Talk:Space colonization

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Space colonization was a good article nominee, but did not meet the good article criteria at the time. There are suggestions below for improving the article. Once these are addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake. Reviewed version: August 22, 2006

Space Colonization WikiProject edit

Core concepts Space colonization Interstellar travel Planetary habitability Space and survival Space habitat Terraforming Colonization and terraforming Colonization of the Moon Colonization of Mars Colonization of Venus Colonization of Mercury Colonization of the asteroids Colonization of Ceres Colonization of the outer solar system Colonization of Jupiter Colonization of Europa Colonization of Titan Colonization of Trans-Neptunian Objects Terraforming of Mars Terraforming of Venus Organizations Mars Society National Space Society

Contents 1 Star Trek: Deep Space Nine 2 Splitting article? 3 split article 4 Objections 5 Sub-standard Writing 6 Moon locales 7 Wikipedia:WikiProject Space Colonization 8 Quote 9 Can asteroids be legaly claimed 10 Failed "good article" nomination 11 Created Sun Colonization Article 12 General cleanup and addition of relevant data and citations 13 Phobos and Deimos 14 Redundant counterarguments section removed 15 Merges 16 In situ 17 Should Justifications and Objections be near the start? 18 Energy sources 19 Gas giants, food supply, life support and transhumanism 20 Who butchered the Criticisms section? 21 Merge material from Space exploration 22 No fiction please 23 Population 24 TINDSOTM 25 Ugly imperialist word! 26 Racial issues 27 Starship 28 contested statements removed

[edit] Star Trek: Deep Space Nine

I contend the inclusion of Deep Space Nine as an "Earth colony" - not only was it not constructed by humans, it wasn't owned by humans or even the Federation (who humans are part of), it was a Bajoran possession. Furthermore, it's not operated exlusively by humans, and is not a colony anyway - it's an administrative centre between Bajor and the Federation, and later a military HQ and staging point. Pomegranate

Sounds like good reasoning to me, I'm taking it out. Bryan 20:37, 5 Jun 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Splitting article?

Once upon a time there used to be a separate article for space habitats (as in space stations that are permanent and effectively self-sufficient colonies) but it got merged into here to be grouped in with all types of off-Earth settlement. However, in various advocacy groups I often see a very strong distinction being drawn between this type of settlement and the kind that's on a planetary surface; some people think gravity wells are awful things to be stuck in, some people think you can't have a self-sufficient colony without the resources of a planet to draw on and so you might as well be located on the surface of one. I personally think both types of colony seem just fine to me, but that there still may be sufficient differences to warrant separate consideration. Anyone else have opinions on the matter? Bryan 20:43, 5 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I agree that there is a split in the community support here. I think that debate should be mentioned in the Location section, and the sub-titled organized according to these debates. I'll do that and see what people think. Chadlupkes 20:28, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

I think "space habitats" have sufficient differences from Mars Settlements or Lunar Colonies to warrant a different article. I would think eventually as stubs fill out "Space Colonization" would be an introduction to general issues with links to other vast subtopics. Lazyquasar 03:17, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] split article

I moved the fictional depictions party to Space Colonization in Popular Culture.

Thank you --noösfractal 09:37, 4 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Objections

Hello, I added the objections section and the favourite anti-space arguments of my group of friends (some of whom are pro-space, some con). I hope the arguments put forward are OK, and that I am not treading on anyones tows for lumping a big lets not in the middle of your lovely article which kinda says lets go!. I really like the whole topic, and I thought it would be polite to just explain what I dumped. All the best, --Dan|^(talk) 21:23, 25 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I saw (and appreciate) the various 'counter objections' that have been added to the objections section that I started. This is good, but the different arguments (pro and con) should be more clearly separated under this heading. I have trivially split the arguments into an "objections" section with a "counter arguments" sub section, however, a series of paired paragraphs under sub sub sections might be better. i.e. "OBJECTIONS: Point 1 : Counter Point 1 : Point 2 : Counter Point 2". This is kinda how the section was written, but their was no clear distinction between the pro and con arguments, which made it a little confusing to read. Sorry if my edits bother the author... -Dan|^(talk) 11:11, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sub-standard Writing

