Recent content by Ken Fabian

My pessimism is mostly grounded in resources and economics, at both ends - Earth and 'colony' - but don't dismiss other concerns like human biological responses to low gravity (which, like most aspects, there can be solutions to, eg centrifuge habitats (spinning pie dish style?). Quotes around...

That was in reference to the difference between bases and colonies - not so clear with a quote of previous quote. I think the Earth economy could manage to build and supply a Mars or moon base - at great expense. Whilst some in-situ resources can help I don't think a local economy - a colony -...

Whereas I think they are vastly different - the difference between using the pre-existing resources and industrial capabilities of a globally connected Earth economy and the relying on hypothetical resources and industrial capabilities of a Mars settlement in isolation. We don't even know if...

I suspect biased sample selection that is not representative. There is no shortage of talented people who have good pitch and the industry usually chooses out of them, but yes, sometimes people are entertaining and popular without it and use such tricks. It is my impression auto tune is not that...

The requirements for certification for safety (or other quality) standards don't require every item to be tested. I'm not familiar with the particulars but random sampling within production runs seems to be the way it is done. May not even require independent testing on a regular basis; it could...

Interesting but I am not surprised that there would be mutation/selection, ie adaptation, however it isn't clear to me what conditions were critical; the paper was quite 'dense' with unfamiliar terms well outside my limited knowledge store. But it did provoke some questions. What is the extent...

Regulated and enforced safety standards seem necessary, ie the cheap counterfeits should be detected and rejected. De-funding regulatory agencies and industry 'self regulation' looks short sighted; I suspect the insurance industry favors enforced standards as will most of the major...

While we are waiting for the nuclear industry to find its feet we should keep adding wind, solar and batteries and see how far that can take us - which is happening most places apart from where policy and excessive red tape deliberately impedes them, eg USA. And let's not stint on pushing ahead...

I think it is as simple as the explanation found unsatisfactory in the first para of the initial post - Put the fan in a duct and the flow rates would be the same on either side of the fan. For the un-ducted fan the closer to the fan we get the less difference between the inlet and outlet side

'We would weigh around 20lbs' But would it be? As a novelty, for a short time maybe. Longer term probably increasingly uncomfortable - stomach in mouth, burp and fart only with care, helmets or padded ceilings recommended indoors, muscle and bone deterioration.

Artificial habitats make conditions just right. Gravity is just one of the potential constraints, but with rotation is readily solvable in space. I suspect planets - where artificial habitats of some sort would very likely be needed anyway - would be more difficult to exploit, not less. A...

No reason to think they are artificial and extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence - but making them increases the views and clicks without any such requirement. Stone and nickel-iron in very large pieces seem possible and mixed rubble bound together with ice is too. Not sure how...

I think real world experience suggests lots of humans are quite willing to reduce their birthrates and choose small family sizes - and that being economically secure and moderately prosperous with ready availability of contraception can lead to reduced birthrates without any overarching societal...

When several times the mass of an asteroid is needed for reaction mass just to push an asteroid to modest delta-v such as moving around within the solar system requires it doesn't sound feasible for any kind of space travel, let alone interstellar travel. Any excess mass is problematic... even...

Coming in on this a bit late to manage a point by point discussion, but I am of the pessimistic persuasion in this. At the most basic level of motivations I think sufficient 'need' has not been demonstrated. If saving humanity from major disasters were a priority I expect we would start with...