restoring the dream

This is a real problem.

And it has several aspects.

There's the history of the idea, as you mention. I remember in the late
'60s early '70's when Science News was publishing articles about space
habitats. I don't see anything similar to that today.

Then there's the marketing aspect. Science News was willing to publish
those articles. For some reason the magazine, or someone behind the
magazine (NSF?) thought this topic was relevant. Why not still? As has
been pointed out in the post about NASA's "game," some people still
think it's relevant. But their ideas aren't getting the marketing
exposure that they used to.

There's the engineering aspect. The idea of another cool engineering
project used to be enough to spark interest in the media. But the
"newness" of engineering seems to have worn off a bit. For example, why
didn't I stay in engineering?

This is what tore my attention away from being an inventor:

It is an extremely valid argument that the planet should be putting some
effort into moving out into the solar system. If we really want to
survive as a culture, or as a species, this could be a crucial part of
our strategy.

There are actually several other areas - some social, some
technology-related - that are like this. There are really valid
arguments for investing more in these areas because that will help us to
survive in the longer term. Renewable energy, better education methods;
things like that.

These areas are not being invested in. Instead I am seeing huge amounts
of wealth being poured into the creation and maintenance of a war
machine. Either someone knows something we don't know, or someone has
their priorities screwed up. And I suspect the latter.

There is some private venture capital going into space flight and
orbiting "hotels," but where's the government? NASA seems to have such
programs in mind, but the politicians aren't talking about them.

This situation is what I would describe as an "ethical failure." It is
ethical to plan ahead for the survival of the species. It is unethical
to plan ahead for the destruction of the species. Right now I see too
much of the latter and not enough of the former.

My choice is to pound on this issue as its own issue. Most people don't
have this approach, but I think there should be at least a few people
taking this approach.

Most others are dealing with the problem of the lack of support for
their good ideas.

If you have a good idea and want to support my work, and that of a few
others interested in this ethics issue, keep pushing your good ideas as
hard as you can. But when you run into someone telling you "that's a
terrible idea..." stop just long enough to report to the community who
that invalidation came from, as close as you can tell. Then go back to
pushing your good idea. Don't even worry about defending the idea
against the criticism. Just remember to leave a note about who opposed
it. Then me or someone like me will collect these and see if we can find
a pattern to this resistance.

We might not be able to produce anything useful from this data. But you
never know. I'm hoping to build a case for where the unethical thinking
is coming from on this planet. I figure people deserve to know.