This article gives the impression that it was written by some middle school kid, saying obvious things without actually knowing anything or providing insight of any kind. 165.123.140.215 07:05, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

"Obviousness" is in the eye of the beholder, bear in mind that ideally a Wikipedia article should be a good introduction to a subject for someone who doesn't know anything in particular about it to begin with so we should make sure all the basics are covered (either here or in related articles with prominent links). That said, by all means take a crack at cleaning up the language and adding more non-obvious or insightful material. Almost all Wikipedia articles are in need of that sort of work. Failing that, perhaps you could provide some more specific suggestions to help suggest stuff for people to do? Bryan 07:45, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Moon locales

I took out ", but the most likly place for a Lunar colony would be the equator (ease of access from Earth) and to get hydrogen from the poles would be like going from Los Angeles to New York for a glass of water." The Moon's rotation is so slow that getting to the poles is not that much harder than getting to the equator. The poles have an additional potential advantage of constant access to solar power, so it is not obvious where the best place for a colony might be. On Earth, access to water has often determined where people settle.--agr 13:47, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

I concur with your reasoning as does NASA.[1] Interesting, the article cites constant sunlight and access to volatiles. Neglects to mention easy constant access to shade for heat sinks and radiators. Lazyquasar 03:25, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia:WikiProject Space Colonization

A few of us have been trying to start up a new Wikipedia:WikiProject Space Colonization (shortcut WP:SPACE) to organize work on topics of direct relevance to this article. Hop on over if you're interested. - Reaverdrop 16:08, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Quote

Konstantin Tsiolkovsky (1857–1935, was a Russian and Soviet rocket scientist and pioneer of cosmonautics): "The Earth is the cradle of humanity, but one can not live in a cradle forever!". --ajvol 10:02, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Can asteroids be legaly claimed

Does anyone know how to legaly claim an asteroid, can asteroids be legaly claimed so no one else can colonize them, hs it ever been done?

According to current law, resources cannot be claimed "in situ", but can be claimed after extraction. Following this logic, an asteroid cannot be claimed as property intact, but one could mine the entire thing and claim the billion or so tons of material produced. siafu 13:06, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

So I throw away a "waste" rock and the rest of the asteroid is my beneficiated ore? 8) If "current law" is the moon treaty ... according to Wikisource.org[2] no space traveling nation ever signed it. Lazyquasar 03:30, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Failed "good article" nomination

This article failed good article nomination. This is how the article, as of August 22, 2006, compares against the six good article criteria:

1. Well written?: There are too many one-sentence paragraphs, and a general lack of flow in the writing. The long quote from Michael Griffin really doesn't belong in the lead section; also, the "Justification" section suffers from erratic capitalisation, and is too much a list of different people's views.

2. Factually accurate?: It seems generally accurate, although very speculative. Citations would help greatly to determine the its accuracy. As it is, the lack of citations is the major reason why the article fails. As it is, many sections have the air of original research; it's hard to tell whether the ideas mentioned have the support of authorities in the field, or whether they are simply the speculations of the author.

3. Broad in coverage?: My knowledge of the subject is not wide enough for me to comment on the article's thoroughness.

4. Neutral point of view?: Generally the article has a very pro-colonization tone. The objections to colonization are not treated very sympathetically, and are rebutted within their own section as well as in the section devoted to rebuttals. It might help if someone opposed to space colonization helped to edit these sections.

