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Let's colonize LEO. You get radiation protection from earth's magnetosphere. You get zero G for funsies. You get a new perspective on earth and interesting ne

Let's colonize LEO. You get radiation protection from earth's magnetosphere. You get zero G for funsies. You get a new perspective on earth and interesting new kinds of manufacturing. It's not too far away, so you can get there and back in a day. It's far enough in space that you need to improve your closed cycle systems. You might survive a number of different cataclysms. It seems like a good stepping stone.

garmaine 7y ago
> You get radiation protection from earth's magnetosphere. Only in very specific orbits (NOT the ones we are currently using, btw.) The Earth's magnetosphere actually captures dangerous radiation and various anomalies in the belt distribution cause portions of low-Earth orbits to be irradiated. > You get zero G for funsies. And the medical issues. > interesting new kinds of manufacturing. There are a handful of (very interesting) crystal manufacturing that requires zero-g. These could be done in automated or human tended LEO or LLO manufacturing labs. You don't need a large human presence. To the downsides, LEO lacks any resources whatsoever, and still has a nontrivial delta-v to the rest of the system. All your arguments in favor could be applied to the Moon, which does have LOTS of resources and better radiation shielding.
- russdill 7y ago
  And really, it's the atmosphere that does the bulk of the radiation protection work. Astronauts abort the ISS still experience their fair share of radiation. As mentioned though, their orbit is far from ideal and different orbits have less radiation.
- Symmetry 7y ago
  So, the ISS orbit crosses the South American Magnetic Anomaly sometimes which does give them a bit of inner Van Allen belt radiation sometimes. But they're still completely protected from direct emissions of charged particles from Sun. They would get much, much more radiation if they were orbiting out by the Moon even before you start worrying about solar storms.
- state_less 7y ago
  I'm not trying to take the wind out of the sails of any vehicles going elsewhere, just think LEO is a good place to start. Something like, before crossing an ocean, let's cross the Florida straits over to the Bahamas. > The Earth's magnetosphere actually captures dangerous radiation and various anomalies in the belt distribution cause portions of low-Earth orbits to be irradiated. Pick the favorable orbits. We have data on our ISS astronauts. Seems like we can go years up there if we wanted. > And the medical issues. Most folks are going to want to go up for a few weeks/months and then come back to tell the tale. A habitat might employ centripetal acceleration. Anyhow, I think medical issues will be manageable. I suspect there are a few orders of magnitude more people who are interested in a vacation in space or work from space scenario than a long distance voyage to the moon or mars where you are cut off from the home world and have a big latency cost on communications. I think this is about filling rockets with large sums of cargo to keep the space business growing. If a starship can be made for $5 million, there are plenty of yachts just down the coast from Cape Canaveral that cost more than that. If you could give folks a stay in LEO for ~$50k, there will be plenty of people who can afford that. I bet you could find tech companies that would let you work remotely from space as a signing bonus. > There are a handful of (very interesting) crystal manufacturing that requires zero-g. These could be done in automated or human tended LEO or LLO manufacturing labs. You don't need a large human presence. Agreed, I'd add that this isn't so much about keeping the number of people down, but increasing the demand for people to go into space. I'm excited about the side effects it will have for technology and science. > To the downsides, LEO lacks any resources whatsoever, and still has a nontrivial delta-v to the rest of the system. All your arguments in favor could be applied to the Moon, which does have LOTS of resources and better radiation shielding. The moon and mars are good places to settle too. I'm only arguing that Earth LEO is easier to start with because Earth has more readily available resources than any of the other locations. LEO is still hard enough where we'll have to improve our ships and space quarters for design and comfort. So I think it's a good stepping stone.
  - mjevans 7y ago
    LEO is more like 'camping in the back yard'. All I ever learned from that is that I hate camping... and would much rather have a house / hotel room. Extending that analogy further, maybe we can figure out how to build a "mother in law apartment" in our "back yard" first.

garmaine 7y ago

> You get radiation protection from earth's magnetosphere. Only in very specific orbits (NOT the ones we are currently using, btw.) The Earth's magnetosphere actually captures dangerous radiation and various anomalies in the belt distribution cause portions of low-Earth orbits to be irradiated. > You get zero G for funsies. And the medical issues. > interesting new kinds of manufacturing. There are a handful of (very interesting) crystal manufacturing that requires zero-g. These could be done in automated or human tended LEO or LLO manufacturing labs. You don't need a large human presence. To the downsides, LEO lacks any resources whatsoever, and still has a nontrivial delta-v to the rest of the system. All your arguments in favor could be applied to the Moon, which does have LOTS of resources and better radiation shielding.

russdill 7y ago
And really, it's the atmosphere that does the bulk of the radiation protection work. Astronauts abort the ISS still experience their fair share of radiation. As mentioned though, their orbit is far from ideal and different orbits have less radiation.
Symmetry 7y ago
So, the ISS orbit crosses the South American Magnetic Anomaly sometimes which does give them a bit of inner Van Allen belt radiation sometimes. But they're still completely protected from direct emissions of charged particles from Sun. They would get much, much more radiation if they were orbiting out by the Moon even before you start worrying about solar storms.
state_less 7y ago
I'm not trying to take the wind out of the sails of any vehicles going elsewhere, just think LEO is a good place to start. Something like, before crossing an ocean, let's cross the Florida straits over to the Bahamas. > The Earth's magnetosphere actually captures dangerous radiation and various anomalies in the belt distribution cause portions of low-Earth orbits to be irradiated. Pick the favorable orbits. We have data on our ISS astronauts. Seems like we can go years up there if we wanted. > And the medical issues. Most folks are going to want to go up for a few weeks/months and then come back to tell the tale. A habitat might employ centripetal acceleration. Anyhow, I think medical issues will be manageable. I suspect there are a few orders of magnitude more people who are interested in a vacation in space or work from space scenario than a long distance voyage to the moon or mars where you are cut off from the home world and have a big latency cost on communications. I think this is about filling rockets with large sums of cargo to keep the space business growing. If a starship can be made for $5 million, there are plenty of yachts just down the coast from Cape Canaveral that cost more than that. If you could give folks a stay in LEO for ~$50k, there will be plenty of people who can afford that. I bet you could find tech companies that would let you work remotely from space as a signing bonus. > There are a handful of (very interesting) crystal manufacturing that requires zero-g. These could be done in automated or human tended LEO or LLO manufacturing labs. You don't need a large human presence. Agreed, I'd add that this isn't so much about keeping the number of people down, but increasing the demand for people to go into space. I'm excited about the side effects it will have for technology and science. > To the downsides, LEO lacks any resources whatsoever, and still has a nontrivial delta-v to the rest of the system. All your arguments in favor could be applied to the Moon, which does have LOTS of resources and better radiation shielding. The moon and mars are good places to settle too. I'm only arguing that Earth LEO is easier to start with because Earth has more readily available resources than any of the other locations. LEO is still hard enough where we'll have to improve our ships and space quarters for design and comfort. So I think it's a good stepping stone.
- mjevans 7y ago
  LEO is more like 'camping in the back yard'. All I ever learned from that is that I hate camping... and would much rather have a house / hotel room. Extending that analogy further, maybe we can figure out how to build a "mother in law apartment" in our "back yard" first.