[extropy-chat] Moon news

[Anders Sandberg]

Damien Broderick said:
>
> No one mentions that if you want to stay on Mars rather than going briefly
> and coming back, the answer might just be -- stay on Earth. For the next
> decade or so (as is planned anyway). Put all that loot into nanotechnology
> and other bootstraps. Then build a skyhook or a diamonoid launch platform
> or
> something equally radical. Meanwhile, send probes if you really must.
>
> Damien Broderick

There seem to be two approaches to really going to space. One is to use
the cheapest, tried-and-true technology you can find - possibly using it
in unorthodox ways, but in general make sure you don't have to wait and
don't have to assume any technological development. The other one is to
wait for more advanced technology to appear in other areas, and then apply
it. It is a gamble, but you may get more performance for the same price
later, and in many applications you get finished faster. For example, if
you have a large computing problem it might pay to wait for faster
machines rather than running it longer on a slow machine.

In space travel the travel time is likely not the most sensitive aspect to
technology development (unless it enables extremely high ISP gains; the
rest is just gravity) but rather launch cost, miniaturization and price of
the components will be affected more. So the waiters might not get there
first, but they are far more likely to be able to stay. Perhaps even more
important is the development times of projects. It is not obvious how fast
they will decrease *if* they decrease - in a situation of fast
technological change adapting new unexpected capabilities that arrive
while planning might cause delays. Especially if accelerating development
makes it attractive to wait just a little bit more for the next
breakthrough...



-- 
Anders Sandberg
http://www.nada.kth.se/~asa
http://www.aleph.se/andart/

The sum of human knowledge sounds nice. But I want more.