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An escalator to nowhere: Science fiction lives and dies in space (open.substack.com)

submitted 1 week ago by ghostofcarnot to c/futurology

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Space looms large in our futurist thinking. It's important to address what we misjudge to be possible in that realm in order to bring our expectations back down to Earth. Read more on Substack

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[–] theneverfox@pawb.social 2 points 1 week ago

This is so unimaginative.

There's one thing that has to happen, and the solar system opens up - manufacturing outside the gravity well. That's it.

Energy is cheap in space. The sun is right there, unfiltered. Raw materials are cheap in space - ice and metals are everywhere. Life is expensive in space

Automation makes it very easy. If you can make a robots that can maintain each other, and eventually manufacture parts, you can build mega structures given time

And we're getting very close to that. It's basically inevitable at this point... The question isn't if it's possible, it's if our species can loosen the chains of capitalism before we strangle ourselves for no reason