Glass windows

From: spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com
[mailto:spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of John Frazer

> The Ames Summer Studies used reflected light; As far as I know,
> they didn't give artificial lighting a serious look.

According to this paper
(http://www.nas.nasa.gov/About/Education/SpaceSettlement/spaceres/II-1.h
tml) they looked at it close enough to conclude it would be 5 times more
expensive than using natural sunlight. Joe Strout says he has serious
unanswered questions about this paper which makes him question its
conclusions. Since it confirms my gut feeling, I'm less skeptical.

> I almost like to assume that colonists -especially in the future,
> when they're not assumed to come from Earth- won't particularly
> care if there's a convincingly fake erzatz "Sky" or a Sun to move
> across it.

I'll go along with that. When I champion natural sunlight and wide open
spaces overhead, I'm mostly thinking about the first few generations
where if space settlement is to be successful people from Earth must be
convinced to leave it for a new life in space.

But long term, yeah, I expect the space-born might (seeking simplicity
or other engineering advantages) come up with pretty unearthly designs.
My expectations are illustrated by some dialog from one of my sf
stories:

" But the colonization of space was not too many generations
along before the youngsters were asking, "Why do we expend so much
effort in our habitat designs to do so-and-so?" The old-timers would
say, "Well, it makes it more Earthlike," only to get blank stares back
from the youngsters. This reason had no meaning for them. They had never
been to Earth, and didn't plan on going there, ever. Why should they
care what was "Earthlike"? "

Regards,

Mike Combs