[extropy-chat] 10th Planet Discovered

[J Corbally]

>Message: 23
>Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2004 15:49:49 +0100
>From: Eugen Leitl <eugen at leitl.org>
>Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] 10th Planet Discovered
>To: ExI chat list <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org>
>Message-ID: <20040315144949.GF18046 at leitl.org>
>Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>
>
>On Mon, Mar 15, 2004 at 09:26:48AM -0500, Brent Neal wrote:
> > Its seems to me that a necessary condition for any outer planet 
> colonization is a manufacturing base outside of our gravity well. I'm 
> sure some will disagree, but unless we -vastly- improve the cost of 
> putting a pound in orbit, even Mars remains a difficult colonization prospect.
>Sustainable colonization is equivalent to local fabbing. The launch
>capacities are only a bottleneck if your seed size is not small. Not a
>problem with small scale technology, especially nanotechnology.
> >
> > I find the hype about Sudna to be an exceptionally amusing journalistic 
> conceit, considering that many astronomers are proposing removing Pluto's 
> 'planet' status. Categorically, it makes more sense to do that that to 
> try to find some arbitrary size limit on KBOs that defines 'planet' or not.
>http://www.hvgb.net/~sedna/story.html
>Sedna is a very significant figure in Inuit mythology. There are a number of
>different versions of the myth of Sedna. I will share with you the one I
>prefer.

<snip>

Interesting story, especially regarding the creation of the seals.  Irish 
legends tell of the seal people, who could take human form.  When they fell 
in love, they could stay with their human partners for the rest of their 
lives, but if they returned to the sea, they would become seals again forever.

One such story I grew up with is "Kagan and the Wind" , written by an 
American I believe.  The Tommy Makem telling of it used to frighten me when 
I was young :)

http://www.mit.edu:8001/people/endeavor/wind.html

These creatures are often referred to as Silkies, selkies, selchies, 
kelpies, roane and seal people.

Wonder if there's some distant connection.




James...