5. Article stability? Seems stable enough.

6. Images?: Given the length of the article, more images would be welcome, in order to break up and illustrate the text.

When these issues are addressed, the article can be resubmitted for consideration. Thanks for your work so far. --MLilburne 14:27, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Created Sun Colonization Article

I created an article on the Colonization of the Sun. Please give it a chance. Mrld 17:44, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

As amusing as the idea is, I'm afraid it runs afoul of Wikipedia:Nonsense and Wikipedia:No original research, particularly because it only cites Wikipedia itself. Note also that the method described would not work, because there is nothing with a melting point greater than the equilibrium temperature at a few solar radii from the surface. The only reasonable method to survive so close to the Sun is to hide behind a very good mirror, or to build a Dyson sphere. Michaelbusch 17:54, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] General cleanup and addition of relevant data and citations

I've added some data pertaining to various locations, advantages, disadvantages. I've also cleaned up some of the one-sentence paragraphs and removed some redundant entries and unverifiable assertions. I've also marked a few items as citation needed in the hopes the original author or someone with them will provide them. I'll try to check back over the next few weeks and clean them out if not provided (I'll be gathering some of mine as well). I have more citations to add myself, but don't have them handy right now.

It seems to me that the article also needs a more cohesive structure. Perhaps something along the lines of breaking out the aspects of colonization such as as general risks that each location shares, energy generation methods, etc.. This would make the location-specific text not need to repeat the risks/dangers that are common. Instead these sections could illustrate how they deal with the risks/requirements. Or am I out in left field here?

I intend to get to more of this over the next few days to include a better footnote/references section - but that I'll tackle last. If someone wants to help out with that part I'd be happy. :) Ucntcme 23:21, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

I've removed most of your additions. While they are interesting, they are lengthly, uncited, and largely redundant. The material concerned would be appropriate on the various colonization sub-pages (e.g. Colonization of Mars). The article definitely needs clean-up, but in the form of editing rather than additions. Michaelbusch 16:41, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Then the sections on locations are redundant, incorrect in several cases, and uncited as well. For example, there is no dispute or debate as to whether Mars has valuable ores, it is a known fact.

It is not. There are very few concentrated ores on Mars. I'm working with 4Frontiers at the moment, and we've barely managed to find water and iron. Michaelbusch

Perhaps the locations would be better replaced by a See also section that links to the various subpages instead of calling each out and talking about them. IN particular the energy section is heavily in need of citations and makes claims that are vague and unverifiable, as well as entirely irrelevant. The Method section contains no methodology at all. The Space Transportation Section makes several claims that are uncited (per Wikipedia docs, references to Wikipedia pages don't count as citations), the section about Analogues is flat wrong, as the /cited/ material I put there demonstrates, and lacks any citation whatsoever. Likewise the Moon section makes assertions without cite. I am curious as to why you removed the citation needed tag from assertions that clearly needed citation. Is that not what it is for? But hey if you want this article to remain incorrect, unverifiable, and generally of poor quality I guess I can take my experience, knowledge, and references, of the subject elsewhere. No skin off my nose.

I'm not suggesting that. I want you to provide your citations, and remove redundant material. I didn't intend to remove the citation needed tags, but that may have gotten lost in removing the redundant material. I agree strongly that the article needs serious revision, but your additions make the article far too long and confusing. Query: what exactly are your experience, knowledge, and references? I have not seen the last. Michaelbusch 22:53, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Phobos and Deimos

The article said, incorrectly, that Phobos could contain water ice. We may say definitively that it does not. Spectral observations (Rivkin et al. 2002, Icarus 156, 64-75) indicate a composition similar to dehydrated carbonaecous chondrites, while radar detects no ice (both in the near surface, from Arecibo, and at depth, from MARSIS on Mars Express). On theoretical grounds, we would have expected both objects to devolatize by now. There may be small amounts of water in hydrated material, below the threshold imposed by the spectroscopy, but there is no ice. You need to be in the outer main belt to retain water ice in vaccum over the age of the solar system. I have edited the article to reflect this. Michaelbusch 01:29, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Thanks; very informative. Tell me, roughly how big could these 'small amounts' of hydrated material be though?WolfKeeper 01:55, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

<1% water by mass (or it would have shown up spectroscopically). That is a conservative upper bound. Andy Rivkin may be able to get bounds lower than that, but I am not certain. Michaelbusch 05:09, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

