Thursday 11 January 2018

The Final Frontier

"It is my considered opinion that, without access to space, without opening space for people to use, industrial civilization does not have much longer to live. At best, our near-future descendants will revert to the norm of history, which Alfred Duggan described as 'peasants ruled by brigands;' and it won't matter if the brigands retain a certain amount of high tech. At worst, our species will go the way of the dinosaurs - who enjoyed a far lengthier day and left the globe in far better shape."
-Poul Anderson, "Commentary" IN Anderson, Space Folk (New York, 1989), pp. 257-260 AT p. 259.

I quote this passage because it is by Poul Anderson and is pertinent, not because I necessarily agree with it. There is current experimentation with reusable spacecraft although not enough. I want to see human beings in self-sustaining space habitats because we need a defense system against asteroid strikes and because mankind should not have all its eggs in one basket at the bottom of a single gravity well. Whether access to space is the only way to save industrial civilization is another matter. If that civilization is systematically destroying the Terrestrial environment, then clearly we need to make some changes in that civilization whether or not we get off Earth soon. At the same time, what Anderson wrote about space is true:

"Yonder are all the materials, energy, elbow room, and wonderful discoveries to make that our species can ever require." (op. cit., p. 258)

9 comments:

paulshackley2017@gmail.com said...

Kaor, Paul!

I absolutely agree with what Anderson and you have said here! And getting off this rock in a permanent and serious way would make it possible to move necessary, but damaging industries off Earth. Rather like a rogue planet began to be used in SATAN'S WORLD for really massive industries that would have damaged habitable planets.

We should have founded bases and colonies on MARS 25 years ago!!!

Sean


David Birr said...

Paul and Sean:
The song "The Light Ship" by Leslie Fish is actually about a solar power space station rather than a ship. Its last lines are,
"And the Earth is clean
As a springtime dream;
No factory smokes appear,
For they've left the land
To the gardener's hand
And they all are circling here!"

paulshackley2017@gmail.com said...

David,
The longer term future but not an immediate prospect but space colonization needs to start now.
Paul.

paulshackley2017@gmail.com said...

Kaor, DAVID and Paul!

David, I like that bit you quoted from the works of Leslie Fish! And I've seen similar statements in the works of Poul Anderson.

Paul, the knowledge, and even the means of getting off Earth in a serious way is here. What has been lacking is the foresight and WILL for using that knowledge. And I think costly mistakes were made, such as the dead end of the Shuttle in the US. The late Jerry Pournelle has convincingly argued that a vertical take off and landing technology was better as a means of reaching space in a reasonably economical way.

Sean

paulshackley2017@gmail.com said...

Sean,
And I believe that vertical take off and landing spacecraft are being developed.
Paul.

paulshackley2017@gmail.com said...

Kaor, Paul!

Correct, that is the basic line being taken by Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX. I hope he succeeds and becomes a real world D.D. Harriman!

Anderson's "Commentary," from SPACE FOLK, was copied by me and inserted into a composition book (along with many other notes, lists, quotes, articles, drafts of some of my essays, etc., devoted to, about, or related to Anderson). By now my pretentiously titled CODEX ANDERSONIANUS has reached page 184.

Sometimes I've even imagined, assuming the fall of our civilization, this composition book somehow surviving and being copied by Benedictine monks. That would be one way of preserving a small bit of the works and ideas of Anderson!

Sean


David Birr said...

Paul and Sean:
We now know it's impossible to land anywhere but Earth with anything but VTOL. The Martian atmosphere is simply too thin to support winged landing. The atmosphere of Venus is dense enough; too dense, in fact, not to mention acidic and furnace-hot. It'd corrode, crush, and melt the wings. Wings are right out, for planetfall* in the Solar System, except on return to the Mother World.

* It may still be possible, if the radiation level can be dealt with, to fly in a gas giant's atmosphere ... but without ever touching down.

paulshackley2017@gmail.com said...

David,
Thanks to Poul Anderson, we discuss mythology, history, politics and space technology on the same blog.
Paul.

paulshackley2017@gmail.com said...

Kaor, DAVID!

I've been convinced of the need for VTOL technology as the best practical means of seriously reaching space since I read Jerry Pournelle's paper on that subject. As for Venus, Dr. Pournelle also wrote a paper with the Andersonian title "The Big Rain" detailing how that planet could be terraformed using technology available in the '70's!

I'm so frustrated at how LITTLE has been done at trying out some of the ideas by Pournelle in books like his A STEP FARTHER OUT or O'Neill's THE HIGH FRONTIER! Timidity, foolishness, shortsightedness, lack of imagination, etc., are the defining qualities of our dismal times.

Sean