Let's Colonize Titan • Hacker News Board

Re: Let's Colonize Titan

#151

Post by banach » Sun, Nov 27, 2016, 4:15 PM UTC

lossolo wrote: post #134

banach wrote: post #106

I think that, before colonizing other planets, we should start by realizing that Earth can easily sustain human kind for the foreseeable future, given some pretty modest tweaks to our way of life (compared to "going multi-planetary" that is). If we start valuing quality over novelty, stop eating animal-based foods and re-organize to live closer to where we work, we can stop the consumption and that is taxing our ecos…

Finding solution is not a problem, human nature is a problem. > stop eating animal-based foods Good luck with that. Sad true is that people don't want to change their life style. If you ask them for solution they will tell you exactly the same thing as you wrote, but most of them will not implement any of this solutions in their life. They want to eat meat, they want to consume, look at global warming, everyone know…

I have actually seen a surprising trend to the contrary among my friends. These are people with very different backgrounds (anything from the hardly-ever-employed working class to researchers), but over the past year I can count at least five people who have started eating vegetarian most days of the week. Just like tattoos and beards, these things can become trendy, and then peer pressure takes care of the rest.

Re: Let's Colonize Titan

#152

Post by ivan_gammel » Sun, Nov 27, 2016, 4:21 PM UTC

lossolo wrote: post #134

banach wrote: post #106

I think that, before colonizing other planets, we should start by realizing that Earth can easily sustain human kind for the foreseeable future, given some pretty modest tweaks to our way of life (compared to "going multi-planetary" that is). If we start valuing quality over novelty, stop eating animal-based foods and re-organize to live closer to where we work, we can stop the consumption and that is taxing our ecos…

Finding solution is not a problem, human nature is a problem. > stop eating animal-based foods Good luck with that. Sad true is that people don't want to change their life style. If you ask them for solution they will tell you exactly the same thing as you wrote, but most of them will not implement any of this solutions in their life. They want to eat meat, they want to consume, look at global warming, everyone know…

People want to live a comfortable life and they'll give up with natural meat if they'll be given good artifical alternative (especially, with genetically identical alternative). Green energy, effective water recycling, disposable packing materials and automatic sorting and processing of garbage are the things that, given the adequate technology, can make the sustainable life style smooth and easy. We don't need to change ourselves and consume less - we need to be innovative enough, so that our consumer life style will not harm the nature.

Re: Let's Colonize Titan

#153

Post by neolefty » Sun, Nov 27, 2016, 4:22 PM UTC

oska wrote: post #36

> On Earth, we are shielded from GCRs by water in the atmosphere. But it takes two meters of water to block half of the GCRs present in unprotected space. Build a double-skinned geodesic dome with a 4 metre gap between the two shells. Fill the space between with water. Your 'sky' now has a water-shielding layer.

It will freeze; water-fiber composite roof material, sprayed/laminated from the outside?

Re: Let's Colonize Titan

#154

Post by neolefty » Sun, Nov 27, 2016, 4:23 PM UTC

ajuc wrote: post #37

oska wrote: post #36

> On Earth, we are shielded from GCRs by water in the atmosphere. But it takes two meters of water to block half of the GCRs present in unprotected space. Build a double-skinned geodesic dome with a 4 metre gap between the two shells. Fill the space between with water. Your 'sky' now has a water-shielding layer.

1 square meter of such roof would weight 4 tonnes (on Earth). 500 kg on Titan. That's quite a roof.

Also, it will be frozen solid; in a dome shape it could support itself.

Construction: Start with a solid dome, layer water/fiber composite on from the outside, then remove the solid dome from the inside?

Re: Let's Colonize Titan

#155

Post by mathattack » Sun, Nov 27, 2016, 4:24 PM UTC

banach wrote: post #106

I think that, before colonizing other planets, we should start by realizing that Earth can easily sustain human kind for the foreseeable future, given some pretty modest tweaks to our way of life (compared to "going multi-planetary" that is). If we start valuing quality over novelty, stop eating animal-based foods and re-organize to live closer to where we work, we can stop the consumption and that is taxing our ecos…

This. The effort to terraform the Earth and learn to get along with each other is much easier here than anywhere else.

