11 ms·

The Quest for a Floating Utopia

33 points by Thevet 6y ago

lisper 6y ago
> Can casting away from established society to inhabit sea-based colonies save us from the problems of modern life No. (Well, OK, maybe in the short term, but certainly not in the long run.) > or are we bound to repeat our mistakes? Yes. All of the major problems we face today are caused by people (and specifically, by too many people). Changing the venue is not going to solve any of those problems. If we can't achieve a sustainable steady-state on land we're not going to be able to do it on the water -- or anywhere else for that matter.
- chr1 6y ago
  > and specifically, by too many people "Too many" is relative to the available space and rate of resource production. The ocean is huge, so it will take us a while to fill the capacity, especially if we use genetic engineering to develop more food sources based on seaweed and algae. By the time we get to there, the 700 billion people living on Earth will surely develop new technologies to colonize other planets, and by the time we fill other planets something new will come. If we try to stay at 7 billion forever, we'll have enough technology and economy to destroy all existing ecosystems, but not enough to restore and to invent more efficient ways of life. If you look at the history the greatest extinction we have caused so far was the extinction of megafauna caused by a very small number of people with very primitive technology. So the only "sustainable steady-state" is constant expansion. The alternative is everyone dying from an asteroid like dinosaurs.
  - hypertele-Xii 6y ago
    Except the dinosaurs didn't die. They survived and live among us still. We call them birds now.
    - danwills 6y ago
      I think it's still stunning how much was lost in the mass extinction, and also how long it had been going at that point, timespans that totally boggle the mind!
    - chr1 6y ago
      You are technically correct (the best kind of correct), but the fact that some mammals will survive and live on after asteroid impact, will not be a consolation to billions of people who will die simply because there was too few of them to build functioning space economy capable of preventing the impact.
      - hypertele-Xii 6y ago
        Don't know about the billions but I'd be consoled by it.
  - bagacrap 6y ago
    we don't have enough tech and economy to make our way of life more sustainable? Au contraire, we simply lack the political willpower.
    - chr1 6y ago
      What are examples of tech that are not being used due to lack of political willpower? Also note that if you have a working idea now that you can't realize because number of your supporters is low, as the number of well off people grows, number of your supporters will grow too, and something that was not possible to do with x people will become possible for 2x.
- HarryHirsch 6y ago
  On a superyacht, problems are rather caused by too few people with power and too much money. We know all that, there's enough accounts on life on superyachts, and Peter Thiel still tries to sell us this stuff. It's like a supercharged company town, like construction sites in Dubai.
cma 6y ago
Gotta love Peter Thiel's faux patriotism, America First, etc. while also funding the early sea steading movement, designed with loopholes as a kind of separatist thing under minor nations' maritime flags.
- crocodiletears 6y ago
  From interviews, I don't think Thiel is, or ever has been a patriot. Nor do I think he ever pretended to be. He backed Trump because he's bullish on the nation-state, and his aims of greater self-sovereignty are in opposition to a more homogenous and coordinated global order. Internationalist America has systematically crushed anything new that might pose a threat to the global order, something autonomous floating nations might do. Bilateral America's self-interested realpolitik approach under Trump was much less interested in the state of the rest of the world, provided it gave the nation what it wanted (in theory, ofc. The foreign policy establishment did everything it could to maintain business as usual).
XorNot 6y ago
The real question with all these things is the common one: are you free to leave? The frequently unspoken tenet of all modern governments and organizations, is that you are generally not free to leave (pandemic aside). Every place as it's first defensive measures tends to the resort to the same idea: prevent people from leaving (so, take them prisoner). Because if people were truly free to leave, then good luck exploiting them.
- chr1 6y ago
  For seasteading being free to leave is the core tenet, and not simply leave but also take your floating home with you, which is not possible on land.
- swiley 6y ago
  As someone who left the US by car on a whim once: you were totally free to leave before covid.
  - XorNot 6y ago
    This wasn't a criticism of the US. Look around the world at all the despotic regimes, or places with Dubai where you have a large population of migrant workers who have their passports seized. The first basic tenet is throwing up barriers or blocking departure. The US doesn't really worry about people leaving - way more people want to enter then leave. Seasteading has a very implicit hazard here though: there's an in-built ability to make leaving difficult (same with the mega-yachts and the like - when you happen to very rarely be in your employees home countries, you've created a rather effective barrier to them being able to depart).
    - teh_infallible 6y ago
      I think similar issues would arise in space. I suspect living on a spaceship would be like being in prison
      - XorNot 6y ago
motohagiography 6y ago
Have they not seen cruise ships? I think they may be iterating on engineering problems that are largely solved. If they want their own country, do it the old fashioned way and either declare independence or conquer one. This isn't an engineering problem, or rather, the only meaningful one involved is that of how to establish air superiority. The rest is economics and blackmail. Unexceptional people have been doing it for milennia. It's pretty simple, you just say, "here are the new rules, and we regret to inform you that we intend to kill anyone who doesn't abide by them. However, here's some bread and circuses while you think it over." Probably even easier than reading half way through one of their tedious internet screeds I'd bet.
- crasch4 6y ago
  Yes, seasteaders are aware of cruise ships: https://www.seasteading.org/convert-cruise-ships-into-seasteads/ https://www.seasteading.org/convert-cruise-ships-into-seaste....
BelenusMordred 6y ago
This is a well written article but I never really understood all the negativity around seasteading, it seems to bring out some serious antagonistic vibes from many people. The tone is summed up best in the last sentence. > To fix the world, though, may require more humility and sacrifice. The issue is that many recognise there is now no opt-out button on entrenched power structures that suffer from so much inertia, affecting change can take well over a human lifetime, even in liberal democracies. Once upon a time groups of people could pack up and leave for greener pastures when faced with oppression. That no longer exists and even worse popular sentiment amplified by the internet which actively seeks to disenfranchise such people: * The Uyghurs wanted independence, hows that going? * The resource rich Australian state of WA voted decisively to become an independent country but the Crown refused to allow it, the state now gets back $0.30 for every dollar of federal tax they collect. * Catalonia independence vote got 92% support, it was declared unconstitutional by Spain and the EU. This argument of fix the existing system simply doesn't work for many across the planet and falls apart quickly. Issues like gay marriage and marijuana decriminalisation have had majority support for decades before governments started paying attention. Plenty of people have potential solutions to many of societies ills, but those in power don't want these problems fixed. I think food aid during African famines is the most vivid illustration of this concept. There's enough food to make sure people die, but the people with the guns get the food from foreign donors then use it to only give to their own supporters and let their opposition die out. Despite being responsible for causing a famine, they actually end up stronger because of it.[1] I congratulate all the people trying to experiment and find solutions to these problems. At least someone is trying, the arguments about it being a rich persons plaything or tax evasion are spurious and downright bizarre. The world could do with a few new small cities built from scratch, like all pioneering endeavours it's going to be horrible at first, but those who pave the way set the stage for many to follow. [1] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0176268016301720 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S01762...
- BelenusMordred 6y ago
  > There's enough food to make sure people die, Too late to edit. That obviously should be "make sure people don't die"

