Reaching For The Stars? II

Again, I disagree with a recurrent fictional assumption.

First, see Venator's reflection in Reaching For The Stars?

Secondly, reread a passage from James Blish's Cities In Flight which I have quoted twice before. See here. (Scroll down.)

Thirdly, consider this similar passage that I have just reread:

"...Earth is mother to all living things. Equally she shares her bounty with each of her children.
"But her problem child is man, for his destiny lies beyond her... somewhere in the stars.
"In his mad race to vacate her womb, he threatens to devour her other young."
-Rick Veitch, Swamp Thing: Regenesis (New York, 2004), p. 12.

Multinational corporations dominate the global economy. Are they now or have they ever been:

reaching for the stars?;

soaring from the rock of Earth like a sequoia?;

madly racing to vacate the womb of Earth in order to fulfill their destiny beyond her, somewhere in the stars?

No, they are maximizing their profits here on Earth. For their kind of reasons, presumably because the initial capital expenditure would have been too great, corporations have not invested in colonizing the Moon, mining the asteroids, constructing self-sustaining, solar-powered space habitats or exploring the outer Solar System.

Empires did not enact the will of the gods and corporations do not threaten Terrestrial life in order to reach for the stars. Let's not pretend that they do.