As
discussed in my previous blog post Flavors of Doom: 11 Variations on the Apocalypse, mankind faces numerous risks to its survival. There
is the threat of nuclear war, the threat of an asteroid collision,
the threat of global warming, and the threat of a microbe that could
wipe out all of us. There are also other more remote threats such as
the threat that the Yellowstone volcano system may erupt in a way
that might cover much of North American in ash, and leave human
survival doubtful.
Many
thinkers have long recognized that moving out into space offers a
potential for lessening the risk that man may one day become extinct.
The idea is that if we can create colonies in outer space, mankind
will not have “all our eggs in one basket.” But discussion of
space colonization tends to quickly become grandiose. People talk
about colonizing a planet around another solar system (something that
is very far in the future at best), or talk about terraforming Mars
(which would take many decades). In this post I will take a very
different approach. I will describe a new relatively low cost
space-based plan to minimize the risk of human extinction, a plan
that could be launched using only currently existing technology (with
the possible addition of a few rather modest technical advances).
Recolonization
Stations
At
the heart of this plan is what I will call a recolonization
station. A recolonization station is a space station that is
capable of recolonizing planet Earth (re-establishing human life on it) after some disaster has wiped
out all human life on it. About 30 people might live in each of these
recolonization stations. A recolonization station might look
something like the station depicted below. The flat gray surfaces are
solar panels, which would provide energy for the station.
This
is mainly the classic ring-shaped design for a space station. The
station is ring-shaped so that it can be rotated to produce
artificial gravity for the people living in it, using simple
centrifugal force. It requires no new technology to produce such an
artificial gravity. Space station designers back way back in the
1950's realized that a simple ring-shaped space station would produce
artificial gravity if it were rotated.
The
main thing that is different about this space station are the three
transport devices positioned at 3 points on the ring. These 3 devices
are what I will call recolonization modules. Each recolonization
module consists of a recolonization capsule designed to re-enter into
the upper atmosphere, and a modest rocket unit designed to take the
capsule from the space station to the upper atmosphere of the earth.
Ideally
a recolonization station would be a closed system that would
completely recycle all of its wastes, allowing the station to exist
indefinitely with no need for new supplies sent from Earth. But
something less than perfect recycling would probably be acceptable,
because the station would probably still serve its purpose if it did not
last independently for more than 50 years.
During
any time in which human civilization was still fairly healthy on our
planet, a recolonization station could be visited by spacecraft from
Earth at intervals of once a year or once every two years, during
missions that would restock its supplies and rotate its crew.
Handling
a Threat of Human Extinction
In
the case of a drastic decline of the human population, there might be
no more resupply trips. Then the job of the recolonization station
would be to survive as long as it could, sending its recolonization
capsules only when there seemed to be no more human life (or very
little human life) left on our planet. The recolonization station
would need to have a good telescope capable of scanning the surface
below for signs of human activity.
So,
for example, here is one hypothetical timeline: a recolonization
station is launched in 2030; it receives annual supply visits for 20
years until 2050; in 2050, a biological plague starts to wipe out
mankind; after 30 years all humans are dead; then in 2085 the
recolonization station (which existed independently for 35 years
without being resupplied) finally decides there is no sign of human
life below, and then launches its three recolonization capsules in an
attempt to recolonize Earth.
The
recolonization station would work well under this type of “rapid
human collapse” scenario, but might not work well under a scenario
involving a very long and slow decline and extinction of mankind.
The
station's requirement for success can be symbolically described like
this:
L
> T
where
L is the maximum length of time that the recolonization station could
exist with dozens of crew members without being resupplied, and T is
the length of time between the last time the station is supplied, and
the time when human life no longer exists on Earth.
Admittedly
there are many hypothetical cases under which this L might not exceed
this T, but there are many cases in which it would. As the
recolonization stations are a relatively inexpensive form of survival
insurance for mankind, we need not worry too much about the fact that
they won't work in every scenario. As the saying goes, some insurance
is better than no insurance.
Recolonizing
Earth
The
recolonization capsules would be launched from the recolonization
station in the event that human life had perished on Earth. Each
recolonization capsule might carry about ten human beings, along with
tools, seeds, and equipment needed for those humans to survive and begin
reproducing once they arrived on the planet. The capsules would use
parachutes to make sure they touched down safely on land or water.
The Soviet Union often had astronauts return to Earth in capsules
that used parachutes to land gently on firm ground. The entire population of the recolonization
station (about 30 people) would be transported back to Earth in the
three recolonization capsules, at which point the recolonization
station would be abandoned.