33 points by Thevet 6y ago

> Can casting away from established society to inhabit sea-based colonies save us from the problems of modern life No. (Well, OK, maybe in the short term, but certainly not in the long run.) > or are we bound to repeat our mistakes? Yes. All of the major problems we face today are caused by people (and specifically, by too many people). Changing the venue is not going to solve any of those problems. If we can't achieve a sustainable steady-state on land we're not going to be able to do it on the water -- or anywhere else for that matter.

chr1 6y ago
> and specifically, by too many people "Too many" is relative to the available space and rate of resource production. The ocean is huge, so it will take us a while to fill the capacity, especially if we use genetic engineering to develop more food sources based on seaweed and algae. By the time we get to there, the 700 billion people living on Earth will surely develop new technologies to colonize other planets, and by the time we fill other planets something new will come. If we try to stay at 7 billion forever, we'll have enough technology and economy to destroy all existing ecosystems, but not enough to restore and to invent more efficient ways of life. If you look at the history the greatest extinction we have caused so far was the extinction of megafauna caused by a very small number of people with very primitive technology. So the only "sustainable steady-state" is constant expansion. The alternative is everyone dying from an asteroid like dinosaurs.
- hypertele-Xii 6y ago
  Except the dinosaurs didn't die. They survived and live among us still. We call them birds now.
  - danwills 6y ago
    I think it's still stunning how much was lost in the mass extinction, and also how long it had been going at that point, timespans that totally boggle the mind!
  - chr1 6y ago
    You are technically correct (the best kind of correct), but the fact that some mammals will survive and live on after asteroid impact, will not be a consolation to billions of people who will die simply because there was too few of them to build functioning space economy capable of preventing the impact.
    - hypertele-Xii 6y ago
      Don't know about the billions but I'd be consoled by it.
- bagacrap 6y ago
  we don't have enough tech and economy to make our way of life more sustainable? Au contraire, we simply lack the political willpower.
  - chr1 6y ago
    What are examples of tech that are not being used due to lack of political willpower? Also note that if you have a working idea now that you can't realize because number of your supporters is low, as the number of well off people grows, number of your supporters will grow too, and something that was not possible to do with x people will become possible for 2x.
HarryHirsch 6y ago
On a superyacht, problems are rather caused by too few people with power and too much money. We know all that, there's enough accounts on life on superyachts, and Peter Thiel still tries to sell us this stuff. It's like a supercharged company town, like construction sites in Dubai.

