Meeting notice: The 00.06.06 meeting will be held at 7:30 p.m. at the Royal East Restaurant (782 Main St., Cambridge), a block down from the corner of Main St. and Mass Ave. If you're new and can't recognize us, ask the manager. He'll probably know where we are. <-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-> Suggested Topic: NT and the Colonization of Deep Space (2) At the last meeting, to the bafflement of many, the suggested topic was actually discussed, to wit: the problem of finding a motive likely to lead to the colonization of galactic orbits. The constraint is that any such motive probably needs to be autocatalytic: It must lead people to want to live -- not 'explore', but reside -- at X AU, tire of that region, grow interested in life at 10X AU, and so on, over and over, further and further out into the galaxy. Motives that do not have this property are likely to leave human settlement clustered in this solar system, where the reserves of energy (10^32 ergs/second), matter (2^27 kg in Oort's cloud alone) and elbow room (10^27 cubic miles within the orbit of Saturn) seem sufficient for most purposes. At the meeting Steve Witham pointed out that motives are highly sensitive to economics and that this group is bound by its charter to reflect on the consequences of technologies that can boost a kg to high velocities for low prices. His point is nicely illustrated by the "space pier" idea now being developed by J. Storrs Hall (see www.imm.org/Reports/Rep016.html). A space pier is a railroad high enough to make air resistance nominal and long enough to accelerate humans to orbital velocities without killing them. Hall suggests 100 km high x 300 long, which would allow humans to attain orbital velocity with an acceleration of "only" 10 Gs. ("Which appropriately cushioned humans can stand for the 80 seconds required." ) The pier would be built from diamondoid materials, which should be more than strong enough. ("A 100 km column of diamond weighs 3.5 billion newtons per square meter, but can support 50 billion. Even commercially available polycrystalline synthetic diamond with advertised strengths of 5 GPa would work.") Depending upon one's assumptions wrt fabrication technology, the cost of achieving orbit with such a device might be quite low, possibly in the range of a cross country bus trip. If so, offplanet migration would be dominated by the populations that have driven migrations in the past: cults and sects, those seeking to evade their legal responsibilities or escape criminal prosecution, misfits with authority problems, and misanthropes and xenophobes. This population would flood into space not because they were attracted by the adventure of life amid the stars but because they felt, with Satre, that hell is other people. In short order this population would give space the reputation of a low- rent, high-risk, neighborhood, characterized by violence, perversity, and opportunities to engage in self- destructive behavior of every sort. We all know what happens next. Once a neighborhood acquires such a reputation its evolution is as foreordained as any system in mechanics. First to arrive will be upper-middle class thrill-seekers and slum tourists, bright young men and women out to test their reflexes and push their luck. Then musicians and artists will move in, hoping to use the image of the neighborhood as a brand, as a way of authenticating their art as the true voice of the oppressed and marginalized, thus allowing them to charge much higher prices. (Besides, in space no one can hear you practise.) These groups will bring with them their own infrastructure: clubs, galleries, publishing houses, service centers, drug rehab clinics, and emergency rooms. In a few years will follow professionals whose niche requires a bit of flair, a sense of edge: architects, commercial artists, agents, entertainment lawyers, and with them another kind of infrastructure: boutiques, Wellness centers, doggy camps, high- end plant stores, and a love of regulating everything in sight. Historical Commissions will spring up to give fuel tanks Landmark Status and insure that each orbital shell will receive a level of development that is "sustainable" and not in violation of its historical character. Property values, once an alien concept in the context of space, will soar. Everyone will agree on the importance of building low cost housing but no permits will be issued. The original settlers, feeling increasing out of place, will cash out and jump to a higher orbit (one far enough out to give building inspectors incentive to look for a reason to delay a visit), where the process will begin again. In ten thousand years we will be though the "bulge", the center of the Milky War, and spreading out to the other side. Fred Hapgood <-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-> Stephan Vladimir Bugaj is attempting to raise enough money to dedicate a reading room to Alexander Chislenko at MIT. He writes: If I am unable to do so, the money will be converted into a scholarship in Sasha's name, but I intend to give the reading room project at least 3 years before giving up on it. If you wish to assist in some way other than or in addition to a donation, please let me know. Please feel free to pass this note on to others who knew Sasha. This room is intended to be for books about futurist philosophy, cutting-edge technology, and related scientific works, as well as journals and electronic information repositories about those topics. I am also hoping that someone who has nice film negatives of photos of Sasha can donate a large print portrait of him with his bright smile which could be hung in the room. I would also like to receive from all those who corresponded with him any papers, e-mails, and other writings you may have received from him which you feel are appropriate for public view - I would like as many of Sasha's own writings to be a part of that collection as is possible. Private e-mails are also useful, though if there are any personal rather than intellectual issues in the e-mails you are requested to edit them out before sending them along. This collection of his writings is intended to be about his philosophical, technical, and scientific ideas, and will be added to the reading room and also placed on-line. If you wish to donate, please send your donation to: Alexander "Sasha" Chislenko Memorial Fund c/o Stephan Vladimir Bugaj 265 McKibbin St. #2 Brooklyn, NY 11206 Please make checks payable to the Alexander "Sasha" Chislenko Memorial Fund, and NOT to me. Thank you. Live Long & Prosper, Stephan <-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-> Announcement Archive: http://www.pobox.com/~fhapgood/nsgpage.html. <-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-> If you wish to subscribe to this list (perhaps having received a sample via a forward) send the string 'subscribe nsg' to majordomo@world.std.com. Unsubs follow the same model. Discussion should be sent to nsg-d@world.std.com, which must be subscribed to separately. 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