On 18 Mar 2001, Anders Sandberg wrote:
> Upon arrival, the craft divides into two. The nuclear reactor part,
> cargo and habitat modules land on Orpheus, becoming a mining base,
> while the (nearly empty) fuel tanks and an auxillary propulsion system
> remain in orbit as a heavy cargo transport.
Oh my god, Anders is actually inventing another boondogle
that requires *people* to do the work! I explained how this
should be done in my previous (somewhat lengthy) post from
a week ago or so. You do it with microsats.
> The crew will have to spend a long time in microgravity; I have been
> toying with the idea of rotating the ship but I'm not sure it would be
> worth it
Why don't you just have the biotech engineers come up with a drug that
simulates the stress-signals produced by gravity (or amplifies those
produced naturally, so you can cut the treadmill time down to something
reasonable).
> The business plan is rather long-range and mainly interested in
> building the industrial infrastructure needed for large scale habitat
> production (of which there is a predicted tremendous jump in demand
> within 20 years of the start of the operation, due to external
> factors).
Long range business plans can only be financed by very rich people.
VC & Investment bankers wouldn't touch them with a ten foot pole.
You can of course wait until 20 years when a new generation of
hot-shots thinks they know everything and buy into the stupidest stuff
(The marketing plan for Iridium must now be a B-school classic.)
Robert
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