So, still some chance then, ~1% hydrates would probably be enough to be useful, there's far lower concentration in useful ores on Earth. But I'm not exactly banking on it. Spectroscopic analysis presumably wouldn't rule out hydrates under the 100m of regolith in any way either, but it's a lot of digging, and I bet it's nasty, sharp abrasive stuff to dig through.WolfKeeper 06:54, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

The Arecibo radar penetrates to ~2 m depth. MARSIS penetrates to several km depth, and sees nothing, except for an echo from the rim of Stickney. There is no ice there. Hydrates are another matter, but if there were any at depth, you'd expect exposures in fresh craters, and there are none. The Arecibo radar tells us that the near-surface material is smooth on cm-scales and very low-density (1.4 g/cm^3), so digging would not be a problem, especially given the low gravity. But we now run into original research. Michaelbusch 07:15, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Redundant counterarguments section removed

I took this away, from under the "Objections" heading. It is biased, redundant, and misplaced.

Silentlight 01:00, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

I placed it in its own section, and remeoved several redundancies. How is it any more biased than the Objections section?? Noclevername 02:27, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Merges

User:87.65.144.41 has been putting up merges on things like merge the Pluto Colonization article to the Kuiper Belt Colonization one. Does anyone know if this is accurate. Because I took the merge down and he flipped and has violated the 3 revert rule. I have stopped editing to avoid an editing war. But I think that the C0olonization of comets and space dust is totally different from Pluto. Can some one tell this user, because he doesn't listen to my warnings. See: Colonization of Pluto and Kuiper Belt and Oort Cloud Mrld 22:08, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] In situ

"Space colonization (also called space settlement, space humanization, space habitation, etc.) is the concept of permanent autonomous (self-sufficient) human habitation of locations outside Earth using In Situ Resource Utilization."

This is the opening paragraph of this article. Just a couple of nitpicks: In Situ Resource Utilization is capitalized here as if it's a printed plan or program or whatnot. Is it? Can we get a citation or a link to another Wiki article? Also, if a permanent human habitation was developed on the moon or Mars, but was not autonomous and did not use "I.S.R.U.", wouldn't it still be considered a space colony? Applejuicefool 17:16, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

In usual terminology, a colony is largely autonomous. Something that is autonomous would require the use of local resources, so I have re-phrased the lead. Michaelbusch 17:22, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

Nice wording. I particularly like the use of the very intelligble phrase "local resources" to link to the buzzword ISRU. Philcha 22:37, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps I'm missing something, or perhaps the colony article is incomplete, but I find nothing there that indicates autonomy. Applejuicefool 18:58, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

Consider the original meaning of the word: "The term colony is derived from the Latin colonia, which indicated a place meant for agricultural activities". More importantly, permanent habitation of space requires autonomy. Michaelbusch 19:09, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't think the etymology gets us very far. Colonia is indeed derived from colere = "to farm" (our words "culture" and "cultivate" are derived from other grammatical forms of the same word). In normal Roman use coloniae were military outposts (garrisons) which were meant to be self-supporting, but the military aspect was the real motive for founding them. "... permanent habitation of space requires autonomy" is dead right - hauling food, etc up from the surface of the Earth is economically impossible. Philcha 22:37, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I don't know if military bases count as "colonies" (I imagine they don't), but they're certainly not autonomous. Also, it would definitely be impossible to haul supplies to the Moon or Mars from Earth's surface using today's technology, but it wouldn't be so hard to imagine hauling supplies from a hydroponic space station facility (or to Mars from a similar facility on the Moon). Sure, such solutions are sci-fi pipe dreams at this point, but hey, they could happen. Applejuicefool 15:09, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Should Justifications and Objections be near the start?

I suggest the "Justifications" and "Objections" sections should immediately follow the table of contents. In general it's best to know what one is trying to achieve and why (or why not), before analysing technological and economic factors in detail. Here I think it will give readers an answer to the natural question, "Why should I spend time reading this article?" (even if they disagree).

