Space development investment ( StarBound)

> I tend to agree with Ron Menich on this one. Life in the first
> habitat may not be quite slave labor but it is not going to be fun.
> Maybe by the tenth things will smooth out. Look around your
> house. How many different types of toothpaste are in the
> bathroom?
One.

> How many specialized cosmetics are on your wife's side of the
> bathroom?
I have no wife --- I use no cosmetics beyond soap and hair shampoo
myself. It has crossed my mind that these may be items of scarcity on
long duration missions, until the time comes when a stay in space is no
longer a "mission".

> How many different meals can you fix with a sack of flour? How do
> you make a pair of shoes without leather? The first colonists are
> going to have to avoid anything they cannot make themselves.
Many of these are luxury items. Many of the consumer goods we have
in the rich part of the world are "nice to have", and that's it. Fifty
different makes of cellphone, and that's just the differences in
design - different colours, and so on. Shoes? I have one pair of
sneakers, one pair of steel capped safety boots, one pair of rain boots
that aren't leaky. I tend to wear out sandals, though --- but many
consumer items are made not to last. A good pair of shoes may last for
years. I hate shopping for clothes, so I have only two pairs of
trousers. I could do with three pairs, perhaps four, so that I could
change them more often without having to do the laundry twice a week.
I live a fairly modest life. I would certainly accept an even more
modest one as the price of a job at a HEO construction station for a
year - especially in the light of the rather good wages I would earn and
spend afterwards, and the good standing this would have me in for the
first homes in the first Island One.

> They will be lucky to have toothpaste and toothbrushes because
> there is going to be alot of priorities on the manufacturing system
> besides consumer goods.
Toothbrushes will be no problem. They aren't very heavy --- each
person takes ten toothbrushes up to HEO. If each of those lasts three
months, s/he has two and a half years worth of toothbrushes. It won't
kill the mass budget.

> Anything brought up from Earth puts the colony deeper into debt.
How much toothpaste, soap and shampoo do you use per year, compared
to your body mass? For that matter, I should not be surprised if some
sort of dehydrated hair shampoo can be brought up, which will reduce the
mass to be launched some more.

> And then there are problems with how will the colony actually
> feel. Will it be dusty and dirty without a cleansing rain?
A small habitat will have air filters. A bigger one will probably
have rain pipes, for artificial rain. A big enough one will have
natural rain.

> The people who have been in Biosphere II look like they have
> been on a starvation diet when they come out.
The diet in the first outpost will probably be limited to vegetable
foods. Billions of people on the Earth live on such a diet. Some by
choice. My experience with a chicken coop tells me that the first HEO
outpost may well prefer to do without eggs, drumsticks and chicken
soup ---

> The humidity in Biosphere II is very high.
That problem may be easily solved in space. Pass the air through a
radiator. It will precipitate out water. This will have to be done
anyway to get rid of waste heat, since the habitat, into which sunlight
will be directed, will be a very efficient greenhouse otherwise. From
this precipitated water will come the outpost's drinking and bathing
water. Was Bio II built with an external cold sink to pass the air
through?
There will be problems, yes. A lack of red meat and milk. I drink a
liter or two of milk every day, and enjoy meat now and again. I could
do without those, or with a biweekly, savoured glass of milk made from
milk powder brought from Earth. There won't be fifty brands of hair dye
nor eighty brands of canned body odour. There may be plenty of hot
water, enough to make do with a much reduced consumption of soap,
perhaps. There won't be access to the newest fashion in designer jeans.
Dr. O'Neill imagined in The High Frontier that the first construction
station to build powersats would be Island One, a society with families.
I imagine rather that the first construction station to build powersats
will be something akin to an offshore oil platform, though with much
longer tours of duty. A year rather than a fortnight or three weeks.
Fewer people will be willing to put up with those conditions than those
on an oil rig in the North Sea, but a hundred will be enough to build
big things and create a profit. Then they will need a larger production
capacity, and a larger outpost will be added. Island One will perhaps
be the third generation, built at a time when orbital construction is
well established.
Island Three will probably be so pleasant that even the most blas
variety-in-luxuries-addict will condescend to try it... :-)

Jon L. Beck.