Re: Let's Colonize Titan

#156

Post by peatmoss » Sun, Nov 27, 2016, 4:25 PM UTC

camillomiller wrote: post #88

If you really want to read some interesting and literary valuable sci-fi about Titan, then read Vonnegut's "The Sirens of Titan". :) https://www.amazon.com/Sirens-Titan-Novel-Kurt-Vonnegut/dp/0...

Also feels very different compared to other Vonnegut. Definitely more sci-fi feel than social commentary as in his later books. Sirens of Titan aged better past my teen years than did, say, Slaughterhouse Five.

Don't get me wrong, there's a lot that I love about later Vonnegut. But Sirens of Titan stands out as an early gem.

Re: Let's Colonize Titan

#157

Post by neolefty » Sun, Nov 27, 2016, 4:26 PM UTC

agentgt wrote: post #14

I am probably completely wrong but it seem easier and perhaps more fruitful to build the proper shielding in a station/ship and build a network up in one of the asteroid belts.

I love this chart: Delta-V required for various solar system destinations:

https://www.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/534ylb/elon_musk_on...

Re: Let's Colonize Titan

#158

Post by marcosdumay » Sun, Nov 27, 2016, 4:27 PM UTC

XorNot wrote: post #26

usrusr wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trap it in a giant plastic bag ;) Yaysayers will always find an excuse why something they don't like to be impossible isn't. "But the Wright Brothers!" and all that...

Honestly why not? If you start from the premise of domed cities, then the expansion pattern pretty obviously says glassing in the entire moon is the natural end result of that. The lower-gravity drastically reduces your requirements, and the regolith can be fused into glass and moved a 100m up to form the roof. It also reduces your energy requirements long term because you can use mirrors at the roof-level to reflect…

> Honestly why not?

If we go into making greenhouses out of celestial bodies, asteroids are a much more compelling target than the moon.

Re: Let's Colonize Titan

#159

Post by pavelrub » Sun, Nov 27, 2016, 4:28 PM UTC

banach wrote: post #106

I think that, before colonizing other planets, we should start by realizing that Earth can easily sustain human kind for the foreseeable future, given some pretty modest tweaks to our way of life (compared to "going multi-planetary" that is). If we start valuing quality over novelty, stop eating animal-based foods and re-organize to live closer to where we work, we can stop the consumption and that is taxing our ecos…

Yes let's stop all scientific and technological progress which isn't directly related to achieving utopia on earth, until a hypothetical point in the future that will never come.

Is everything you do and find important in life directly related to improving our ecosystem and eliminating nuclear stockpiles? Do you think it's ok to be interested, for example, in web development, but not in space colonization? Maybe instead of attempting to force artificial goals on human society, you should acknowledge the fact that people care about more things than your notion of "quality". Denying them those things in the name of some artificial pragmatism is exactly the opposite of pragmatism - it ignores the realities of human society, ignores the actual wishes of people, and replaces them with an artificial ideology.

I would much rather live in a world where some people care about clean energy and sustainability, others about colonizing space, others about mathematics, and others about art, etc., than in a world where the majority of those things are shunned because of arguments such as yours. The latter world is a far more miserable one, and a miserable reality isn't a solution to anything.

Re: Let's Colonize Titan

#160

Post by Koshkin » Sun, Nov 27, 2016, 4:31 PM UTC

hereonbusiness wrote: post #17

We expect human nature to stay the same. Human beings of the future will have the same drives and needs we have now. Practically speaking, their home must have abundant energy, livable temperatures and protection from the rigors of space, including cosmic radiation, which new research suggests is unavoidably dangerous for biological beings like us I would expect the complete opposite if we really want to colonize the…

> replace the human body

But would not this be the same as the destruction of the human species as we know it? Which is exactly what is meant to be avoided by the idea of colonizing other planets?

(Incidentally, I suspect that the brain will not be the last organ that will be replaced with a mechanical part.)