If this suggestion is accepted, the item I've just added to "Outside the Solar system" about Stephen Hawking's advocacy should be in "Justifications" (which I hadn't spotted because it's so far down the article). Philcha 22:20, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

It seems to me that at this point the reasons are less important than the technical and economic feasibility questions. Of course costs and benefits have to be balanced off against each other, and a serious effort to address that is inseparable from feasibility. But my guess is that most folks coming into the article cold will first need to be convinced that the idea is feasible enough to merit serious thought, then they'll want to know if it sounds nice, and then they'll want to review the problems. There is inevitably POV here implicit in the order: if the consensus were that space colonies were a terrible idea, absurdly impossible and or deadly dangerous, then putting that early on would likely be a good idea, to get it out of the way. Personally, thinking it's interesting, I'd rather make a case for technical feasibility, then describe why such things might be attractive, then face the questions and problems.

Also, on a related issue, I've been wanting to improve the "Rationale" section of the Space exploration article, with subsections both pro and con. This is still pretty chaotic (and likely to become more so), but it does seem that there is a lot of natural overlap with similar discussions here, so those of you who are interested might like to keep an eye on it. (And of course I may appropriate good stuff here for that article.)

Thanks, Bill Wwheaton (talk) 23:27, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Energy sources

I think this section ignores other well-canvassed possibilities, e.g. electrodynamic tethers generating energy from Jupiter's enormous magnetic field and using Helium 3 for fusion (Jupiter apparently has a lot of ³He and ³He is said to be an easier source of fusion power than deuterium. To make room for this I'd reduce the amount of space spent on solar power. Philcha 22:52, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm afraid those two don't work out from technical and economic standpoints, at least in the short term. Michaelbusch 23:13, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Can you please point to explanations of why they don't? Even better if they also explain what we'd have to do to make them viable.

Your comment also highlights a philosophical issue which this article needs to resolve. Should it deal with what is (a) both possible and feasible with current technology; (b) possible but economically unfeasible; (c) consistent with our current understanding of the laws of nature and just a little beyond our current reach; (d) theoretically possible but well beyond our current reach? If it includes (b),(c) or (d), I think the article should also state to which category approach belongs.Philcha 23:39, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

The problems with ³He from Jupiter are, first, it seems discouragingly beyond present technology to get anything off Jupiter in significant quantities due to its very high escape velocity (even to reach orbit from the equator, taking advantage of its rotation, needs about 30 km/s; compare with the total velocity capability of the Saturn V of about 12 km/s and its total mass to payload ratio of about 60 = 6,000,000/100,000, [in pounds, where payload is the Apollo CSM/LM stack] and then ponder the practical difficulty of assembling a Super-Saturn V on Jupiter), and second, ³He fusion also has significant problems (fusion still not at break-even even with the easiest D/T fuel; still higher temperature needed for ³He + D; associated D+D reactions would still produce neutrons), though it may be viable sometime in the future.

Tethers only extract energy from an orbiting body (which would have to be replenished somehow), they do not obtain energy from an unlimited or renewable source. The ³He you could at least ship back to Earth (John S. Lewis valued it at 16 billion $US per ton in 1997), but there is no obvious practical way to get energy to Earth from a tether, though it might be useful in situ in certain situations.

I would class both of these as (d) on your scale above. Sorry so negative and so late, hope it is useful to someone. Wwheaton (talk) 17:20, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Gas giants, food supply, life support and transhumanism

I don't find this section convincing as it stands. I notice there's no link to a main article (as there is for e.g. Venus) - perhaps because someone's doing the research for one, or perhaps because there's a shortage of usable references.

There's no mention of the high wind speeds on Jupiter and even more so on Neptune - these would be a serious problem for "floating colonies".

"Jupiter would be less suitable for habitation due to its high gravity, escape velocity ..." makes little sense - if the floating colonies are at an altitude with 1G gravity, escape velocity from that altitude is the same as from Earth's surface.

Food supply would be a real problem for floating colonies, because the gas giants' atmospheres are deficient in carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, sulfur, phosphorus and lots of trace elements.