cma 6y ago

Gotta love Peter Thiel's faux patriotism, America First, etc. while also funding the early sea steading movement, designed with loopholes as a kind of separatist thing under minor nations' maritime flags.

crocodiletears 6y ago
From interviews, I don't think Thiel is, or ever has been a patriot. Nor do I think he ever pretended to be. He backed Trump because he's bullish on the nation-state, and his aims of greater self-sovereignty are in opposition to a more homogenous and coordinated global order. Internationalist America has systematically crushed anything new that might pose a threat to the global order, something autonomous floating nations might do. Bilateral America's self-interested realpolitik approach under Trump was much less interested in the state of the rest of the world, provided it gave the nation what it wanted (in theory, ofc. The foreign policy establishment did everything it could to maintain business as usual).

XorNot 6y ago

The real question with all these things is the common one: are you free to leave? The frequently unspoken tenet of all modern governments and organizations, is that you are generally not free to leave (pandemic aside). Every place as it's first defensive measures tends to the resort to the same idea: prevent people from leaving (so, take them prisoner). Because if people were truly free to leave, then good luck exploiting them.

chr1 6y ago
For seasteading being free to leave is the core tenet, and not simply leave but also take your floating home with you, which is not possible on land.
swiley 6y ago
As someone who left the US by car on a whim once: you were totally free to leave before covid.
- XorNot 6y ago
  This wasn't a criticism of the US. Look around the world at all the despotic regimes, or places with Dubai where you have a large population of migrant workers who have their passports seized. The first basic tenet is throwing up barriers or blocking departure. The US doesn't really worry about people leaving - way more people want to enter then leave. Seasteading has a very implicit hazard here though: there's an in-built ability to make leaving difficult (same with the mega-yachts and the like - when you happen to very rarely be in your employees home countries, you've created a rather effective barrier to them being able to depart).
  - teh_infallible 6y ago
    I think similar issues would arise in space. I suspect living on a spaceship would be like being in prison
    - XorNot 6y ago

motohagiography 6y ago

Have they not seen cruise ships? I think they may be iterating on engineering problems that are largely solved. If they want their own country, do it the old fashioned way and either declare independence or conquer one. This isn't an engineering problem, or rather, the only meaningful one involved is that of how to establish air superiority. The rest is economics and blackmail. Unexceptional people have been doing it for milennia. It's pretty simple, you just say, "here are the new rules, and we regret to inform you that we intend to kill anyone who doesn't abide by them. However, here's some bread and circuses while you think it over." Probably even easier than reading half way through one of their tedious internet screeds I'd bet.

crasch4 6y ago
Yes, seasteaders are aware of cruise ships: https://www.seasteading.org/convert-cruise-ships-into-seasteads/ https://www.seasteading.org/convert-cruise-ships-into-seaste....

BelenusMordred 6y ago

This is a well written article but I never really understood all the negativity around seasteading, it seems to bring out some serious antagonistic vibes from many people. The tone is summed up best in the last sentence. > To fix the world, though, may require more humility and sacrifice. The issue is that many recognise there is now no opt-out button on entrenched power structures that suffer from so much inertia, affecting change can take well over a human lifetime, even in liberal democracies. Once upon a time groups of people could pack up and leave for greener pastures when faced with oppression. That no longer exists and even worse popular sentiment amplified by the internet which actively seeks to disenfranchise such people: * The Uyghurs wanted independence, hows that going? * The resource rich Australian state of WA voted decisively to become an independent country but the Crown refused to allow it, the state now gets back $0.30 for every dollar of federal tax they collect. * Catalonia independence vote got 92% support, it was declared unconstitutional by Spain and the EU. This argument of fix the existing system simply doesn't work for many across the planet and falls apart quickly. Issues like gay marriage and marijuana decriminalisation have had majority support for decades before governments started paying attention. Plenty of people have potential solutions to many of societies ills, but those in power don't want these problems fixed. I think food aid during African famines is the most vivid illustration of this concept. There's enough food to make sure people die, but the people with the guns get the food from foreign donors then use it to only give to their own supporters and let their opposition die out. Despite being responsible for causing a famine, they actually end up stronger because of it.[1] I congratulate all the people trying to experiment and find solutions to these problems. At least someone is trying, the arguments about it being a rich persons plaything or tax evasion are spurious and downright bizarre. The world could do with a few new small cities built from scratch, like all pioneering endeavours it's going to be horrible at first, but those who pave the way set the stage for many to follow. [1] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0176268016301720 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S01762...

BelenusMordred 6y ago
> There's enough food to make sure people die, Too late to edit. That obviously should be "make sure people don't die"