Goodspaceguy: Let's Now Build the Heavenly Habitats of Orbital Space Colonization

GOODSPACEGUY: LET’S NOW BUILD THE HEAVENLY HABITATS OF ORBITAL SPACE COLONIZATION

This is my message #27 on my blog: Colonize Orbital Space

In the colonization of our solar system, our Spaceship Earth remains our paradise planet, but let us now build additional, orbiting, spinning, heavenly habitats.

(2011 December 19 – 2012 July 8)



Our Spaceship Earth is our paradise planet in our solar system. As we start colonizing our solar system, we should also continue to improve our Spaceship Earth. Improvements should become easier as our technology continues to advance. We have now built up our ability to start building privately owned, spinning, hardship habitats in orbit around our Earth, around our Moon, around our Sun, and around our two moons of Mars. We can start by building hardship habitats and homes and then upgrade and expand them into heavenly habitats and homes. We can gradually build our spinning, heavenly homes better than we have built our International Space Station, our zero-gravity research station.

Some of you who become space colonists and some of your descendants will expand and transform these orbiting, hardship habitats and homes into expanded space settlements. Some spinning, space settlements will later be connected into orbiting, spinning, towering towns. Over the years some of the orbiting, spinning, space towns will connect or expand into orbiting, spinning, space cities of high civilization. Many hardship habitats will gradually connect with or be transformed into heavenly habitats.

The economic foundation of the coming heavenly habitats in space will be an abundance of solar power. The solar power will be used to sustain life in the orbiting greenhouse farms. The solar power will be used to mine and process material from asteroids and comets that cross the orbit of Earth and Mars around our Sun. The clean solar power will be used to power the space industries. The solar power might even be beamed down to warm our Earth to prevent the scheduled and normal return of the Age of Ice that previously crushed Northern Eurasia and Northern America.

Solar power will help the space colonists who become space miners to get ready for the next killer asteroid or comet that approaches and threatens our Spaceship Earth.

In 1994, as an example of the threat to Earth, we photographed a series of potential Earth killing comets hitting (thankfully) gas giant Jupiter, instead of our Earth. Gas giant Jupiter, having an exterior of gas, absorbed the comets that could have wiped out our civilization on Earth. The comet crashes left Earth-size markings on the tops of the clouds of planet Jupiter.

I, Goodspaceguy, want the space miners to be ready to mine away the next killer asteroid or killer comet that threatens Earth. I want the space miners to sell the mined mass of iron and nickel and water and other material to other space colonists for the building of our new, Sun-orbiting, spinning, space habitats, and spinning, space towns of towers, and spinning, space cities.

If we get our starter, privatized, orbital space settlements built in time, then killer asteroids and killer comets, instead of wiping out our civilization on Earth, will be mined away. These celestial threats will be turned into building material for our spinning, space settlements. The mining away of killer comets and asteroids will make it cheaper to expand the hardship habitats of the space colonists into the towering space towns and the spinning, space cities of the heavenly homes of your space descendants.

I, Goodspaceguy, predict that gradually more and more humans will be living in their orbiting, spinning, space settlements, and that one day sometime in the future a majority of humans will be living up in their orbital, heavenly homes instead of living down on Earth.

Some space settlements will become orbital paradises. These spinning, heavenly homes will, of course, start out as hardship habitats. Work is hard. Pioneering the high frontier will be hard and dangerous. Some space pioneers will die in accidents, but some people who stay on Earth will also die in accidents. Wherever people are, people die in accidents.

We and NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) should make it easier for the private, space pioneers to open up the high frontier and build their heavenly habits. To transform their new orbiting hardship habitats into heavenly homes, much work will be required of the space pioneers and their descendants.

For the money we have already spent on our US space program, we should already have over 260 habitats connected together in several beginning, orbiting, spinning, space settlements, but we don’t. We only have the equivalent of a few habitats joined together to form our International Space Station.

Apparently, our elected and appointed leaders were not educated in orbital space colonization, and so they committed much waste and destruction. Instead of privatizing, they destroyed Sky Lab and they destroyed Space Station Mir. They shut down our successful Saturn 5 Rocket program for the boondoggle Space Shuttle Program, thereby preventing us from sending space stations to orbit around Mars and to orbit with the asteroids of the Asteroid Belt.

Whenever we spent a lot of taxpayers’ money to put something up into orbit, we should have kept it in orbit for use by the future space colonists. Returning the space shuttles to Earth and destroying their huge fuel tanks was highly wasteful. We should have sent privatized space habitats up into orbit instead of the space shuttles. The space shuttles were a faulty concept. Once in orbit, we should have privatized the space shuttles and fuel tanks and kept them in orbit. Also, we should have privatized other rockets and other mass and waste that reached orbit. Instead, we destroyed these recyclable resources. Through the technology of recycling, the space colonist could have used even the waste. Waste material will be useful, needed mass in the space colonies. Because of the high cost of reaching orbit, the waste was valuable and usable. It was and it is wrong to destroy orbital waste by throwing it back into the atmosphere, where it is burnt up like a shooting star. For the huge amount of taxpayers’ money that we have already spent, we should already have space colonists in orbit, and some of those space colonists, now in the year 2012, should already be orbiting Mars.

For the money we have already spent, we should now be prepared to mine away the coming killer asteroids or comets, but we aren’t.

We should make it easier for people to build connectable, orbital space habitats and orbital paradises for themselves. Unused labor is currently available. Much solar energy is available. Orbital material is available and awaiting us in the asteroids and in the comets ... waiting for us Earthlings to advance our technology to include orbital space colonization.

By using more of the abundant labor of our overpopulated Spaceship Earth, and by using the abundance of material floating in space in and near the orbits of Earth and Mars, and by using the abundant energy streaming out from our Sun, and by using the advanced knowledge that now exists, we could begin the building of Sun orbiting, space settlements. At first, these orbiting, space settlements will be hardship habitats. But some will gradually become connected and expanded, technological, heavenly habitats … heavenly homes, towering towns, and civilized cities, spinning in orbital space.

Space colonization should have been the goal from the beginning of our American Space program. The destruction would have been less. Our progress would have been so much greater than it has been.

We are fortunate that the resources exist in our solar system to build many off-Earth, orbiting, technological, space settlements. I, Goodspaceguy, recommend and predict that space colonists will build connectable, hardship habitats in orbit around our Sun. Then, hopefully, soon space colonists will improve and upgrade and transform some of these hardship habitats into Sun orbiting, heavenly habitats of space commerce and growing towns.

Some of your descendants will become space colonists. Some of your descendants will transform some space settlements into Sun orbiting paradise towns and Sun orbiting paradise cities.

The better pathway to this heavenly future is probably the pathway of limited government that helps the competitive, incentive-rich, profitable, free market economy that works for you, the consumer.

Some of your descendants, the coming space colonists, (and perhaps even some of you) will build a variety of Gardens of Eden in these orbiting, technological space settlements.

With the money we have already spent, we should already have more than 260 beginning, orbiting, hardship habitats, but the people elected to power were not educated in beginning orbital space colonization, and so they misspent much of our space money, and they burnt up many of our space assets. The wanton waste and destruction of the tax payers’ money and property in my favorite government program has been sad.



OUR SOLAR SYSTEM CONSISTS OF:

OUR MASSIVE, MOVING SUN, WHICH MAKES UP THE CENTER;

OUR FOUR INNER, TINY, SUN ORBITING PLANETS, MADE OF METAL AND STONE;

THEN OUR WIDE ASTEROID BELT, ORBITING OUR SUN;

THEN OUR FOUR OUTER, GAS GIANT PLANETS, ORBITING OUR SUN;

THEN OUR KUIPER BELT, ORBITING OUR SUN;

THEN OUR OORT CLOUD, SURROUNDING EVERYTHING INSIDE (Beyond which we reach the neighboring solar systems, which also condensed from giant clouds of gas and dust, as did our own solar system.)