In fact I think the whole article pays too little attention to food supply and chemical requirements for life support. If these are not met, a colony cannot be self-sufficient and therefore is likely to be economically unviable - unless one goes for the transhumanist approach (as I do for that reason - specifically mind uploading, in which case water and gravity are just nuisances to be avoided). Philcha 23:39, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

The one-g point above Jupiter would be well outside its atmosphere, so no floating colonies, but perhaps a structure at that hight supported by orbital tethers. Noclevername 20:58, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

This would be impossible, due to the massive and intense radiation belts surrounding Jupiter. siafu 02:41, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

The information I got here suggests otherwise-- the 1-g level should not be near the radiation belts. If you have other numbers, I'd be willing to look at them. Noclevername 01:25, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

You're going to have to be more specific than that for a reference; that's just a page with 2 dozen essays on it. It also occurs to me that the claim: "at an altitude with 1G gravity, escape velocity from that altitude is the same as from Earth's surface" is not true either. The force of gravity varies with the inverse square of the distance r, while the escape velocity varies with the inverse square root of r; they do not correlate linearly. siafu 16:21, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Nuts, I thought that was the right link. Anyone have the data on the correct 1-G altitude of Jupiter? I'm in the middle of some RL and everything's kind of unfindable here. (Actually, this is getting kind of off-topic, it may be sufficient just to have the article say something like "there are several reasons why Jupiter and environs would not make an ideal site for colonization-- its gravity well, unpredictable wind conditions and radiation belt" --worded better than that, of course). Noclevername 17:34, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

Using the value for the mass of Jupiter of 1.8986×10²⁷ kg, the distance at which the force of gravity is 1 G (i.e., at which 1 kg weighs 9.81 N) is 113,649.5 km (as an aside, the distance from Jupiter's center at which the escape velocity is the same as it is on the Earth's surface is 1,000.993 km, a difference of almost a full order of magnitude). This is only 16,000 km from the orbit of Metis, the innermost of the mini-satellites, and according to the table I found on p. 167 of Zubrin's Entering Space, the radiation dose on the surface of Metis is 18,000 rem/day. That's an awful lot; about 30 times as much as is received on the surface of Europa. So, I think we can count this one out as a real possibility, unless you have a source than can point out what I'm missing. siafu 19:16, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Who butchered the Criticisms section?

I just restored it, if anyone thinks it needs changes please address them here on the talk page (that's what it's for). Noclevername 03:06, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

On a related issue (duplicating a notice three sections earlier; pardon), I've been wanting to improve the "Rationale" section of the Space exploration article, with subsections both pro and con. This is still pretty chaotic (and likely to become more so), but it does seem that there is a lot of natural overlap with similar discussions here, so those of you who are interested might like to keep an eye on it. Thanks. Wwheaton (talk) 23:32, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Merge material from Space exploration

Would someone from the community of space colonization editors please take a look at Space exploration to see if the material there should be merged into this article? Space exploration has *two* sections on colonization, in addition to a "Main article: Space colonization" link. Could that article keep one of the sections, and the link, and then just have a brief intro to the topic of space colonization? (Sdsds - Talk) 20:51, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] No fiction please

Please do not add fictional material to space colonization pages. There already exist articles dealing with fiction related to all the major bodies of the Solar System, and many of the fictional references were simply copied from those articles, creating an unnecessary duplication. If a space colonization page does not have enough material to make it an informative article, adding references to fiction (often having nothing to do with colonization) does not help it at all. RandomCritic 17:43, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

I would agree, and also think there should be a separate article for the games, probably titled Space colonization (games). Hope I'm not being a snooty elitist, but I hate to see the "serious" technical, economic, and other issues get diffused unnecessarily, and maybe lose the focus of the article. Game designers could still use the technical article as a resource, but discussions of pure game issues would not get mixed up with it. I would hesitate to do this without discussion and feedback, but might do it if there is no significant objection from the game community. Bill Wwheaton (talk) 22:18, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Population

Removed this bit:

However, since some believe that the world population may stabilize^[1], eventually the Earth's polulation may stabilize for a time.

