meet domestic needs and create profits, the problem of uneven resource distribution is solved.
And can they take this path?
Obviously, it is very difficult.
As Xu Chuan said, their population is too large.
If the real population of 1.4 billion wants to satisfy the whole world through social welfare security, I am afraid that it will require siphoning the world's wealth to do so.
While the United States occupies the top of the technological pyramid, it can hand over other less core technologies or sub-level technologies to other allies for production.
But they don't have this condition. Population determines everything.
Take the shipbuilding industry for example. South Korea's shipbuilding industry is one of the pillars of their country's economy, and they also have a developed shipbuilding industry, so competition between the two is fierce.
If South Korea's shipbuilding industry can eat 10 shares to make itself full, then they have to eat at least 100 or even 1,000 shares to make themselves full.
This means that it is actually very difficult for them to follow the expansion path of the United States.
After all, their size is simply too large.
After thinking for a moment, the old man looked at Xu Chuan and asked, "Can space solve our problems?"
This chapter is not finished yet, please click on the next page to continue reading the exciting content! Xu Chuan nodded and said: "I don't know how to solve the problem of resource allocation mechanism, but what I am sure of is that space has enough resources to support our continued development.
resources.”
"I have played a game before, which contained a large number of alien races and a compact game plot. In the early stages of development, the most important thing for players was the population. The population growth in the early stage was too slow, resulting in
There’s no labor available for a lot of positions.”
"In the later period, too much population will cause serious economic pressure to increase, administrative efficiency to decrease, scientific research to slow down, social instability and other problems."
"I think this game is just like our current earth. If the population is too small, it cannot develop. If the population is too large, there will be various problems. (PS: Stars makes money!)"
"The simplest way to solve this problem is to obtain more resources."
"Needless to say, compared to the entire universe, or even the entire solar system, the resources on Earth are pitifully few."
"If we turn our attention to space and develop the moon, Mars, and even other planets further away, then the problems we are facing now can be solved to a large extent."
"When we enter the space age, no matter how large the population is, it will become a scarce resource."
A thoughtful expression appeared on the old man's face: "Does that mean we should set our sights on space development in the longer term?"
Xu Chuan nodded and said: "In fact, regardless of these issues, we should also focus on space development."
"This is the path that any advanced intelligent civilization should take after it has sufficient capabilities, instead of fighting life and death with its fellow humans on the home planet to compete for the limited resources on the home star."
To me, it's like standing next to a banquet of Manchus and Han Chinese, fighting for a few peanuts."
Hearing this, the old man couldn't help but smile, obviously he was interested in Xu Chuan's description.
"Standing next to a Manchu and Han banquet fighting for a few peanuts?"
After muttering something subconsciously, the old man smiled and said, "I've written this down. I'll have a meeting to study it when I get back."
After a slight pause, he looked at Xu Chuan and continued: "Besides AI intelligence and space development, do you think there are any other suitable research directions?"
Hearing this, Xu Chuan thought for a while and said: "Quantum computers, biotechnology, virtual reality technology, etc. are all important areas for future technological development."
"I may be in a hurry today and it is difficult to discuss it in detail. It is better to wait until the manned landing project is completed and I will find time to think about it seriously."
Hearing this, the old man nodded with a smile and said, "Then I'll spare your trouble."
Xu Chuan smiled and said: "This is what I should do, and it is also my honor. There is no hard work or trouble."
"To put it bluntly, being able to determine the direction of the future era is an opportunity that many people only dream of and dare not even imagine."
The old man smiled and was about to say something when he suddenly remembered another thing and spoke.
"Oh, by the way, there is one more thing."
While talking, he took out an envelope from his pocket and handed it to Xu Chuan.
"This is a project plan submitted by the Space Administration and the Academy of Sciences some time ago. Take a look."
Taking the envelope with some curiosity, Xu Chuan opened the seal and took out the documents inside.
When his eyes fell on the report on the first page, he was stunned for a moment, looked at the old man in surprise, and asked.
"Expedition to Barnard's System?"
Hearing Barnard Star, Chang Huaxiang was stunned for a moment, and then looked over curiously.
The old man nodded and said: "This is a project plan made by the Aerospace Group, the Space Administration and the Aerospace Research Institute of the Academy of Sciences."
"They plan to launch a space shuttle and carry a probe to Barnard's galaxy to detect whether there are Earth-like planets suitable for human habitation there, and to examine various conditions of exoplanets."
While listening to the old man's introduction, Xu Chuan quickly flipped through the planning documents in his hand.
Barnard's Star, also known as Barnard's Star in English, is a very small red dwarf star located near the beta star Ophiuchi, about 6 light years away from the earth. It is named in memory of the astronomer Edward Emerson Barnard.
Named for virtue.
At the same time, it is also the closest 'single star' galaxy to the solar system.
But what is interesting is that it is not the first star closest to the sun, nor the second closest star, nor even the third closest star.
Because the first, second and third stars closest to the sun are all in the Centauri galaxy, which is also the galaxy where Proxima Centauri is better known.
This story sounds a bit like a certain great man who fired three shots in a row.
Compared with Barnard's Galaxy, the three stars of Proxima Centauri are all closer to the solar system. Among them, Proxima Centauri is only 4.24 light-years away from the sun, making it the closest star to the sun.
The core reason why Barnard's Galaxy was chosen as the target of the expedition instead of the closer Proxima Centauri is that Barnard's Galaxy is a single-star galaxy.
The Gate II system is more suitable for human expeditions.
First of all, a single star means more stability.
Although the three stars of Nanmenmen are closer, the interaction between the stars means that the surrounding planets will also be affected.
In the famous science fiction novel "Three-Body", the "Trisolaran Civilization" four light-years away was destroyed and reborn more than a hundred times because of the irregular movement of three stars and was forced to escape from its parent star.
Although science fiction novels are based on fantasy, even from a scientific perspective, Proxima Centauri is not very suitable for human habitation.
Because the planets discovered near it are too close to their parent stars.
The other two stars, Nanmen A and Nanmen B, are in a state of intertwining and influencing each other, which means that even if there are planets nearby, their orbits are likely to be in a chaotic state.
Barnard's Galaxy is different.
The structure of a single star is similar to that of the solar system, and more importantly, three planets were discovered near it, in the habitable zone for life.
It is worth mentioning that these three planets were calculated and confirmed using the expanded application of the Xu-Weyl-Berry theorem completed by Xu Chuan through radiation fluctuations, gravitational lensing and other parameters.
Of course, no matter how it is confirmed, there is no doubt that it is now more worthy of exploration than Nanmen II.
Judging from the plan in the letter, this project was divided into two parts by the aerospace group. The first part is earth exploration and unmanned exploration.
That is, various astronomical observation equipment and telescopes are used to investigate Barnard's Galaxy on Earth, and then an unmanned space shuttle is launched to carry a large amount of detection equipment to Barnard's Galaxy for on-the-spot investigation.
And the second part is the expedition!
Yes, if the results of the first part of the investigation are in line with expectations, the aerospace group is planning to build a large spacecraft to carry 300 to 500 people on an expedition to the Barnard Galaxy.
The entire project has been planned for fifty years, and some problems that may be encountered and technical breakthroughs that need to be solved are reported.
If you just look at the letter and report, this is indeed a very attractive plan.
Expedition to Barnard's Galaxy six light years away!