We can divide our eight official planets of our solar system into two groups: (1) our four tiny inner planets, made of stone and metal, and (2) our four giant outer planets, made largely of gas. These two groups of planets are separated by the wide orbital region of space known as the Asteroid Belt, which orbital region contains many Sun orbiting asteroids of varying sizes and other orbiting objects and debris. These eight planets and many asteroids are circled by our Kuiper Belt and then surrounded by our Oort Cloud.

Our four, tiny, inner, stony, metallic planets are known as Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars.

Then come our numerous asteroids and other orbiting objects that occupy our wide Asteroid Belt.

Then come our four outer gas giant planets, which are known as Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune.

Further out in our vast solar system, we have our Kuiper Belt, which consists of more orbiting debris, which debris includes minor planets (such as Eris and Pluto and Charon) and includes more moons, asteroids, comets, meteors, dust, and gas.

Then we have our Oort Cloud, which is both the largest portion and the outer portion of our solar system. Our surrounding, sphereical Oort Cloud is the remainder in our solar system of that portion of the space cloud from which our solar system gravitationally condensed.





OUR FIRST FOUR PLANETS: MERCURY, VENUS, EARTH, and MARS:



PLANET MERCURY:

Mercury, the smallest of the eight planets, is highly hostile to life.

(Those planets that are smaller than planet Mercury, such as Ceres and Pluto and Charon and Eris, are arbitrarily called planetoids or dwarf planets or minor planets.)

Think of planet Mercury as being in the area close to our Sun that I call the Forbidden Zone of Heat. Because Mercury is the closest planet to our burning, blasting, radiating Sun, we humans should stay away. Stay away from the intense, solar radiation. Think of space inside of the orbit of Earth as being a zone of heat, forbidden to humans. Humans stay out! Send robots instead.

Our Sun is blowing a thin, solar wind out into space in all directions, which wind bathes Mercury first. As the solar wind moves further out into space it becomes more dispersed and weaker.

Mercury is partly a hot hell planet. Turning slowly in the thin, solar wind, planet Mercury is burning hot on its sunny side, but, surprisingly, is freezing cold on its shaded side, where the night is long.

How long is the night of Mercury? Mercury makes a complete spin in about 59 Earth days (almost two Earth months,) but Mercury is also travelling around the Sun in about 88 Earth days (almost three months.) Therefore this combination of slow spin in relation to Mercury’s fast three-month year lengthens both the day time and the night time on Mercury. The sunny day time on planet Mercury therefore lasts almost three Earth months! The night time on planet Mercury also lasts almost three Earth months! A complete day on Mercury, including both the day time and the night time, from midnight to midnight, therefore, lasts almost half an Earth year.

On its roasting, sunny side of three months, Planet Mercury holds much heat in the ground. In low spots, such as at the bottom of craters directly under the noon day Sun, I expect that pools of molten material will be found. If found, I would expect that these molten pools would freeze over as they slowly rotate to the three month, freezing side of Planet Mercury.

Planet Mercury is also the smallest of the eight planets, and therefore Planet Mercury’s small gravitational mass is only strong enough to hold no more than a trace of atmosphere. The air molecules of Mercury’s trace of beginning atmosphere were energized by the heat form the nearby Sun. These air molecules were so heated and energized by the Sun’s heat that I believe they sped up to Mercury’s local escape velocity and shot out into space. The solar wind from the Sun may help to replenish and then carry the trace of air of Mercury out into the solar system and away from Mercury and away from our Sun.

Mercury is a furnace planet on its three month, sunny side and then a refrigerator planet on its three month, night side. Without a significant atmosphere, there is no significant, atmospheric wind to move the extreme heat from the sunny, day side of Mercury to warm up the cold, night side of Mercury. What about the solar wind? I, Goodspaceguy, an amateur astronomer, don’t yet know enough about the strength of the thin, solar wind at Mercury.

There might be water ice surviving in the permanently shaded areas of polar craters of Mercury. (What about the solar wind?) Such a shaded location with frozen water in a crater near the North Pole or South Pole of planet Mercury might be a good location for a robotic research station? We humans can send robots into the Forbidden Zone of Heat, but most space colonists will probably prefer to be in one of the many possible space colonization locations much, much further away from the roasting, radiating Sun. Until we learn more through our robots, space colonists would do well to stay away from planet Mercury, orbiting our Sun in the Forbidden Zone of Heat.

Earth, in comparison with Mercury, is the cool, protected, paradise planet of our solar system.





PLANET VENUS:

Planet Venus is the second closest planet to our hot, burning, radiating Sun. Being closer to the nuclear fire of our Sun than our Earth is, Planet Venus is therefore hotter than our Earth and is within the area around our Sun that I call the Forbidden Zone of Heat. Humans should not enter this forbidden zone. Planet Venus is so hot that it is a most unpleasant, furnace planet. Planet Venus is so hot that the water of crashing comets that would have become its vast oceans has instead evaporated to become part of its dense atmosphere or has escaped into space.

The hot furnace atmosphere of Venus is also spiced with clouds of sulfuric acids … an added unpleasantness for humans. The atmosphere of Venus (containing some of the remnants of its never-existing, vast oceans) is more than 90 times the atmosphere of Earth. On its surface, Planet Venus is such a hot hell of a planet that lead would melt. Consequently, I, Goodspaceguy, expect that molten pools of material will also be discovered by our advancing robots on Planet Venus, as well as on Planet Mercury.

Being almost as big as our Earth, Planet Venus has enough gravitational mass to hold a massive ocean of atmosphere. The air currents of Venus transfer the incoming heat from the Sun all around the globe of Venus so that Venus (unlike Mercury) has no frozen side. Venus is furnace hot, all around its surface. But I am guessing that the energized molecules of the lighter elements, such as hydrogen, of its dense atmosphere probably did reach the local escape velocity of Venus at the top of the atmosphere and shot off into space.

Some people have said that there is a segment of upper atmosphere of Venus where the temperature and pressure is friendly to Earth life. They have suggested that we do research.

Your space descendants might figure out how to perform the giant task of gradually cooling down Planet Venus a bit. Perhaps space colonists of the future will put both shaders and reflectors into orbit around Planet Venus. The cooling of Planet Venus will be a huge and expensive job for your descendants. Will your descendants cool Planet Venus? Would it be a money loser? Probably, but our technology is continuing to advance.

Any future cooling down of planet Venus should probably be done by robots. Because of the intense radiation, humans should stay away from Venus. Venus is in the Forbidden Zone of Heat. We humans should not want anymore radiation than we already get in our own orbit of Earth around our Sun.

If we humans make lots and lots of progress in longevity research, will some of you readers still be alive to see some of our robots decreasing the temperature of Venus so much that the polar regions of Venus will become less hot? Will our future robots decrease the temperatures at the North and South poles of Venus sufficiently so that our robots won’t melt? But I recommend that human, space colonists go no nearer the Sun than our own Earth Orbit. For human health in our beginning 21st Century, all Earthlings should stay out of the Forbidden Zone of Heat, wherein Mercury and Venus orbit our Sun. Send robots instead.

In comparison with planet Venus our Spaceship Earth is our cool, paradise planet.





