Greenland: The Semi-Final Frontier 

This article is the second of two parts. Read Part One here.

In Part One, we considered the geopolitics of Greenland: how it might peacefully, and profitably, come into American hands; finding the green—as in money wealth—in Greenland. Now let’s consider another aspect of Greenland’s potential as a place not just to make money, but to flourish. 

Yes, Greenland is cold, really cold. Most of its climate is arctic tundra; generally, winter temperatures sit well below zero—and it has been as cold as minus 90 Fahrenheit. At times parts have gotten warmer, even into the 80s, but for the most part, Greenland is a frigid ice sheet more than a mile thick. 

Still, underneath all that ice is an abundance of natural resources. As noted in Part One, nobody knows exactly how much, but the dollar figure is surely to be denominated in the trillions.

Yet in addition, there’s one enormous—planet-sized, in fact—resource underneath Greenland that we know full well: the white-hot core of the Earth. It offers a resource, geothermal energy, that could turn every turbine in the world, and also warm the coldest places. 

So yes, Greenland’s 836,000 square miles are mostly frozen—but only on top. Down below, it has the potential, with some deep piping, to be as cozy as a den with a fireplace. 

You see, Earth contains quite the fire. The diameter of this globe is about 7,900 miles, and of that width, about half is the earth’s core. Thanks to decaying radioactive isotopes, it’s as hot as 7,000 degrees Fahrenheit—about the same temperature as the surface of the Sun. In effect, Earth is its own big reactor, or maybe its own little star. Either way, the energy potential of geothermal is virtually limitless. The issue is our ability to dig and get it. 

Not surprisingly, Texans are the best at getting from the ground. So it’s no accident that the folks who pioneered deep oil drilling and fracking are now leading the quest for the Earth’s steam heat. 

Houston is on its way to becoming the world’s geothermal hub. It isn’t blessed with any particular proximity to vulcanism; it doesn’t need it. What it needs is folks who know how to drill, and regulators who stay out of the way. That’s all Texans, or any of us, need—the energy is all there, the fire down below. So while geothermal isn’t there yet, we’ll get there—and who knows then what wonders will come.

Jules Verne’s 1864 novel, Journey to the Center of the Earth, is predicated on the geologic realization that it gets warmer as we go deeper. One character explains, “It is perfectly well known that the internal temperature rises one degree for every 70 feet in depth.” So Verne’s protagonists descend into a dormant volcano in Iceland, there to find a vast underworld of adventures and even dinosaurs. Only at the end of the saga are they returned topside through a volcano in Italy. 

So as we get better at digging and excavating, we can look forward to more subterranean expansion, not just for tapping energy, but for living and thriving. Decades ago, Bill Gates dug himself a mansion in Washington State; there’s something compelling about being a high-tech hobbit. It’s good, too, for security, privacy—and survivability.

Today, digging technology is all the better. Elon Musk’s Boring Company is well known; less well known are the efforts of another techpreneur, Palmer Luckey. “I’m talking about the full crust of the earth as a three-dimensional maneuvering space,” he told Tablet, “through which we’re moving people, weapons, effects, signals, and even infrastructure.” Okay, that’s about warfighting, and it’s all very hush-hush. Yet history shows that military tech soon enough spins off into civilian tech. In which case, maybe soon we’ll all be able to burrow deeper and faster. 

These new capabilities will, of course, transform mining and extraction. So far, the deepest mine humans have ever dug goes down only 2.5 miles (the deepest oil well, a bit more than five miles). So our assumptions about reserves and resources are based on the current limits on our ability to extract them. But if our technological reach extends deeper, then our ability to harvest grows greater. It’s 1800 miles to the Earth’s core; so there’s 1797.5 miles that’s never been touched. In the most literal sense, we’ve only scratched the surface.

As an aside, this abundance beneath our feet calls into question a geek-investor favorite at the other end of the down-below/up-above spectrum: asteroid mining. It’s cool to think about zooming out a few hundred million miles to the asteroid 16 Psyche, thought to contain great riches of iron. (As with the Earth, every solid thing in space is some kind of resource.) 

But maybe it’s not necessary to mine asteroids. Maybe it’s easier just to dig deeper. Maybe there’s a reason why terrestrial mining companies are doing fine while extra-terrestrial hopefuls are going bust. 

Indeed, once we get to thinking about it, we might conclude that going to space—to look for minerals, or to look for abodes—isn’t as imminent as we have thought.  Alas, science fiction, that leading indicator of the conventional wisdom about space, has always oversold the schedule: Remember the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey?  Back in 1968, it assumed that by the titular year, we’d be routinely shuttling to the Moon, as well as odyssey-ing to Jupiter.  And then there’s Star Trek, Star Wars, and all the rest.  Hate to say it, but we may never achieve warp speed and zip through wormholes. 

This author is no Luddite. He has been writing about space, with enthusiasm, for decades; indeed, even now, he is completely supportive of the John F. Kennedy/Elon Musk vision of spacefaring. And yet for a good long time, our spacefaring might be confined to this solar system.

Indeed,  it may take a while for even our solar system to be safe for human spacefarers. Why is this so? The answer begins with the anthropic principle, which includes the observation that Earth is remarkably, even miraculously, conducive to life as we know it, including mankind. 

So what is not conducive to life? One such place: space. We could say that space is guided by the misanthropic principle—the briefest unprotected exposure will instantly kill a person. Homo sapiens has evolved (or, if one prefers, was designed) to live on Earth as it is: within the familiar bands of temperature, moisture, sunlight. If we go outside those bands, we need special provisions—insulation, supplies—to survive. We can see: Outside the sway of the anthropic principle which wants us alive, the misanthropic principle wants us dead.

