Helen Sharman Quotes

Mars is the only place in the solar system where it's possible for life to become multi-planetarian.

In the long term, it is desirable that the human race, faced with the prospect of extinction on Earth, should prepare an escape route for itself to another inhabitable planet.

Earth is the nest, the cradle, and we'll move out of it.

I think that the future of the human race is to spread through the universe, and now is the time that we should be laying the foundations for that.

People quite often think of the question 'Are we alone in the universe?' in terms of other civilizations out there: life forms that have reached at least our level of technological development.

It's important that we attempt to extend life beyond Earth now. It is the first time in the four billion-year history of Earth that it's been possible, and that window could be open for a long time - hopefully it is - or it could be open for a short time. We should err on the side of caution and do something now.

There's so much interest and curiosity about alien life, interstellar travel. It's always in the news.

I think there's all kinds of life out there, including intelligent life, but the reason we haven't found each other is because of vast distances.

Are we alone? Many, many people on planet Earth want to know. We are on the cusp of being able to answer that question... because of the investments we're making in space technology.

Galactic plankton is undoubtedly out there, but it's statistically highly likely there's also another intelligent civilisation out there somewhere. Unfortunately, the distances and time differences are so great, communication might remain impossible.

It might be helpful to realize, that very probably the parents of the first native born Martians are alive today.

We should be ready to reach out beyond our planet and beyond our solar system to find out what is really going on out there.

Of course, it's a dream to go to Mars. I want to find out whether there was life there or not. And if there was, then why did it die out? What sort of catastrophe happened?

It's feasible that we'll meet other sentient life forms and conduct commerce with them. We don't now have the technology to physically travel outside our solar system for such an exchange to take place, but we are like Columbus centuries ago, learning fast how to get somewhere few think possible.

Perhaps, as some wit remarked, the best proof that there is Intelligent Life in Outer Space is the fact it hasn't come here. Well, it can't hide forever - one day we will overhear it.

I believe that there may be intelligent life on other planets.

We're all interested in life outside of Earth. We all have a fascination with what's out there because we don't really know.

Going to Mars would evolve humankind into a two-planet species.

Another random thing I do is the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, or SETI. And you may be familiar with the movie 'Contact,' which sort of popularized that. It turns out there are real people who go out and search for extraterrestrials in a very scientific way.

I firmly believe in what Stephen Hawking says - that if we don't get off this planet, we're going to go berserk. We have to have more space.

I don't think the human race will survive the next thousand years, unless we spread into space.

When we get there, if we don't find any life on Mars, from that point on there will be life on Mars because we'll bring it there, whether it's germs and leftover urine bags, whatever it is.

I haven't a clue if there is life on other planets but I'd be charmed if we found a unicellular organism on Mars. It would change our whole concept of life on Earth.

I think we need to move to the moons of Mars and learn how to control robots that are on the surface. It's not the impatient way of getting there, but Mars has been there a long time.

I think the human race doesn't have a future if we don't go into space. We need to expand our horizons beyond planet Earth if we are to have a long-term future.