THE HABITABLE LIFE ZONE OF OUR SOLAR SYSTEM:

Within our solar system, surrounding our Sun, there is a human-friendly temperature zone. We could call this area the Life Zone or the Habitable Zone or the Goldilocks Zone or Goldilocks Sphere or all of these. The Goldilocks Sphere or the Goldilocks Zone, neither too hot, nor too cold, is sandwiched between what I call the Forbidden Zone of Heat and the Forbidden Zone of Cold.

Think of our Sun as a campfire. Close to our Sun, our campfire, as in the orbit of planet Mercury and also in the orbit of planet Venus, the heat from the campfire of our solar system is too hot for us. This is the Forbidden Zone of Heat. Within this zone, we would want to move away from the intense heat, away from the intense radiation of our Sun. But, too far away from our Sun, our solar campfire, as, for example, at the orbit of planet Jupiter and beyond, we find the temperature to be too cold. Out here, the heat given off by our Sun is not enough. The heat from our Sun has been spread out over too much space. We become cold. We want to move back closer to our Sun. Between the two forbidden zones of heat and of cold, within the more comfortable temperature zone of life, our Earth orbits our solar campfire. Within this Life Zone, our Sun sends out the right amount of heat for us to capture and use to sustain our human lives. Starting within the Life Zone of our solar system, our space colonizers will bring the life of Earth to orbital space.

We will colonize orbital space. It is in orbital space that we can create artificial gravity equal to one Earth gravity. Creating artificial Earth gravity by spinning our space settlements is the advantage of orbital colonies over planetary or moon colonies. In our giant solar system, we should first colonize the orbital space of our Life Zone.

In this Habitable Zone, water enclosed by atmosphere or other containers is able to take liquid form and is able to support life. Our Spaceship Earth orbits our Sun within this Goldilocks Zone or Habitable Zone or Life Zone. Here the temperature is right for liquid water and the forms of life that are supported by liquid water.

This Life Zone, this Goldilocks Zone, also exist around the other stars, but the other stars are so far away that, although our technology is advancing, our technology is far below that required to voyage to the Habitable Zones of the other stars.

As consolation, Earth, our paradise planet, has the correct gravitational mass to hold the right amount of atmosphere to contain the right amount of liquid water for supporting intelligent human life (plus, for comparison, many dummies.) Being so right, Spaceship Earth in our solar system is the planet of paradise for life in our beginning 21st Century, in our Paradise Age of upward advancing technology.

Our orbital space colonists will experiment with orbits that are different distances from our Sun, our solar campfire. Will we find that they actually prefer orbits that are further out from our Sun than the orbit of Earth? How far from our Sun will the preferred orbits of the orbital space colonists be? Different orbital space colonists will probably differ in their choices.

Many orbital space colonists might prefer orbits around our Sun that are between the orbit of Earth and the orbit of Mars. Planet Saturn has rings of orbiting icebergs and smaller material. Over the generations, the space colonists, your descendants, will probably build rings of space habitats around our Sun, with an orbiting towering town here and there and a celestial city here and there as determined by the profitability of space commerce. Imagine many spinning, greenhouse gardens and mining towns and manufacturing towns and resorts and super-duper malls within trading towns spinning and orbiting in space.





PLANET EARTH:

Our Spaceship Earth is the third planet from our Sun. Most of the energy from our Sun’s nuclear power radiates out into space in all directions, missing Earth. Our Spaceship Earth is continuously soaking up only a tiny fraction of the atomic energy sent out by our Sun. There is continually an abundance of unused nuclear energy coming from our Sun. We should make it easier for space colonists to now go up into orbital space and capture and use some of this abundant energy to power their orbiting, spinning, space settlements that they will build. Our orbital space settlements in the Habitable Zone of our solar system will be powered by an abundance of currently unused nuclear power radiating out from our Sun.

I, Goodspaceguy, ask that you think of our pleasant Planet Earth, our paradise planet, as a marvelous spaceship, our Spaceship Earth. Our Spaceship Earth is traveling continuously through space around our Sun in our pleasant Life Zone, where the future Goldilocks of space should be pleased. Furthermore, our Spaceship Earth is traveling with our Sun through space within our Milky Way Galaxy.

Our Spaceship Earth is a water world. Over 70% of Earth’s surface is covered by liquid water, necessary for Earth life.

Long ago, the Chinese started developing rockets. Twentieth Century government development of this rocket technology allowed Americans to go to Earth’s moon in 1969. Now in the year 2012, non-government owned companies, such as Space X, an American company, have proven their ability to send cargo up into orbital space. Soon, Space X and other companies will be able to also rocket humans into orbital space. Now people can also buy trips into orbit in Russian rocket ships. The prices will gradually come down.

On our mostly water world, we humans live on the high ground. The oceans cover the low areas of Earth. The oceans and other bodies of water cover over 70 percent of our Spaceship Earth. We seven billion humans live on less than 30 % of the surface of our Earth, even less, when we consider the sparsely populated desert lands and the frozen lands and the mountainous areas. Currently, in the International Space Station, we usually keep three or more people in orbital space, about one person for each two billion people down on Earth.

Life requires energy, and if our Sun were to send out a little bit more energy (as in global warming,) our Sun might then support more life in the cold oceans of Earth and on the cold northern lands of Earth.

If our Sun is currently putting out more energy (as some people believe,) will it continue to do so, or will there be another normal decrease in the energy output of our Sun, which will cause the return of another Age of Ice? Were the previous, recurring Ice Ages on Earth caused by regularly recurring dips in the energy output of our Sun? I am guessing so. Have you noticed that the energy output of campfires is always changing?

Starting during the last Ice Age, has the Sun been putting out more and more energy? Is it this increased energy coming from our Sun that has been melting away the water ice of Earth, making the glaciers of the past Ice Age disappear? Is the increased energy output of the Sun, the true cause of global warming? Again, I am guessing so.

Has more energy from the Sun also been melting away the carbon dioxide ice of Mars? Within the next 20,000 years, will the energy output from the Sun again decrease, allowing another Ice Age of frozen water to return to the Earth and another Ice Age of frozen carbon dioxide to freeze out of the thin atmosphere of Mars?

As the energy output of the Sun changes, the orbiting space colonists can move their space habitats to their desired temperature distance from our Sun. Many space habitats may come to form a new ring around our Sun in the slightly shifting Life Zone.

Who can figure out how we can prevent the recurring ice ages from returning and freezing our Earth again? Imaging glaciers, again covering northern America and covering northern Eurasia. Will we humans of high technology be able to keep our Earth warm in the future? With our advancing technology, will we brainy humans be able to stop the Age of Ice from again freezing our Earth. To stop the next Ice Age will be a big job, but I, Goodspaceguy, and others have some ideas that might work and could be tried with the help of our advancing, orbital technology. But to stop Earth’s next Ice Age when our Sun again dips in its output of heat will be expensive. It will not be cheap to alter the natural temperature variations produced on our planet Earth by energy output changes in our Sun. Should we fear the return of the Ice Age? What can your descendants do to prevent the normal return of the Age of Ice?

Some of the space colonists, might place many solar-energy reflective mirrors in orbit around our Earth to warm up our Earth. They might build many solar power stations in orbit around our Earth and then beam solar power down to Earth to warm our Earth to try and prevent the next Ice Age.

Your descendants who stay on Earth might also decide to build many nuclear power plants on the surface of Earth to help keep Earth warm and thereby prevent the Age of Ice from returning. What will be the low cost method of keeping Earth warm if the Age of Ice starts to return?





SPACESHIP EARTH IS OUR PARADISE PLANET, OUR PANET OF LIFE:

To improve our paradise on Spaceship Earth, we should now build a full production, full employment economy all around Spaceship Earth. As a model, we should start by un-sabotaging the economy of the United States. The knowledge already exists in textbooks on economics and business. To raise the living standard, the incentives of profit and wealth building need to be defended and promoted.