The
astronauts riding in the recolonization capsules would need to be
mainly young and female, to assure that the population of a newly
established colony would grow as quickly as possible. An ideal
average age would be only about 21 years, to allow for a maximum
number of child-bearing years. Such a young population would be
possible if certain measures were taken. One such measure would be
rotating the crew in the recolonization station (prior to any
disaster putting mankind in danger) to assure a young crew. Another
such measure might be having the station crew (after some disaster
that put mankind in danger) mate onboard the station to add new
station crew members who could one day serve as earthly colonists by
traveling down to Earth in the recolonization capsules. In the
latter case, techniques might be used to assure a great likelihood of
female offspring, as the recolonization capsules would need to be
populated mostly by young females.
To
assure the rapid growth of the newly established colony on the
surface of Earth, it would probably be necessary to abandon
conventional reproductive habits. There would probably initially be
only two or three males among the recolonization capsule crew of ten.
After adequate shelter was established, each man would probably need
to quickly impregnate three or four consenting females, to assure
that the colony started to grow quickly.
To
assure adequate genetic variation in the new colony, it might also be
necessary for the colony to make use of frozen sperm and possibly
also frozen embryos brought with them in the recolonization capsule.
Each recolonization station could initially be supplied with a
repository of frozen sperm and frozen embryos, consisting of the
genetic material of hundreds of carefully selected people. Such a
genetic bank (which would not weigh very much) could be split up
among the recolonization capsules, and used in the newly established
colonies on Earth. This might require sophisticated medical training
for the crew, and might require that some sophisticated medical
equipment be included in the recolonization capsules. The technology
for artificial insemination (and the implant of thawed frozen
embryos) has been around for a long time, so this aspect would
require no technical breakthrough.
Once
they had landed, how could there be shelter for the crew members who
landed somewhere on Earth in these recolonization capsules? They
could start out by simply living in their capsule. Under most
apocalyptic scenarios (such as the death of everyone on Earth because
of global warming or a biological plague or a comet collision or a
small asteroid collision or nuclear fallout or a super-volcano) there
would still be many surviving human houses and buildings all over the
globe. So the most likely way for the crew to acquire shelter would
simply be to find a previously built building, and make use of that.
Only the most extreme apocalyptic event (such as the collision of a
giant asteroid which buries everything on the planet) would destroy
all human buildings.
Each
recolonization capsule would also carry with it electronic storage
devices that would store a huge amount of useful technical
information, as well as a huge number of cultural, historical, and
artistic treasures in digital form. We can currently store the
equivalent of a 20-volume encyclopedia (including all its pictures)
on a single small disk. It would not add much weight to the
recolonization capsules to have them include digital archives that
included items such as the 1000 greatest books in digital form, the
1000 most useful books in digital form, the 100 greatest movies in
digital form, and the 1000 most useful instructional videos on
www.youtube.com. Such an
archive would help insure that the recolonization capsules would be
the seeds of communities that would become technically proficient
relatively soon, without having to pass through centuries of
“re-inventing the wheel” in a thousand different ways.
The
Relatively Low Cost and High Feasibility of This Plan
Perhaps
the main attraction of the plan discussed here is its low cost
(compared to other space-based plans), and the fact that it requires
few or no technical breakthroughs. The plan could be put in place
for a small fraction of the cost of colonizing the moon or
terraforming Mars. We already know how to build space stations.
Although the International Space Station currently in existence does
not have a ring shape that allows for artificial gravity, it would
require no big technical leap to construct a station that had such a
shape. The technology for re-entry capsules that land with parachutes
has been around for decades, and we also have had reproductive
technology using frozen embryos and artificial insemination for
decades. Probably the one technical advance needed for this plan is
additional closed-system and resource recycling technology, which
would allow a recolonization station to exist for a few decades
independently. But that would be a relatively easy hurdle to jump.
As
for the cost of the plan, assuming a somewhat lower cost of space
flight because of recent launch vehicle advances, I estimate that
several recolonization stations could be built and maintained for an annual cost of about 100 billion
dollars (which would need to be shared by the world community). That's a significant cost, but not much of a price tag for
helping to insure the continuation of a civilization which has a
current net worth estimated at 223 trillion dollars. Any
insurance agent will tell you that an insurance rate of a tenth of
one percent is a huge bargain (by comparison, homeowners routinely
pay an annual charge of about 1 percent for homeowner's insurance).
As
for when such a project should be launched, the answer would seem to
be: the sooner, the better. If various types of apocalyptic threats
were to suddenly arise, it might be too late to get started on
recolonization stations that might take 20 years to implement. The
safest situation would be to have some recolonization stations
already in existence, ready to respond to any existential threat to
humanity that rapidly developed.
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