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Generation ships may not be possible, at least for biological lifeforms. Kim Stanley Robinson wrote his novel Aurora in large part to argue this.
by Mediterraneo10 5y ago
Generation ships may not be possible, at least for biological lifeforms. Kim Stanley Robinson wrote his novel Aurora in large part to argue this.
- mrfusion 5y agoI’d be curious what the argument is. They would certainly be able to resupply raw materials if needed. Just plan a stop at a promising star system. Why wouldn’t a long lived nuclear power system provide the energy for food and life support? Beyond that, even five or ten generations is enough to get somewhere at .1C.
- Mediterraneo10 5y agoI recommend reading the novel. The key line in it is “Life is a planetary phenomenon.” Basically, the argument is that at less than planetary scale, you would be confronted with things like waste products building up too quickly to sustain human life. For example, the generation starship struggles with an excess of salt (which in turn affects food production). The limited confines of the ship also produce deleterious effect on successive human generations akin to those found among species in isolated island ecosystems.
- garbagetime 5y agoMaybe he had to make his argument into a novel because it isn't good enough to stand up to direct inspection. Deleterious effect of species on small islands are (a) maybe not always present? E.g. kakapo (b) due to factors which needn't be unaddressed in generational ships
- Mediterraneo10 5y agoHe made his argument into a novel because he is a writer, novels are what he does. But he tends to write around the scientific ideas he has been reading and his work often serves as convenient summaries of those ideas for a broad audience – mentioning a KSR plot is standard fare on "news for nerds" sites like this one. Also, my post above intentionally says "akin to" and not "identical to".