Currently, we are wasting much labor; we are wasting the lives of people. We are not using the labor of many people. Some people are unemployed, and some people are under-employed. People are waiting to be put to work, improving our Spaceship Earth. These unused people want to become serious consumers in our exchange economy, where we work for each other.

In our solar system, our Spaceship Earth is our paradise planet of life. Of the eight planets in our solar system, only our Spaceship Earth can currently support human life. Our Spaceship Earth is the planet where many people can currently attempt to build their individual Gardens of Eden.

Our amazing technology is continuing to advance on Earth, and we have long had the knowledge and technological ability to start the colonization of our own solar system. If we Earthlings had started the colonization of orbital space at the beginning of our space programs, we would already have beginning space settlements. Instead, we Earthlings have wasted and destroyed many of our space resources and assets.

To start the colonization of our solar system, I, Goodspaceguy, am mainly interested in first colonizing the Habitable Life Zone around our Sun occupied by the orbit of Spaceship Earth, and by the orbit of planet Mars, and by the orbits of the huge number of objects that occupy the Sun orbiting region known as the Asteroid Belt.





NEAR EARTH OBJECTS:

Roughly more than 5,000 near Earth objects (NEOs) have been discovered in orbit around our Sun. I use the number 5,000 because it is easy to remember and it is good enough to indicate that there are many space rocks and comets that cross the orbit of Earth. Most are smaller than one kilometer (0.6 miles) in diameter.

Our star, the Sun, and our Earth and the other planets and moons were formed by objects crashing into them. Most of the big crashes in our solar system have already occurred, but there will be some more. For example, we have photographs of recent large crashes into planet Jupiter.

The stars, such as our Sun, and their planets, and the moons of the planets function as vacuum cleaners in space. The gravity of these large objects pull smaller objects into them, crashing into them. The gravity of the stars, planets, and moons help maintain the vacuum of space through which the orbital objects of space rush rapidly.

Being bombarded from space, the Earth slowly grew larger and larger to its present size in 2012. Everyday thousands and thousands of tiny, tiny meteors crash into Earth. If they strike the atmosphere of Earth during the night, some of them are large enough to appear as shooting stars. Most of these shooting stars are so small that they burn up in the atmosphere. A few are large enough to survive the fiery plunge and hit the surface of Earth. The larger ones form craters if they hit the land instead of the water of our water world.

The more than 5,000 near Earth objects are the natural objects that are large enough to track. There are many more objects that are too small to track. (In this concept, I am not counting the numerous Earth orbiting, human-made objects.)

Some of your descendants who become space colonists might work at capturing near Earth objects. They might sell this raw material to other colonists who might work at processing these captured object into building material from which to build the orbiting space settlements (including magnificent, orbiting, spinning, space towns and then cities of culture.)

Hopefully, the space colonists who work as miners will mine away and convert any threatening asteroids and comets into raw material with which to build the space settlements. This will be much cheaper than bringing the raw material for the space settlements up out of our Earth’s gravity well.

This construction of the orbiting, space civilization of our solar system will be the work of generations of your descendants. We should have started at the beginning of our American Space Program. Technology is advancing rapidly. Our magical technology of the Twentieth Century and now this new Twenty-first Century is continuing to race forward. The technological progress is amazing, almost magical.



L4 AND L5:

The beginning space colonists might also find profitable, orbiting objects and material at the LaGrange points known as L4 and L5. These two locations are about 60 degrees ahead of the Earth and 60 degrees behind the Earth in the orbit of our Earth around our Sun. Useful space objects are thought to collect near the L4 and L5 orbital locations.





WHICH NATIONALITIES WILL BECOME THE FIRST COLONIZERS OF ORBITAL SPACE?

Our knowledge and technology is continuing to improve. The possibility for more progress and production is looking good. But we Americans of the recently ended 20th Century allowed the backward Soviet Union to become the first achieving, space nation of the Space Age. Will we Americans again hold ourselves back until some other nation (perhaps China or India or a small nation that thinks technological advancement is important?) becomes the Space-Age leader and orbital colonizer of the 21st Century?





PLANET MARS:

Tiny Mars, the second smallest planet, is the fourth planet from our Sun. Being small, Mars has only enough gravity to hold onto a thin atmosphere. Being further away from the Sun than our Earth is, Mars is colder than our Earth. Being cold helps Mars, in spite of its weak gravity, to hold onto more of its thin carbon dioxide atmosphere than otherwise. For example, on hot Mercury, the air molecules are more quickly energized up to the local escape velocity and shoot off into space. The air molecules on cold Mars are less energized than those on hot Mercury and are slower to shoot off into space.

The Earth and Mars are the closest to each other when the Earth moves in between the Sun and Mars. At this closest point in their orbits, Mars looks to us on Earth like a bright star with a slightly reddish tint. Instead of oceans, Mars has desert land of rusted red soil, rich in rusted iron. Earth is a water world. Mars is a land world. But comets, delivering water, also crashed into Mars. What happened to the oceans of Mars? Currently, I believe that because of the small size of Mars and thus its small gravity (about 1/3 that of Earth’s) and the coldness of Mars, the surface oceans of Mars have frozen and mixed with the ground and have also partly escaped into space.

On Earth, only a few people live in the freezing cold of Antarctica in spite of Antarctica’s abundance of mineral wealth. The Arctic and Antarctic of Mars, in comparison, are much colder, and Mars is so hostile that I do not believe that life ever evolved on Mars. It took life a long time to evolve on our warm Earth, and our water world Earth is surrounded by both a life protecting blanket of water (called oceans) and a life protecting blanket of atmosphere, both lacking on Mars, making native Martian life unlikely. Instead, life on Mars is likely to be only exported life from Earth.

In the frozen Martian polar caps of water and carbon dioxide ice, photos reveal prominent channels. Frozen carbon dioxide ice caps on top of the more permanent dirty water ice caps means that the polar regions of Mars are much colder than the polar regions of Earth. Were these channels, through the frozen polar caps of Mars, caused by the thin but fast moving winds of Mars?

Each Martian year, when the warmer (but still cold by Earth standards) summer season returns, first to one Martian polar cap and half a Martian year later to the other, the Sun melts the frozen, polar, carbon dioxide ice. The thawing carbon dioxide returns to the Martian atmosphere. In summer and winter, one polar cap of carbon dioxide ice melts and the other polar cap freezes. Does this mean that the carbon dioxide atmosphere of Mars is denser in the spring and fall than in summer and winter? I am guessing so. Like on Earth, the two Martian polar caps take turns freezing and partially melting. Although there is also frozen water ice in the polar regions, as an amateur astronomer, I am guessing that the water ice remains all year round because the local summers on Mars are still freezing cold by Earth standards.

The freezing of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere in the local polar winters of Mars suggests a coldness so cold in the Martian polar regions that it would be wise for humans to stay away. Cold Martian polar regions that will freeze carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere are not good places for humans. Better for humans to stay in the cold but warmer, equatorial, low lands of slightly thicker, carbon dioxide atmosphere.

Currently, human space colonists should not land on Mars (except for the person who wants to be the first human on Mars, and the person who wants to be the first human to die on Mars.) The benefits of landing on Mars and returning will not be worth the costs! Trips to the hostile surface of Mars would make more economic sense as one-way trips. People who go down to the surface of Mars should plan to become Martians for the rest of their shortened lives. How long will the new Martians from Earth be able to live?

