Habitat Population Control

A quick calculation shows that the materials in Ceres is about enough
for space colonies with a total 1g surface area about 160x the surface
area of Earth. It's going to be a long time before we fill up this
solar system. By then, I'm quite sure we'll find a way to get to the
nearest star. There are about 100 billion stars in this galaxy (I
think). Population control, once we can build orbital space colonies,
is going to be the least of our problems for a very long time.

On Monday, September 22, 2003, at 01:55 PM, victoriatangoman wrote:

> --- In spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com, "Giovanni"
> wrote:
>> Hi Guys,
>>
>> The resources available within a single habitat are finite (by
> which, . . .
>
>> The technology available for creating new resources, or
> producing existing resources more efficiently, are finite within
> reasonable time scales . . .
>
>> And finally, (and this IS an actual, honest to goodness (tm)
> Axiom) that any free breeding population will expand to exceed its
> available resources (basic driving force behind natural selection,
> that. I may have been sloppy in my phraseology though.)
>> It seems reasonable to conclude that population control will
> be a vitally important issue in any habitat, especially when the
> limits of the life support system are being reached. So, what
> measures would be rational, with regards to limiting the
> population? Can it be done without continuous governmental
> intrusion? Would any such measures be Eugenics? How could abuses
> be discouraged? What about people who defy the policy, and their
> children?
>
> Hi. It's nice to hear a new voice. Here's my take on your axioms and
> argument.
>
> I pretty much agree with axiom 1. The Habitat will be designed with
> a maximum limit to the life support it can carry. This will have
> different implications for the different sizes of Habitat. An Island
> one, with a population limit of 10,000 may be filled up within a
> year if passenger shuttles departing from Earth are launched
> frequently. I'd say that they probably would allow for some growth
> over time, so they wouldn't fill it up to the max immediately. But
> growth would be limited and some population control measures would
> be necessary. It may be that the population would be temporary
> workers on assignment for 5 years and then return to Earth.
>
> At the other extreme, an Island 3, with a population limit of
> 10,000,000 will take a long time to fill up. Run some numbers for
> yourself. Even once the airlocks are opened there will be much
> interior work to be done. Housing, office, hospitals, roads, etc
> will be continually built as the population grows. Keep in mind that
> the atmosphere and other life support features will probably be
> fully established before airlock openning.
>
> The interior construction work will require different skill sets and
> robots than the equipment and skills needed to fabricate the
> pressure shell and establish the biocylinder, so if the population
> planning models call for another Habitat in X years time, this can
> be planned for and built while the population grows.
>
> Your second axiom is also true but too narrowly defined. ISTM that
> you're looking within the Habitat as the arena in which the
> technology must be applied to overcome the problem. If more CO2 in a
> plant growing environment will yield higher biomass output, then
> technology can try to find a way to replicate the process without
> CO2, or we can just process some NEO Methane Ice and pump it into
> the plant growing pod and we haven't robbed the existing biotorus of
> its stock of CO2.
>
> Your third axiom also rings true but I don't see it as a problem
> because new Habitats can be built.
>
> I'm in agreement with your position only if the citizen's of the
> first Habitat's are there on temporary assignments. Then there'll be
> little need to expand unless it's warranted by the export economy.
> There could be room for 8000 workers and 2000 children. The workers
> would be selected for small family size and births would be planned
> for, but after a period the workers would go back to Earth and new
> singles and couples would go up.
>
> If, OTOH, we're talking about permanent settlers, then I think
> there'll be different dynamics at work. You ever wonder why so many
> people are interested in economic growth statistics. They're a good
> indicator of economic prosperity and wealth. The growth comes from
> increased productivity, increased demand and population growth. As
> more and more people live in orbit, the orbital domestic economy
> will grow and more industries will be established and wholly
> supported by the orbital citizens. This'll result in the decreased
> influence of the initial export industries but also allow for the
> creation of once marginal export enterprises into operational
> enterprises because of increased capital, labor, technology and
> market demand in orbit.
>
> On Earth, as you've undoubtedly noticed, there are complicating
> factors that are assoicated with economic growth. In orbit, that
> growth and prosperity will have other issues to deal with but lack
> of space and overcrowding will probably not be significant.
>
>> I don't mean to start up the whole Fascist Blood-slinging feud
> again, but it has surprised me that nobody has approached the issue
> of breeding from the rather obvious (and I hope relevant) angle of
> population control and life support stresses.
>
> Yes, this is an obvious issue but I think you need to lay out an
> argument for why it is relevant. What would prohibit the
> construction of new Habitats and the resulting growth in economy,
> citizen mobility, and sheer variety of experiences?
>
> I think that once the investment has been made in the mining,
> refining, and fabrication infrastructure required to construct the
> pressure shells of the Habitats that there would be little call for
> all that capital and the human talent to sit idle. There's no way
> that they mining could continue only to supply the interior
> construction of buildings, etc. The demand scales are too far apart.
> And if you can sell the land of the new Habitat to new settlers and
> businesses, then you're growing the economy, creating wealth, and
> diversifying the industrial infrastructure.
>
> The second habitat would be less expensive because all of that
> supporting infrastructure would be considered a sunk cost. After
> that first Habitat of 10,000 permanent settlers the administrators
> would ask themselves, "if we had another 10,000 people, what could
> they do up here?" There would be a bigger domestic market so some
> products could now be built in orbit rather than imported, and
> perhaps more products can be exported. Also, consider the liquidity
> of individual capital tied up in Habitat real estate. If there are
> only 10,000 people there, and you want to sell your condo and move
> up, you've got little opportunity, but if the population is always
> increasing, you could decide to move on to the new Habitat and sell
> your condo to a newcomer.
>
> Finally, no more imports of toilet paper and toothbrushes. Now there
> is a toilet paper factory in orbit :) :) :)
>
> In the past, this issue has been hand-waved away under the
> presumption that 'Oh, the people living there will sort it all out,
> I guess'; but eventually we may run into the limits which constrain
> us here on Terra....
>> Just my two cents - anyone else have a take on this?
>
> EVENTUALLY we will run into the same limits. There's a lot of mass
> and energy in orbit. Perhaps when the population in orbit is 3,000
> times that of Earth, we'll have to confront the limits to growth
> issue, but should the Pilgrams of Early America have practiced birth
> control and conservation when they had an empty continent before
> them?
>
> TangoMan
>
> Canada).
>

The dinosaurs were destroyed by an asteroid because they weren't
space-faring. It's almost as if Gaia then thought "Well, dinosaurs
worked pretty well, but space-faring is necessary. Maybe I'll should
try mammals this time." Humanity is now developing systems to detect
and deflect asteroids, and could build orbital space colonies to spread
beyond Earth to insure life would survive a planetary catastrophe.

Al Globus
CSC at NASA Ames Research Center
http://www.nas.nasa.gov/~globus/home.html

Views expressed in this email are only my opinions and are not the
position of any organization I'm familiar with.