[Harv72b]

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is it less important than concepts like ending world hunger and creating world peace?

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I would argue that the colonization of other worlds would go a long way towards solving, or at least alleviating, both of those problems.

A few options I've read about/thought of for getting to these other planets without FTL spaceships:

-Stasis, or some form of artificially induced longterm hibernation. I don't personally think this one will work, as even assuming that science can create a way to keep humans alive in stasis for the decades or centuries required to travel to a suitable planet outside of our solar system (I seem to remember reading that Alpha Centauri is not thought to have any planets at all, let alone terran ones), there are so many other problems which could happen & must be solved. Among them, creating a smart enough AI to pilot the ship, care for the people on board, and wake & care for them when they arrive.

-Genetic manipulation. This one really intrigues me. Basically, the colonists would no longer be [censored] sapiens, technically, but a genetic mutation of our species. Theoretically, you could engineer humans to age slower, live longer, require less food, surivive for long periods of time without gravity...just about anything.

-Cloning. Fairly self-explanatory. You could either equip the ship to conduct cloning during travel, allowing for a relatively small group of colonists, or stock the vessel with "just add water" clones to be created upon arrival by a caretaker crew (or AI, if possible).

-Various interdimensional forms of travel. I.e., "warp speed", folds in space, wormholes, and the like. Technically FTL travel, but theoretically still within the universal speed limit as the ship is technically leaving this universe while "traveling".

-Cyborgs. Just like Battlestar Gallactica, create a "race" of intelligent machines in our image, which could then do the colonizing for us while not having to worry about things like food, water, and molecular aging. While this wouldn't exactly help us should the Earth ever become uninhabitable, it would at least ensure that some form of "humanity" survives.

I think we'll do it eventually (I don't see how our species can continue to survive & multiply at our present rate without colonizing other planets), but I'm not so optimistic to think it'll happen in the next 500 years. At least, not beyond a setup similar to current observation posts in Antarctica (rotating crews, entirely dependent on outside supply).