Instead, it would be more profitable for space colonists to colonize the two orbits around the two moons of Mars and also colonize the orbit of Mars around our Sun.

If, after more advancement in our space technology, such as life support, some of your descendants land on Mars, perhaps, the gigantic valley floor of the great and long canyon of Mars would be an interesting location for a first research station and colony? The colonists of a research station on the surface of Mars should spend most of their time underground in the tunnels and caverns and rooms of their research colony. When outside on the surface of Mars, even at the equator, humans should stay inside their warm and pressurized spacesuits or die.

Because of the extreme cold, it would be wise to leave the first polar research station of Mars to our advancing robots. Keep humans away from the extremely frozen Martian polar caps. Stay, at first, close to the cold equator, where there is, at least, some brief warming under the midday Sun.



We should not warm up Mars. If we were to do so, the air molecules might be energized to local Martian escape velocity. The energized air might shoot off into space. The atmosphere would become even thinner than it already is. The coldness of Mars allows Mars to hold onto more atmosphere than hellish hot planet Mercury is able to hold onto. How thin is the Martian atmosphere? The almost non-existent but yet noticeable atmosphere of Mars is less than one percent of Earth’s atmosphere. When outside, humans must wear spacesuits or die in this thin carbon dioxide atmosphere that is almost a vacuum.

I, Goodspaceguy, am guessing that because of the small size of Mars and the resulting weak gravity, Mars has lost a lot of atmosphere to space. A lot of air molecules have reached Martian escape velocity and shot off into space. Also, weak Martian gravity is not enough gravity for humans. Weak gravity will probably causes human colonists to weaken.

If Mars were as big as Earth, its gravitational mass would have been large enough to hold an atmosphere thicker than Earth’s, which would have helped to raise the surface temperature to a temperature closer to that required to support human life at the equator.

But, please, do not terra-form Mars. Do not increase the size of Mars! It is better to keep Mars at its present, small size because your future, orbiting space descendants will have need of all available space debris and materials for the building of their orbiting space cities, which will produce a civilization superior to that which could be produced on Mars.

If enough of us Americans gain the desire to colonize orbital space in this beginning 21st Century, we already have so much knowledge and so much technology that we could even build orbiting, spinning, space settlements around Mars in orbit around its two, asteroidal moons soon after building such privately-owned, connectable, hardship habitats in orbit around our Earth and around our Moon.



LOW-COST, SUBSURFACE COLONIZING OF MARS:

After our orbital space colonists succeed in advancing space technology, then to survive on the surface of Mars, one-way human colonists should build underground habitats and connecting tunnels, preferably, at the equator of Mars, perhaps at Mole City. They should compartmentalize and pressurize their underground habitats and passageways. The pressure of the rock and dirt above the human habitats could help hold in a human-made, Earth-like atmosphere. Perhaps, for humor, some polluted air from Los Angeles could be imported to Mars to make the colonist feel right at home? Of course, the carbon dioxide on Mars would be helpful for growing plants in the domed greenhouses, and the plants would give off oxygen and food for the colonists.

The dirt and rock above the increasing number of habitats and tunnels of the subsurface Martian colonists in Mole City will also act as shields from incoming meteors. Incoming asteroids and even large meteors will, of course, crash right through and kill the humans in some of the compartments, but other dangers will continue to cause the deaths of those humans who remain on Earth. Humans, whether on Earth or in the future space colonies, will die. (I want our medical technology of rejuvenation to be advanced to improve the quality and length of human life.)

I, Goodspaceguy, predict that the more successful Martian colonies will turn out to be privately-owned colonies, not under the surface of Mars, but in orbit around Mars around the two tiny, asteroidal moons of Mars, where centrifugal force can be used to produce Earth-like gravity. For the health of the colonists, it will be important to create Earth-like gravity by using centrifugal force. For the long-term, it will be better for the health of the orbiting space colonists to use a variety of human controlled and autonomous robots down on the surface of Mars.



More small asteroids could be moved to orbit around Mars to become new smaller moons of Mars, and used to build additional, orbiting, space settlements.

To get the most for our money, our several, starter, privately-owned Mars space colonies should be space settlements in orbit around the two, asteroidal moons of Mars. In orbit, the different, space colonists can create centrifugal force of one gravity. Deimos and Phobos, moons of Mars, should be our first Martian destinations, not Mars itself.

But first, we would be wise to build privately-owned, demonstration, one-gravity spinning, space settlements in orbit around our Earth and around our Moon before moving such segmented, space settlements on to more far away destinations, such as L4 and L5 in Earth’s solar orbit and Deimos and Phobos in Martian orbit.

Our Spaceship Earth in comparison with Mars is the paradise planet of our solar system.





OUR ASTEROID BELT

In our solar system, let us think of the wide Asteroid Belt as one of two, thin rings around our Sun. The second, thin ring is our wide Kuiper Belt. The rings of Saturn are visible rings. The wide Asteroid Belt and the wide Kuiper Belt are like invisible rings.

I, Goodspaceguy, think of our Asteroid Belt as a divider between the tiny, four inner planets, made of stone and metal, and the giant, four outer planets, made of an abundance of gas, that has been gravitationally captured by their metallic and stony centers.

Out in this cold and wide, orbital region that we have named the Asteroid Belt, many asteroids and other small objects orbit our Sun in ovals much larger than the orbits of the four inner planets. These asteroids and other objects mainly orbit the Sun between the orbit of planet Mars and the orbit of planet Jupiter.

These asteroids and other objects are thought to be the building blocks of a planet that never succeeded in forming in that wide orbit. Some of the Asteroid Belt objects have oval orbits that bring them repeatedly inside the orbit of Mars and even inside the orbit of Earth and then out to the Asteroid Belt again.

It seems that the surrounding pulls and tugs from the interacting gravity of the Sun and Jupiter on these many small planetary building blocks were stronger than the small gravity in the individual building blocks. The weak gravity in the individual objects of the Asteroid Belt did not overcome the stronger gravitational interference from Jupiter. The weak gravity of the objects of the Asteroid Belt was not strong enough to pull the objects together to form a regular planet, but was strong enough to form a few dwarf planets.

Ceres, 940 km (585 miles) wide, is the largest dwarf planet that was able to form in the Asteroid Belt. Other smaller dwarf planets were also able to form. The smaller the objects are, the more numerous they are. There are many. Over a period of time, more gravitationally interacting objects will have their orbits changed. Some will then come into the inner solar system, and some of them will crash into our Earth, a gravitational vacuum cleaner, helping to maintain the vacuum of space. Some asteroids and comets will crash into Earth … unless we first mine them away.

In the Asteroid Belt, we see a glimpse of the remains of the original cloud of gas and dust and meteors and asteroids, all building-block material, from which our Earth and the other planets gravitationally pulled together and then crashed together to become the planets and moons of our solar systems.

For our goal of orbital space colonization, it is good that the numerous, orbiting objects that make up the Asteroid Belt did not come together to form a larger planet. It will be easier for our orbital space colonists to collect these numerous Sun-orbiting objects to use as building material for their heavenly habitats. From the cold Asteroid Belt, some of your descendants and their robots will harvest much material (such as iron and nickel and stone and ice.) Using energy from our Sun, other space colonists will work at melting and forming this material for use by other space colonists in the building of their orbiting space settlements. There will be much specialization of labor among the space colonists. There will be many different occupations.

From the already broken down material of the Asteroid Belt, many of your space colonist descendants and their robots and their computers will be able to process and distribute building material and other resources and supplies. Then other of your specializing descendants and their companies will build segmented, orbiting space settlements in which civilization will grow and become wondrous.

