I liked‘A City On Mars’. That said I think it didn't have the right sense of scale. The Weinersmith's offered up a bunch of reasons why the eponymous city would never be possible but I think the most important bit - which they would concede I think - is that it's not Never but rather not any time soon.
200 years? 300? Timescales like that are going to create solutions to all the problems they listed. It's why they spend time knocking people suggesting we'll have boots on the moon in 50 years.
The modest stuff being done now - say setting up something equivalent to the various Antarctic bases on the moon seem like a reasonable step today towards something in the future.
> weinersmith's offered up a bunch of reasons why the eponymous city would never be possible
That wasn’t my read. They said there is scientific and engineering work to be done before we attempt colonisation. Work done more cheaply in LEO and on the Moon.
One that stood out is the lack of low-gravity trauma medicine. Another was the lack of an in-space toilet. (Since developed!)
That doesn’t mean we can’t do manned missions or even establish a base in the meantime. But it won’t be a colony. It will be a research outpost whose greatest ambition might be to resemble the ones we have in Antarctica.
hackeraccount · · focus · HN ↗
200 years? 300? Timescales like that are going to create solutions to all the problems they listed. It's why they spend time knocking people suggesting we'll have boots on the moon in 50 years.
The modest stuff being done now - say setting up something equivalent to the various Antarctic bases on the moon seem like a reasonable step today towards something in the future.
JumpCrisscross · · focus · HN ↗
That wasn’t my read. They said there is scientific and engineering work to be done before we attempt colonisation. Work done more cheaply in LEO and on the Moon.
One that stood out is the lack of low-gravity trauma medicine. Another was the lack of an in-space toilet. (Since developed!)
That doesn’t mean we can’t do manned missions or even establish a base in the meantime. But it won’t be a colony. It will be a research outpost whose greatest ambition might be to resemble the ones we have in Antarctica.