Comments on: Maglev + space elevators + Moon = Big Dumb Object http://futurismic.com/2009/03/16/maglev-space-elevators-moon-big-dumb-object/ Presenting the fact and fiction of tomorrow since 2001 Sat, 19 May 2012 23:03:43 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.2 By: khannea suntzu http://futurismic.com/2009/03/16/maglev-space-elevators-moon-big-dumb-object/comment-page-1/#comment-21504 khannea suntzu Wed, 18 Mar 2009 12:37:40 +0000 http://futurismic.com/?p=6538#comment-21504 I know this idea has merit, and I understand that the solar system could be quite open to slingshotting with rotating skyhooks, spaceships and colony vessels being flung left and right, grabbed up from railguns like mail cannisters through airtubes. However I find the sometimes surreal implications of what freefall environments may have in terms of mass architecture are far more alien than we conceive of right now. The above examples are the first iterations of zero gravity mass architecture and industry. However we are all landlubber and flatlanders speculating about the tempestuous oceans beyond our current reach and imaginations. Imagine if I (being the fairy godmother again) forces a few thousand well-stocked, well trained people into these conditions and had them survive for a few centuries, locked off from terrestrial support, resources, logistics and moral support. Completely cut off, with all the requirements for a colony, but little immediate potential to do fundamental science other than to survive. Death tolls would be high, but damn, what kind of design choices would a few hundred such civilizations come up with in a few centuries. How diversified would these colonies become if created in splendid isolation? How much weirderer would they be than we currently envision? I know this idea has merit, and I understand that the solar system could be quite open to slingshotting with rotating skyhooks, spaceships and colony vessels being flung left and right, grabbed up from railguns like mail cannisters through airtubes.

However I find the sometimes surreal implications of what freefall environments may have in terms of mass architecture are far more alien than we conceive of right now. The above examples are the first iterations of zero gravity mass architecture and industry. However we are all landlubber and flatlanders speculating about the tempestuous oceans beyond our current reach and imaginations.

Imagine if I (being the fairy godmother again) forces a few thousand well-stocked, well trained people into these conditions and had them survive for a few centuries, locked off from terrestrial support, resources, logistics and moral support. Completely cut off, with all the requirements for a colony, but little immediate potential to do fundamental science other than to survive. Death tolls would be high, but damn, what kind of design choices would a few hundred such civilizations come up with in a few centuries. How diversified would these colonies become if created in splendid isolation?

How much weirderer would they be than we currently envision?

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