I've seen a lot of people speaking out against space exploration, lately - sometimes people with otherwise healthy minds. How could petty political squabbles assume pre-eminence over conquest & discovery? Has the Spirit at last run its course, reached the term of its period?
In Notes from the Underground, Dostoevsky shows a man living solely to spite the world, enjoying his pain against the outside help he'd receive & constantly humiliating himself in public - human freedom making deleterious choices when only good choices are forced upon one.