Posted on 08/11/2017 10:15:15 AM PDT by BenLurkin
Yes, many people want to travel to other stars....Yet making preparations and doing judicious planning is the aim of this book. Wisely though, this book isnt technical. It has no mention of specific impulse calculations or ion shields. Rather, this book takes a very liberal view of space travel and ponders deep questions such as whether the cosmos is an ecosystem.
Does our species have an appropriate culture for space travel? What exactly is a human? These concerns get raised in some very thought provoking sections. And given that the editor is an architect and one who apparently considers the emotional qualities of a structure as much as functional qualities, then this books presentation tends to be a little more on the philosophical side of things.
In particular, it looks at the benefits of living entities. For instance it notes that humans live in symbiotic relationships with a host of internal and external organisms. Most have already gone into space either within people who have traveled in space or possibly upon probes sent to other planets. So we arent the only species thats traveled beyond Earth. But which beings are sufficient and necessary to keep humans alive for the generations needed to travel to another star? That question and many answers come up often.
As well, the essays get into bigger questions such as: What is life? Could the vessel be an organic construct? How might todays humans evolve to tomorrows star travelers? Should humans travel in space and promote/continue panspermia? Yes, these questions and many more are raised in the essays collected within this book. And true to form for any book considering star travel, there arent any strict answers. There are however lots of ideas and concepts to better prepare humans.
(Excerpt) Read more at universetoday.com ...
This would be my ship and only those beautiful women I choose to go with me. No other questions need to pondered or asked.
The Starlost series comes to mind.
Excellent series and concept. ‘Wish it’d been continued.
To live in space, humans will basically need to create artificial ecosystems that duplicate all the conditions necessary for life, but on a small scale. It won’t be able to handle extinction events like a large one can. One failure and it’s doomed.
Or one Muslim on board and it’s doomed...
[ To live in space, humans will basically need to create artificial ecosystems that duplicate all the conditions necessary for life, but on a small scale. It wont be able to handle extinction events like a large one can. One failure and its doomed. ]
You can store seeds and extra food supplies to get you by in case you have the artificial bio-sphere have an ecological collapse. Ideally you could have several ships flying in formation ( keeping about 50,000 miles distance between each one ) and have them so they can are running at say 75% capacity for 5 ships so you can always evacuate one ship to the others while you re-pair / fix the broken ship.
but yeah, it is hard to take shelter underground if there is no “underground”, though if you are using ships built into small asteroids you could be fairly robust.
What is it with sci-fi, advanced technology... and robes?
They are cheap.......................
That book sounds like a real POS, written by Gaia-loving asteroid huggers.
"We make it for him Jedi round eye!"
I thought the same thing. And whatever’s in that pocket, I don’t want to know.
Isn’t that what earth is?
The SPICE MUST FLOW..................
I don't think the human body could survive in a non gravity environment for a life span.........
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