And in the centers of their orbiting, spinning, space cities of culture, your technologically educated descendants will even be able to float and fly.

The smaller objects will be easier to move to the desired locations of their future space cities of culture. From the material imported from the Asteroid Belt, your many, technologically skilled descendants will collect and use the small orbiting objects to build space cities of grandeur. Your descendants will form many new, specialized companies to operate their orbital space culture and free market.

We Earthlings are the owners of the abundant materials in the Asteroid Belt. In our solar system, only we humans have the ability to claim ownership of the numerous objects in the Asteroid Belt.

We Earthlings are the owners of our entire solar system. Soon we will have the ability to go out and stake our claims. Accordingly, let us think of the Asteroid Belt as part of our inner solar system. Let us think of the four outer giant planets of gas as being in the beginning of the outer solar system.





THE FOUR OUTER PLANETS, ORBITING OUR SUN IN OUR FROZEN FORBIDDEN ZONE OF COLD:

Out past our wide Asteroid Belt of countless, orbiting objects, we find our four outer planets: JUPITER, SATURN, URANUS, and NEPTUNE, gas giants all.

The further out we go out in our solar system, the smaller our Sun appears, and the colder space gets. The warming radiation from our Sun is spread out over a larger and larger area that the Sun is unable to warm sufficiently for the life needs of us humans. Contained water freezes into stone-like ice. Water ice becomes a type of rock. The heat from the Sun is not enough to keep contained water in liquid form. Water-based, Earth-type life becomes unlikely.

But the force-of-gravity is also able to produce heat within planets and moons. Gravity might produce small pockets of warmth in the outer Frozen Forbidden Zone of Cold.

Planet Earth is only one astronomical unit away from our nuclear heat producing Sun. But planet Jupiter is about five astronomical units away. In the orbit of Jupiter, space is cold. Contained water heated only by the distant Sun becomes rock-hard ice. This is not good for water-based life. The last three gas giant planets are even further away from the Sun than Jupiter. Very roughly, Saturn is ten astronomical units away. Uranus is roughly twenty astronomical units away. Neptune is roughly thirty astronomical units away from our nuclear, heat-producing Sun.

Again, at one astronomical unit, Earth is pleasantly warmed by our Sun. Human life flourishes at a distance of one astronomical unit from our Sun. At a distance of five astronomical units, human life would normally be frozen and dead.

Being so far from our Sun, should make the four gas giant planets (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune) much, much colder than our Earth. But these giant planets do have areas of warmth.

Through their force of gravity, and the resulting, increasing pressure as one goes deeper and deeper into the atmosphere of the giant planets, the distant gas giants do produce some internal heat. By their internal, moving, atmospheric currents and by their flexing and friction and the compression that moves their atmospheric molecules close together, heat is created. The gravitational, tidal forces move the molecules. There is pressure. There is containment. There should be a layer of liquid or layers of liquids. Is there a layer of liquid water under the heavy, confining atmospheres of the giant planets?

Are the metal and stone interiors of the giant planets molten hot? The larger the mass of a planet, the greater the pressure, the greater the compression, the greater the currents, the greater the friction, the greater the heat. For example, giant Jupiter with the strongest gravitational force among the planets in our solar system is reported to emit more heat into space than it receives from the distant Sun. Of course, this might not be saying much, because being five astronomical units from the Sun, Jupiter does not receive much heat from the Sun. This makes it easier for the heat produced by Jupiter’s gravity to help Jupiter to emit more heat than Jupiter receives.

And through gravitational, tidal flexing, planet Jupiter helps produce, for example, sulfur volcanoes on Io, one of its more than 60 moons of its miniature, sub-solar system.

The gravity of Jupiter may also be helping to produce a liquid ocean under the frozen surface of its moon Europa. Space researchers should want to investigate this suspected liquid-water ocean under the floating surface ice. Moon Europa appears to be warmed by gravitational, tidal flexing. If this liquid water ocean does exists, it will probably be unprofitable for the beginning space colonists to use because it is so far away. But later it might become profitable after the orbital space colonists make more technological advances and build the orbital free market and then venture into the Frozen Forbidden Zone of Cold.

At a distance of five astronomical units from our Sun, these resources may, at first, be too, too far away for the orbiting space colonies in the warm Life Zone of space around our Sun between the orbits of Earth and Mars. But as time passes, space colonists and their businesses will probably discover how to profitably use some of this liquid water in the frozen, formerly Forbidden Zone of Cold of the outer four planets.

Before venturing into the Forbidden Frozen Zone of Cold, the space colonists should want to first find what resources they can harvest from Earth orbit crossing objects such as comets and from LaGrange Points 4 and 5 and even from the Asteroid Belt, which is closer than Jupiter.

In the beginning colonization of orbital space, there may at first be no need to go out to the distant orbits of the four gas giant planets and their moons for resources. Doing so may not be profitable. Comets that cross inside the orbits of Earth and Mars should be a more profitable source of water and other resources for the beginning space colonists. First mine the objects that come to us, before going far away to mine the distant resources. The resources of our four distant, giant planets and their many moons can be left for future generations of space colonists, as directed by profitability.



Gravity from planet Saturn helps produce icy water volcanoes on Saturn’s moon Enceladus. Some moons warmed by gravitational flexing appear to have liquid water below their frozen surfaces, and they may have molten cores. If so and if these oceans are currently lifeless, researcher might make them homes to exported, ocean life from Earth. Your space-colonizing descendants and their robots will probably experiment with these oceans and lakes that are thought to exist below the frozen surfaces of some of the moons of the giant planets.

The four outer, giant planets are storage spheres of large amounts of hydrogen and helium and other gases, which would be unprofitable to retrieve with today’s technology.

The more massive the planet, the more atmosphere there is that pushes down, creating heavy atmospheric pressure far below. Jupiter, the largest of our eight planets, has the atmosphere that crushes down the most. This deeper, heavier, atmospheric pressure has crushed probes sent from Earth, but we Earthlings will send improved probes into Jupiter and into the other giant planets of gas.

Question: What will the flying of experimental, robotic aircraft and balloons in the layers of atmosphere of these four giant gas planets teach us?

Since these four giant hydrogen gas planets and their moons are far, far out from the temperature zone that promotes human life, intelligent human colonists will have to bring and build various heating systems with them to colonize the orbital areas around the moons of these giant planets. Economically, this frozen, currently Forbidden Zone of Cold can be left to future generations of your descendants and their advancing technology and businesses.

You who are to be among the first space colonists and some of your immediate descendants, will probably be quite busy just building your first orbiting space habitats in the closer and friendlier Habitable Life Zone portion of our inner solar system,

We are not yet ready to colonize the outer, frozen solar system in the region of the four gas giants. Of course, surprises await us. What will be some of the surprises? We can speculate. Advancing robots will be sent and used by the gradually increasing number of space colonists. While the space colonists remain safe in protected, orbital space settlements, their controlled robots might perform many functions down on and inside the moons of the distant, giant planets of our solar system.

What will the gravitational, tidal heating of some of the moons of the giant planets enable our robotic researchers to do in those moons? Future generations of space colonists in submarines might even visit their hardship, robotic research stations beneath the frozen surfaces of some of the moons. But your space-colonizing descendants will probably earn most of their profits by spending most of their time working and controlling their robots from nuclear-powered, orbiting, spinning, space settlements circling high above and around each moon of interest.

Spaceship Earth in comparison with the four, distant, hostile, giant planets of our solar system and their moons is the paradise planet in our solar system.





