If you're in a middle generation, what's the alternative?
If you're in the middle of a long, slow interstellar journey, there's no chance of a survivable exit from the ship, so reversing course doesn't help you, although it may or may not help your successors. I expect most first wave journeys wouldn't have sufficient fuel to reverse course anyway, so trying to would probably be certain doom for your successors instead of meerly probable doom.
Anybody planning a mission on the timescale of interstellar journies is going to have to accept that they won't have much control of the result. You can pick the destination, and you can provide the initial conditions, and whatever happens, happens. The colony would have to be independent and self-sufficient by necessity, there can't be an expectation of sending spoils of colonization back home.
Even if we got up to 10% of the speed of light, transit time is too long for close coordination.
This all assumes that every one of your descending chain will be equally willing to make descendants. That's a very big bet for a species whose worldview (and scientific understanding of the universe) changes every generation. Imagine deciding the future of your descendants 2000 down the line. Imagine if your Australopithecus ancestor deciding your future. Whatever decision he made it is unlikely to be of your benefit as he lacks virtually any scientific knowledge and has little if any in common with you worldview wise
If you're in the middle of a long, slow interstellar journey, there's no chance of a survivable exit from the ship, so reversing course doesn't help you, although it may or may not help your successors. I expect most first wave journeys wouldn't have sufficient fuel to reverse course anyway, so trying to would probably be certain doom for your successors instead of meerly probable doom.
Anybody planning a mission on the timescale of interstellar journies is going to have to accept that they won't have much control of the result. You can pick the destination, and you can provide the initial conditions, and whatever happens, happens. The colony would have to be independent and self-sufficient by necessity, there can't be an expectation of sending spoils of colonization back home.
Even if we got up to 10% of the speed of light, transit time is too long for close coordination.