What is Islam's view on Space, and the human race expanding into it?

theres nothing wrong space exploration and all that stuff, theres malaysian muslim astronauts involved in all that too

format_quote Originally Posted by LoJack

i'm a non muslim (sorry),

That's fine.

and also a writer.

Awesome.

i'm writing some science fiction, and i need to get a feel for how Muslims, and Islam in general feels about where the human race might fo in the long run, if we push off this particular rock, and have the run of (if nothing else) the solar system, would Islam travel with it? would it support colonisation of other bodies, or not?

thanks for any feedback on this question, regardless of how brief, but it's kind of important for me to get an idea of how my lead character would feel about it.

Well, Islam encourages Muslims to explore all of Allah's creations, scientifically, mathematically etc, so I don't see any reason Islam might discourage space exploration.

Not sure about colonisation. Are we talking 'kill the natives' colonisation, or 'there is no indigenous intelligent life here so let's move in' colonisation?

format_quote Originally Posted by LoJack

neither really, in the context of my story, we're only talking the "local" area, the solar system, say, mars, the moon, possibly further out, but certainly not "outer space".

So, terraforming kind of thing? Sounds good as a concept.

I don't see any ethical issues with that in and of itself (unless the characters are fleeing an Earth that they have grievously polluted, and/or a caste system has developed whereby the rich live off-planet and the poor remain on Earth, Blade Runner-style).

Although, come to think of it, if you are going down the route of terraforming, I suppose one could argue it is Islamically unethical because it would be altering Allah's creations.