What would come first, the colonization of the solar system or interstellar colonization?

I have a world (around 3000-3500ad) where human race is spread across various planetary systems - so interstellar travel it's possible.

The interstellar travel is possible via a Bussard Ramjet which uses the CNO Cycle to propel itself.

Each planetary system has a couple of planets/moons colonized and interplanetary travel is quite accessible.

Now, in my story, the idea is that human race colonized Mars and the Moon (all this before hitting 2500ad) and after that developed interstellar travel and went to Gliese 667 and colonized Gliese 667Cc.

But after thinking about it I thought "Why wouldn't the human race pospone interstellar colonization and instead terraform other planets/moons from the solar system (ie Venus, Mercury, Europa), and not go for interstellar colonization until all solar systems planets/moons are terraformed and habitable?"

And I couldn't really find a reason as to why.

So basically my questions are, what would be more likely to happen first? The colonization of the entire (as much as possible) solar system or interstellar colonization? Or maybe both? Which one would be easier? Why would human kind go for one or the another? One of the many reasons in my story is that human kind needs more space - immortality has been discovered so earth is lacking space.

posted almost 8 years ago

Radu Rojas‭

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