Funk Babblings

1) Survival more important than justice: Yes, but I wonder how many of the people espousing views like Hawking's really think it through this far.

2) Effectiveness of space preserving humanity without more social progress: This seems to be one idea explored by the current Battlestar Galactica series. I figure that human nature is unlikely to change no matter how much the technology does, and sending populations into space sends the sociopolitical problems along too. How these things hurt the chances for survival, however, is hard to predict.

3) At least in the Brannon Braga era the canonical Star Trek view seems to be that contact with the Vulcans made humanity somehow come together as one and solve everything. Actually I think Roddenberry himself was more interested in using futuristic settings to comment on current social issues, rather than truly attempting to posit a potential or desirable future. So maybe I should be slamming Braga more than Roddenberry.

Come to think of it, Roddenberry's Andromeda series may have taken a more realistic view of what might happen with Earth in a post-space-colonization future.