...As original research. Noclevername 01:09, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] TINDSOTM

"There is no dark side of the Moon", really. From the perspective of a solar power station at Sun-Earth L1, the Moon passes behind the Earth on a regular basis. So the current claim in the article that, "Continuous energy could be beamed to the lunar surface from a solar power satellite at the Lagrange L1 location" is dubious. What is the source for this claim? (sdsds - talk) 19:42, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

I don't have any references but it occurs to me that from the Sun-Earth L1 point you could beam continuous power to the moon but not directly, but with a suitably positioned satellite (probably more than one actually) in earth orbit which could act as a relay for the microwave power from the solar collector and direct the energy towards the moon while the moon fell on the night side of earth, in precisely the way one uses communication satellites to relay signals around earth. MttJocy (talk) 08:59, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

Forgive me if I am being dense, but I don't quite get it. Earth/Moon L1 is about 4X farther from Earth than the Earth/Moon distance. So although a power satellite out there would presumably not be precisely at L1 (I think spacecraft there have to be actively maintained along the unstable Earth-Sun direction, and usually "orbit" L1 in the transverse plane), it would see almost a full Moon, all the time. So the side it would see would be just the side in daylight, which would not need power. An alternative, Earth/Sun L2, on the far side of the Earth away from the Sun, would see the DSOTM (?! So there is one, actually...! I always thought it was a mythical place!). But does it really make sense to beam power so far? This is 30X farther than the Earth-GSO distance, which gives a factor of about 30⁴ = 10⁶ degradation in combined antenna gain factor for the transmit & receive antenna system, so they would have to be correspondingly larger to avoid big losses. Seems like we'd do better to just run high-tension lines around the Moon from solar panels near its equator. Wwheaton (talk) 22:04, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

It definitely does seem possible for power to be beamed to Earth or the Moon, from the Sun. As interest in this route, therefore leading to funding, starts to form, a project of this kind is bound to begin. Not only can power be beamed with accuracy using microwave/laser technology but a complex network can eventually be created (hundreds maybe thousands of years into the future) that can transfer energy to many different parts of the solar system. This type of technology is what could be used for powering the space elevator, and future deep space crafts that will not carry fuel. 131.172.4.44 (talk) 01:51, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ugly imperialist word!

Colonization as a word should be avoided, it is as much tainted as the holocaust. Look at what happened to the inca, the redskins or the negros from Africa who got sold as slaves, or how the british imperialists destroyed China with their opium wars.

Maybe americans, as a young country, who only had a few colonial affairs (the Philippines mainly), do not understand the gravity of this issue, but Europe is still much troubled by the atrocities of colonial era and these extra-terrestrail projects would certainly get more support, if there was more politically correct name to it, that awakes no memories of either Cortez or General Custer in the readers minds. 82.131.210.162 (talk) 13:27, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

I doubt that this objection will find much traction in the context of space, assuming we find no alien life in the near future. Then there will be no ethical issue about the relation between different species, and the damage one might do to the other. Of course the term "space settlement" would avoid the problem, but I fear "colonization" is probably too well established to change.

But also, even though the prospect of old-fashioned colonial oppression seems remote based on what we know now about the nearby universe, we should not forget that it could arise unexpectedly at any time. There is certainly some possibility that life (microbiology, at least) exists in our own Solar System, though the likelihood of advanced life seems fairly remote at the present. But even if there are only ancient microbes, on Mars say, we would have to face up to the possible catastrophic effect human presence might have on such life forms (not to mention the effect it could conceivably have on us ....) And we will also need to face the issues raised by the likely destruction of the natural alien environments we encounter, even in the absence of life. Knowing the human species (based on troubling past experience), I doubt these issues are going to stop the program, but it would probably be wise to notice that they do exist, and could become serious at any point. Keeping the old bad word seems to me to be prudent, if just to remind us that the danger is lurking out there. Changing a word without changing the reality, for PR or political correctness, is not necessarily such a good idea, after all. I personally am strongly in favor of human expansion into space, but if we forget the lessons of history, we could get into serious ethical (or practical) trouble down the line, eventually on a cosmic scale. Wwheaton (talk) 15:17, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Racial issues