OTHER ORBITAL OBJECTS OF OUR SOLAR SYSTEM:

In addition to the eight major planets (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, and then Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune) inside our solar system, our solar system also contains frozen planetoids. Planetoids are also known as dwarf planets and as minor planets. I, Goodspaceguy, predict, that as our technology continues to improve, even more dwarf planets will be discovered, for example, beyond Neptune’s orbit, in the orbital region known as the Kuiper Belt (which is also part of the frozen Forbidden Zone of Cold) and in the gigantic, spherical Oort Cloud (which is the largest part of the frozen Forbidden Zone that makes up our surrounding, outer solar system.)

I believe “Kuiper” rhymes with “hyper.” “Hyper Kuiper.” And I believe “Oort” rhymes with “port” as in “spaceport.” “SpacePort Oort.”

In nature, small items usually vastly outnumber large items. Therefore, the dwarf planets in our solar system should vastly outnumber the major planets. Some of the dwarf planets appear to have been captured by the gravity of the major planets, and thereby have become known as the moons of the major planets. The major planets have also captured asteroids, and these asteroids are also called moons. For example, Mars has captured two asteroidal moons.

Our solar system contains many known moons and many known asteroids and many known comets. ( I, Goodspaceguy, believe that we will be discovering more moons and more asteroids and more comets in the outer solar system, such as in our Kuiper Belt and in our Oort Cloud.)

In the Forbidden Zone of Cold of our solar system, the frozen planetoids (which are far out dwarf planets) and the many moons and the many asteroids and the many comets, will at first be hardship locations for future, human colonists. From hardship locations such as these, your advancing, space-colonizing descendants and their improving robots will be able to obtain an abundance of resources for building new paradises, such as Sun orbiting space settlements (including orbiting space towns and orbiting space cities.) Many of these orbiting space settlements will be built within the pleasant, habitable, Goldilocks zone in the inner solar system that surrounds our Sun, but later some of your descendants will start colonizing in the frozen, Forbidden Zone of Cold, when it begins to appear profitable.

In the Fantastic Future, your descendants will build a ring of spinning, orbiting, space colonies around the Sun, our star.





KUIPER BELT (rhymes with “hyper”):

Our wide Kuiper Belt, like our wide Asteroid Belt, also forms an invisible ring around our Sun.

Our Kuiper Belt contains many objects, spread out and orbiting our Sun through the great vacuum of space.

While our Asteroid Belt separates our tiny, four, inner planets from our giant, four, outer planets, our much larger Kuiper Belt encircles all eight planets and the dividing Asteroid Belt. Like our Asteroid Belt, our Kuiper Belt is also made up of countless, Sun orbiting objects.



PLANETOID PLUTO OF OUR KUIPER BELT

Pluto, which is usually in our Kuiper Belt, previously was classified as our ninth planet, but Pluto has been re-classified as a dwarf planet. Pluto has been demoted. We now have only eight official planets in our solar system, instead of the previous nine. Minor planet Pluto still orbits our Sun. Planetoid Pluto already has its own miniature sub-solar system. Four moons have been found orbiting Pluto: Charon and Nix and Hydra and S/2011 P1 (P4.) Actually, planetoid Pluto and the smaller minor planet Charon mutually orbit each other in a double dwarf planetary system. Will even more moons be found orbiting planetoid Pluto?

As minor planet Pluto swings further away from the Sun in its elongated, elliptical orbit back into the Kuiper Belt, the atmosphere of Pluto freezes and snows to the ground. Later, when planetoid Pluto moves temporarily back inside the orbit of Neptune in Pluto’s circling around the Sun, some of the frozen gases will melt and return to being atmosphere. Planetoid Pluto is, perhaps, only the second largest known dwarf planet.



PLANETOID ERIS

Dwarf planet Eris orbits further out in the cold Kuiper Belt than binary dwarf planets Pluto and Charon. Minor planet Eris is thought by some to be the largest of the dwarf planets in our solar system, but the measuring of the sizes of the planetoids from great distances might not be accurate. Planetoid Eris has one known moon: Dysmonia. Since we gradually discovered four moons circling Pluto, we will gradually discover more moons orbiting minor planet Eris?



From the region of our solar system known as the Kuiper Belt, our Sun looks like a bright star. Without significant heat from our Sun, the objects in the Kuiper Belt tend to be frozen. For the rest of this new 21st Century, I, Goodspaceguy, recommend that the space colonists leave the exploration of the frozen Kuiper Belt to their robots. The space colonists would be wise to spend their time profitably building their orbiting, spinning space habitats in the pleasantly warm Goldilocks Zone of orbital space around our Sun. Leave the colonization of the forbidden, frozen Kuiper Belt region to some of your descendants of the 22nd Century or later. Wait until they have developed good warming systems for their far out orbital colonies. Give the space colonists time to make our magical technology more magical. Wait until profitable ventures are suspected or discovered. Then space-colonizing entrepreneurs can be warm and more successful in the colonizing of our Kuiper Belt.





THE OORT CLOUD: (Rhymes with “port” such as in the word “spacePORT”)

The Oort Cloud is the biggest area of the frozen Forbidden Zone of Cold of our solar system. Will space colonists build a spaceport in the Oort Cloud? Answer: Yes, but not soon. Some future generations of space colonists will, but not the first generation of space colonists, unless they really surprise me. A spaceport in the Oort Cloud would be a real money loser during the first generation of space colonization. There is more profit to be earned in the busy Habitable Life Zone of our solar system. The huge distance to our Oort Cloud and the Great Coldness of our outer solar system will make it a real money loser for the beginning space colonists to build a spaceport in our Oort Cloud.

But after future space colonists succeed in building reliable, safe, nuclear heated and powered, space settlements, both the hidden and the known resources of the near and far portions of the frozen Forbidden Zone of Cold will become more accessible for profitable ventures. Once nuclear heating of space settlements is made safe and affordable, future generations of space colonists will be able to colonize the Forbidden Zone of Cold. Until then, early space colonists should stay out of the Forbidden Zone of Cold. They should stay, instead, inside the busy Habitable Life Zone occupied by the orbits of Earth and of Mars and the Asteroid Belt. (Even in the Asteroid Belt, improved heating systems will be needed. Perhaps, the colonies in the orbit of Mars would be a good location for developing improved heating systems.)





GAS CLOUDS OF THE GALAXIES AND OUR OORT CLOUD:

Billions of years ago, there were (and still are) giant, clouds of gas and dust and other material floating in space within the length and breadth of our Milky Way Galaxy and within other galaxies. These gaseous, dust clouds of the galaxies made up significant portions of the galaxies. Giant, floating clouds in the galaxies in space were common then and are common now. Photographs of other galaxies show galactic clouds of gas and dust commonly extending around the breadth and length and circumferences of other galaxies.

From these gigantic, galactic space clouds, the stars and their solar systems have gravitationally condensed. Space clouds extend throughout each of the galaxies and are renewed by material from exploding stars and dying stars and their solar winds. Mutual gravity helps hold together the space clouds within the galaxies. Slowly, areas of space clouds are pulled more and more together by mutual gravity to form new stars and their solar systems.

About five billion years ago, one such area of giant space cloud in our Milky Way Galaxy gravitationally pulled together to become our Sun and its solar system. Other segments of the space cloud pulled together to become the nearby stars and their solar systems.

Gravitational condensation happened throughout our galaxy and in the other galaxies to form the stars and their surrounding solar systems.

Our solar system gravitationally condensed into its present form. Our Oort Cloud seems to be the vast remnant of the segment of the original space cloud from which gravity condensed our solar system.

I believe that the gigantic Oort Cloud is the remaining outer shell of only our portion of the gigantic space cloud from which our solar system and other solar systems gravitationally condensed.

