Hello Space Visionaries,

I am the moderator of an objectivist philosophy forum
objectivism@... (OWL), that recently began a discussion thread of
creating a free country in space. Unaware of the leading-edge discussions
occurring on this list, skeptical and pessimistic views have been raised on the
feasibility of space settlements. I will quote a sequence of posts from OWL and
invite you to answer, if you please. You may reply on this SSI list or to me
off-list, and I will forward them to OWL (or you may post to OWL directly).

I thank you in advance for your kind efforts, and keep your visions alive --
they will be realized.

[My interest and support of space settlement is expressed in the research I've
done to earn my MA (1985) in "objectivist astronautics: the philosophy of space
colonization".]

Best regards,

Monart Pon
http://members.home.net/monartpon/

Date: Mon, 16 Apr 2001 22:45:10 -0600

This brings up a more general question: How to find a better country to
live in? Is it to change the one we're in? Groan... It might take forever. Is it
to create a new one somewhere? Where? All the countries and suitable lands are
governed by statists. Well, how about creating one from scratch -- where no-one
is living now -- like up in FreeSpace? And what does it take to do that? Would
it be a better life?

Actually, I think it might be easier to create a whole new country with all the
freedom-and-reason-loving people in the world -- but in orbital FreeSpace --
than it would be to convince the rest of the people in a country on Earth like
New Zealand or the United States. It would be -- IF the
libertarians/objectivists could collaborate with the startrek/spacesettler
groups and the space entrepreneurs/investors.

Monart

Date: Tue, 17 Apr 2001 07:59:09 -0700

[...]

I'm not sure if it would be easier. I've been trying to get people to think
along these lines for years. There are several problems with starting a new
country and with settling space. While I'm a big supporter of libertarian
space settlement -- as evidenced by "For a Free Frontier: The Case for Space
Colonization" and other writings of mine:) (see
http://uweb.superlink.net/neptune/) -- it's easier said than done. (This
essay appeared in _The Free Radical_, but, sadly, no longer appears at its
web site.)

One vexing problem, too, that needs to be solved -- though it's only an
engineering problem -- is the regimentation needed in space travel and on
space stations. While on Earth, your neighbor can generally do a lot of
things which you wouldn't mind -- smoke tobacco or anything for that
matter:), set off firecrackers, not clean house at all -- in space, some of
these things would raise to the level of life-threatening for either a
spacecraft or a colony. This would be especially problematic for small
space colonies -- ones the size of small communities -- which I envision
being the first to be formed. (Notably, small colonies anywhere have run
into similar problems, though on Earth there's always air to breathe and
usually food, water, and shelter. Much harder to procure in space.)

These are, of course, technical problems. I believe they will be solved,
especially if a market approach to settlement and travel is taken -- note
how NASA is resisting the Tito visit to the ISS -- but they have not been
solved as we discuss this.

Starting a new country but not in space involves other problems, such as the
need to get a place that isn't claimed by an existing nation state. You
might want to read Erwin S. Strauss' classic _Start Your Own Country_ on
this matter.

Cheers!

Daniel

Date: Thu, 19 Apr 2001 20:59:58 -0400

[...]

I would think that space colonization is just not feasible now or in
the near future. Some leaps that I think are necessary:

* A boom in interest in space travel.
* Privatization, for accountability and acceleration in research.
* Advances in energy generation, above and beyond fission.
* Advances in propulsion -- Earth-to-space travel is much too difficult.
* Advances in the production of space-suitable materials and of
devices/craft made of such material -- things are too labor intensive
now.

Regards,

Sourav

Date: Thu, 19 Apr 2001 23:24:00 -0400

Monart Pon wrote (4/16):

> Actually, I think it might be easier to create a whole new country with
> all the freedom-and-reason-loving people in the world -- but in orbital
> FreeSpace -- than it would be to convince the rest of the people in a
> country on Earth like New Zealand or the United States. It would be --
> IF the libertarians/objectivists could collaborate with the
> startrek/spacesettler groups and the space entrepreneurs/investors.

And if the US and other U.N. members didn't shoot us down at the first sign
that we might be harboring "tax evaders". The vehement opposition to the
guy who wants to pay $20 million to float around the Earth for a little
while shows that it'll take more than just gathering resources to get into
space; it's going to take a strategy for dealing with the governmental
bodies who have already laid claim to everything in outer space in the name
of "the common heritage of humanity", which means, in other words, for
themselves.

- Matt

Daniel Ust's comment:
> [...] the regimentation needed in space travel and on
> space stations. While on Earth, your neighbor can generally do a lot of
> things which you wouldn't mind -- smoke tobacco or anything for that
> matter:), set off firecrackers, not clean house at all -- in space, some of
> these things would raise to the level of life-threatening for either a
> spacecraft or a colony. This would be especially problematic for small
> space colonies -- ones the size of small communities -- which I envision
> being the first to be formed. (Notably, small colonies anywhere have run
> into similar problems, though on Earth there's always air to breathe and
> usually food, water, and shelter. Much harder to procure in space.)

is certainly valid, though is this just "an engineering problem" as he
states because we can solve it simply by separating people far enough
from one another? In principle what Gerard O'Neill recognized was that
space provides us with immensely more energy (and other resources), so
we should in the long run have much more freedom to do anything we like
without fear of harming others. But I'm not sure most people would think
isolation from others really added to their freedom, and there seems no
doubt that at least early space colonies will have to have rigidly
enforced behavioral rules simply to survive.

Sourav Mandel gave 2 nontechnical and 3 technical reasons why it won't
happen soon. On the technical side Sourav requests advances in energy,
propulsion, and materials, but I personally think there is frequently
far too much emphasis on "new advanced technology" in space. In the
computing industry the latest and greatest wonderful ideas used to go
into one-off or small-run "supercomputers", which were fine expensive
toys, but never commercial successes, and the real successes were the
mini- and micro-computers using much less bleeding-edge technology. The
real successes in the space industry (yes there is one) are the
expendable multi-stage rockets; why not scale them up again using
established technologies? In fact, they can even be made re-usable
through the two-stage "flyback booster" concept promoted by Buzz Aldrin
(see http://www.house.gov/science/aldrin.htm for his recent testimony to
the House Science Committee). Of course some new things are needed, but
they should be at the Development end, not the Research end, of R&D.

On the nontechnical side, perhaps Dennis Tito's flight (mentioned by the
other two comments) will be a spur to increasing both the public
interest in space flight (lottery winners can imagine a flight to the
ISS!) and general commercial involvement. I think the time is right over
the next few years. But I could be wrong.

Arthur Smith (apsmith@...