The article should discuss the issue that space colonies be limited to members of one race. What is the purpose of exporting earth's racial problems to space? These could be avoided, possibly forever, by limiting the population of space colonies to members of one particular race. There might be a white space colony, and a black space colony, and a Chinese space colony, etc., where members of those individual races could live together harmoniously.65.215.113.163 (talk) 05:40, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

I must say I have extremely mixed feelings about this. At the worst, it could lead to the evolution of implacably hostile human subspecies, and plant the seeds of future terrible conflict on a cosmic scale. Surely we have had way too much of that in the past century. On the other hand, I am not sure I am wise enough to set myself against the wisdom of biological diversity, which seems to be one of Life's fundamental strategies ("Try everything!"), and which a more permissive attitude might support. I am certain I would oppose limiting all colonies to racial uniformity , however, though I might be willing to accept some that were selective, as long as they did not impose discrimination on others. The space environment is fundamentally different than Earth, in that space and energy are not really problematic. That does change things. Good question! Wwheaton (talk) 04:10, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Starship

I think the concepts mentioned in this section need to recognize that, with the barely conceivable exception of anti-matter propulsion, no credible means of getting up to more than about 10% of the speed of light is known. Even with nuclear fusion, the most energetic realistic form of on-board propulsion, the rocket equation poses tremendous problems for a ship that is to accelerate to say, 0.1c , possibly coast for a while, and then decelerate to the speeds of stars in the Galaxy. Laser sailing with beam-driven propulsion seems potentially able to achieve similar speeds, but nothing seriously approaching light speed, due to the redshift (and accompanying loss of energy and momentum in the beam) of the source, if for no other reason; and it also has the serious problem of not being able to stop at the destination without some other means of propulsion.

This means we are talking about trip times of decades or a century even to reach the nearest stars. The technology needed to build a self-sustaining colony, with a life time of a century, could well be enabling for such concepts. Shielding against radiation would not be significantly affected by such low speeds beyond that which would be needed to protect against cosmic rays (conservatively, 1000 gm/cm², the same as provided by the Earth's atmosphere). Interstellar dust would probably not be a serious issue either, once far from the Solar System, perhaps avoiding especially dusty regions. The local solar neighborhood seems to have very low density of dust and gas, on the order of 0.01 protons per cm³. Section would be more relevant and more credible if it were edited with these realities in mind. Wwheaton (talk) 00:55, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

I have reworked this section considerably, in line with the above considerations. I have omitted anti-matter propulsion, with some sorrow, from the mix of relevant possibilities, as I consider it to be beyond the pale of reasonably predictable technology, except possibly for reaching high sub-relativistic speeds, because of its severe energy losses to neutrinos and gamma-radiation. (My general criterion has been "no magic allowed".) I feel this section still leaves much to be desired, but I hope it is somewhat better than what we had before, and that people will use it as a place to start for improvement. At the same time I think the section is fundamentally important, as it could conceivably hold the key to the long-term survival of intelligence in the Galaxy, if it turns out, as it may, that Earth holds the only intelligent life in it. Wwheaton (talk) 03:53, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] contested statements removed

• Present-day launch costs are very high — $3,000 to $25,000 per kilogram from Earth to Low Earth Orbit (LEO). {{Fact|date=July 2007}}
• Note that plant based life support systems are very inefficient in their use of energy; about 1–3% energetic efficiency is common. {{Fact|date=March 2007}}
• Near Earth Asteroids, which have all the materials needed (with the possible exception of nitrogen {{Fact|date=October 2007}})
• In the 1950s and 1960s, . . . Krafft Ehricke published [his] ideas. {{Fact|date=March 2007}}*According to this view, there is nothing in space that we really need, adding that moving beyond the solar system is totally impractical in any reasonable time scale {{Fact|date=February 2007}}.

Please do not return this information to the article without a citation.--BirgitteSB 17:04, 6 June 2008 (UTC)