"Since, in the long run, every planetary civilization will be endangered
by impacts from space, every surviving civilization is obliged to become
spacefaring--not because of exploratory or romantic zeal, but for the most
practical reason imaginable: staying alive... If our long-term survival is
at stake, we have a basic responsibility to our species to venture to other
worlds."
If you aim for the moon and miss......You will still land among the stars.