For instance, there’s intense radiation in space, where there’s no shielding magnetosphere. The Moon also has no magnetic field; nor does Mars. So astronauts who spend, say, three months in space (the amount of time it takes to get to Mars), even inside a vessel, are bombarded by 10 times the millisieverts judged to spur cancer. So once they get to Mars, they will have to be confined to thick bunkers, or to the heaviest of protective suits. For sure, a brave few will bear any burden for the glory of pioneering space, and let’s bless ’em, even as we should be reluctant to offer ’em life insurance. 

Yet the rest of us can ask: In addition to the physical concerns, what about psychological concerns? What does encasement do to personalities? Especially when coupled with the realization that for humans on Mars, home is 140 million or so miles away? Assuming anyone survives on Mars long enough to reproduce, we’re left to wonder what the offspring will be thinking, and doing.

Yet of all these physical and psychological forces, there’s one force that rules them all: gravity. There’s no known way of protecting against gravity—or in the case of space, the lack of gravity. Yes, it’s fun to float around for a while in the zero-g of outer space, but for an extended period, it’s not healthy. Maybe even lethal.

Astronauts have met this harsh mistress: The longer they’re in space, the worse off they are. According to a report in Science News, pointing to evidence, including astronaut Scott Kelly’s 240-day sojourn on the International Space Station in 2015–16, “Well-known problems include bone loss, heightened cancer risk, vision impairment, weakened immune systems and mental health issues.” Israel’s Davidson Institute points to still more health concerns: 

Fluids, which make up about 60 percent of the human body weight, tend to accumulate in the lower part of the body when under the influence of gravity, and through the course of evolution we have developed systems that balance the blood flow to the heart and brain while we stand. These systems continue to work even in the absence of gravity, therefore causing fluid to accumulate at the top of the body. This is why astronauts have swollen faces. Accumulation of fluid in the eye also blurs their vision for a few days until the brain learns to compensate and correct the image….The heart also gradually degenerates as a result of it having to pump less blood. A weaker heart muscle causes a decrease in blood pressure and may hamper the flow of oxygen to the brain.

Okay, so that’s space, in all its zero-g misanthropy. But what about celestial bodies? The Moon has 16 percent of Earth’s gravity, and Mars has 38 percent as much. Is that enough to keep humans healthy? Seems doubtful, but there’s only one way to find out—spend long periods of time on each. And be braced for the medical, social, and political consequences, whatever they might be.

It’s likely, of course, that we will develop strategies to improve human viability in space. Yet these could open up a new can of worms—or Pandora’s Box. 

For instance, as we think about how humans might survive in extreme conditions, we can look to those organisms that have already done so: extremophiles. These are critters that flourish in boiling water—or no water. Or at the bottom of the ocean, or inside acid pools, and so on. 

Yet while extremophiles are role models of a kind, they are nowhere near human; about the most complex of them is the microscopic tardigrade, which is nothing to look at, or, really, to aspire to. So all of us might take pause before we dabble at extremophilia. 

We can add that such efforts fall under the rubric of transhumanism. To be sure, transhumanism is a sci-fi standby, and yet our early non-fiction efforts, such as transgender surgery, have been mostly, maybe completely, calamitous. Conservatives might take comfort in the thought that human nature is less amenable to “transition” than the gender-transgressive avant-garde has been claiming. Yet we can also wonder whether those who have failed heretofore will now try harder, including for the sake of space exploration.

The great C.S. Lewis foresaw this. In his poignantly titled work of 1943, The Abolition of Man, he observed that our power over human biology is really our power over individuals, as well as over humanity as a whole. If we slice off, or stick on, a body part, and/or manipulate a gene or a germline, what can’t, or won’t, we do? Let’s hope—and if we’re of a mind to, pray—that we find good answers to the challenges to human space habitation. Lewis would want that. He was, after all, a fan of star trekking. 

Yet finding these answers—bringing the anthropic principle to space in a humane way—might take more time than is currently on Musk’s timeline. Last year, the SpaceX tycoon said his goal was to see a million people on Mars in two decades. It’s always been a mistake to bet against him, and yet still,absent some epic breakthrough, a Mars-opolis seems iffy. 

Perhaps there’s a cosmic conservative compromise to be reached: Of course we go to space only using robots (and knowingly, enthusiastically expendable astronauts, of whom there will always be some) until we figure out the technical, medical, and ethical essentials of large-scale human survival in the Final Frontier. 

In the meantime, we do better on Earth, which we might think of as the Semi-Final Frontier. On this third rock from the Sun, digging technology is better, people are richer, and yet many judge the times to be scarier. So maybe there’s a market for terrestrial pioneering to places that are forbidding, but still abiding, for the most part, to the anthropic principle. Places such as Greenland. The key to its success is a secure political economy: no Putinite Russians, no Red Chinese, no DEI, no Eurocrats, no terrorists, no Malthusians.

Indeed, there’s already the risk that People’s Liberation Army  soldiers will land tomorrow on Greenland’s shores and request “asylum,” taking advantage of the European Union’s laughable immigration rules. Or maybe it’ll be Camp of the Saints. Whatever the threat, the sooner we raise Old Glory, the better.

Interestingly, back in 2023, Donald Trump spoke of building 10 new freedom cities, to disperse the U.S. population and open up opportunities. Why not some in Greenland? Under American ownership, the path would be smooth for both mega-ranches and condo developments. Even if Greenland boasted a Trump Tower or two, vast tracts would still be serenely snowy, far from the madding crowd. And to the extent we dig dwellings underground, all the more room for living and flourishing.

Buying Greenland is Peak MAGA. If we can make this deal, America will be even greater, including the new territory, worthy of its obviously best new name—Trumpland.

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