Our Oort Cloud may stretch out to and bump into or even merge with the Oort clouds that surround the neighboring stars and their solar systems.

Because of the Great Coldness in the Oort Clouds, the Oort Cloud probably contains many frozen comets. The Oort Clouds surrounding each of the stars and their solar systems are huge. Our Milky Way Galaxy is a huge collections of perhaps four hundred billion stars and their solar systems and their surrounding Oort Clouds merging with one another.





SPREADING OUT TO NEIGHBORING SOLAR SYSTEMS:

As your distant descendant, with their improving, nuclear technology, learn how to build successful orbital space colonies at resource locations in our frozen Oort Cloud, eventually their space settlements might be built further and further out, until humans start building space colonies in the neighboring Oort Clouds.

Human expansion to neighboring solar systems will probably be slow and gradual as the nuclear space colonizing technology of your distant descendants improves and space settlements are built further and further out at discovered resource locations in our currently forbidden, frozen Oort Cloud.





PARADISES THAT ARE FAR, FAR AWAY … BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT IN OUR SOLAR SYSTEM, BUT ARE IN OTHER SOLAR SYSTEMS

Among the estimated 200 billion to 400 billion stars and their solar systems that make up our Milky Way Galaxy, I, Goodspaceguy, believe that there are also billions of other paradise planets. Statistically, our paradise Earth is not the only paradise planet in our Milky Way Galaxy.

(Please notice: because the estimated hundred billion other galaxies in the observable portion of our universe are so, so far away, I am not including their trillions of paradise planets. I am only talking about the estimated 200 billion to 400 billion solar systems that make up our own Milky Way Galaxy, and the statistical billions of paradise planets contained in our own Milky Way Galaxy.)

I, Goodspaceguy, believe that statistically some of these other paradise planets within our Milky Way Galaxy must be superior to our own paradise planet Earth. Some of the billions of other paradise planets probably have civilizations that are more technologically advanced than our own civilization. But, fortunately, they are so, so far away from us that we and they do not have the technological ability to reach each other … yet, and thus much cruelty and woe is currently avoided by us.

I, Goodspaceguy, believe that we will have time to improve our technology by taking on our present 21st Century task of beginning the colonizing of our own solar system before any of the more advanced, alien civilizations find us.





LESSONS FROM THE VIKINGS AND THE GOD AND GOLD-LOVING SPANISH:

Remember that about a thousand years ago, around 1,000 A.D., Vikings, such as Leif Eriksson, discovered America. Then the numerous American Indians of the Atlantic northeastern coast of America defeated and drove-off the violent Viking settlers. (Lesson: Be friendly.)

The technology of the numerous American Indians was not far below the technology of the Vikings. The Viking discovery of America was forgotten or never even learned of by their fellow Europeans. The victorious, American Indian warriors won additional time for their warring tribal civilizations. They won about 500 years during which each tribe could continue to defend their hunting grounds from their neighboring tribes.

Life became harder for the vanquished Vikings from Greenland. Finally after several hundred years of farming, Global Cooling destroyed the Viking farming settlements in Greenland. These Vikings disappeared. These Vikings rejected the knowledge that allowed the Eskimos of Greenland to survive the New Global Freeze. By rejecting the knowledge of the Eskimos, these Vikings of Greenland vanished. The Eskimos survived. (Lesson: Don’t reject the knowledge possessed by the Others.)

Global Cooling also caused hardship for the Vikings of Iceland, but some of the Icelandic Vikings held on and survived the Global Cooling.



Then almost 500 years after one or more American Indians tribes had defeated the Vikings, the Spanish Europeans, following Christopher Columbus, an Italian, rediscovered America for the Europeans. This was not good for the American Indians.

The combat and medical technology of the American Indians had not advanced much over the technology they had when they drove off the Vikings 500 years earlier. But the technology of the Europeans had advanced so much that this time the colonization of America by the European conquistadors and settlers succeeded.

Their deadly European diseases killed many Indians who had not built up the immunity of the Europeans. Also the European weapon and war technology had advanced during the 500 years between the two known discoveries of America. The Spanish Conquistadors and settlers and then other Europeans were successful in the second known colonization of America by Europeans. (Lesson: Develop technology, science, and individual incentive in order to survive discovery by aliens.)

Is it clear why we should not want to be discovered by advanced, space-faring aliens who possess the advanced technology necessary for travel between solar systems? Is it clear why we should want to become the leading, orbital, space colonizing civilization?

If the Vikings had been friendly and had merged with the numerous Indians of North America, a new, blended branch of our human family might have emerged, but the altered history of our world and the different chain-of-events would have meant that you would never have been born. So be happy with the cruel chain of historical events that led to your birth.



Now we Americans, who come from all the nations of Earth, are rapidly advancing our technology. People of America and people of the other advancing nations on our Spaceship Earth are building a worldwide market economy. Through free market forces and advancing technology, we, the advancers, are bringing the human family of Earth back together. Worldwide, we are increasing knowledge and trade and technology and democracy and incentive and productivity and the rights of the individual. We are bringing our Spaceship Earth together. We should raise the living standard.

As we and your descendants gain the ability to live in space in the future orbiting, civilized cities of our solar system, we may gain the technological ability to survive being discovered by an advanced, space-faring, alien race.

By advancing our technology and by becoming an orbital, solar-system-colonizing civilization, we will be more ready to mine away the next Earth approaching killer asteroid or comet, and we will be more ready to welcome and survive any advanced aliens who might discover us.





OUR AMAZING, INCREASING TECHNOLOGY:

When compared to the age of our solar system (probably more than five billion years old,) our improving technology (advancing slowly over the past ten thousand years or so of human, conflicting civilizations and conflicting … sometimes murderous … religions) is such a young technology. But our technology has been advancing faster and faster, especially after the European re-discovery of America in 1492. Our technology really bloomed in the Twentieth Century (growing from the Horse and Buggy Age to the beginning of the Space Age) and is continuing to bloom in our Twenty-first Century (during which life from Earth will begin the colonization of its solar system.)

We now have gained the technological ability to begin the orbital space colonization of our own solar system, which will be easier than the sub-surface colonization of Mars.





DO WE HAVE THE WILL TO COLONIZE ORBITAL SPACE?

We have the ability. Now we have to gain the will. Many Americans will try to stop our advance as they stopped us in the 20th Century, thereby allowing the backward Soviet Union to become first in space. The colonization of our solar system is one of several great challenges and goals of our new 21st Century. Many nations will make it easier for their people to go up into orbital space to start the colonization.





OTHER GOALS:

Another challenging goal is Life Extension.

Another challenging goal is to entice the backward, the under-educated, the unscientific peoples of our Spaceship Earth to enter into the realm of knowledge of economics and other sciences and high technology. (We humans are already making impressive progress on this goal. For example, as prices fall, more and more brainy but backward people will be advancing themselves into the Age of Technology by purchasing smart cell phones, which will also become pocket computers.

The smart phones/pocket computers purchased by backward people will connect these brainy people of high potential with the vast knowledge that is stored on the Internet of Spaceship Earth. Through their smart phones/pocket computers, many brainy, backward people will become their own teachers and will enter the world of increasing knowledge. This will be good for our human family.



Continuing to build a worldwide economy, the crew and passengers of Spaceship Earth are coming together for a worldwide family re-union in this 21st Century.



Another challenging goal is to raise the living standard.

We have many challenging problems and goals in our new 21st Century. There are solutions to the problems we face. We can achieve some of our goals. There are known ways to raise the living-standard of the people of Spaceship Earth. If we pursue the known solutions, we can be successful. Through protection of the individual, and through protection of incentive, and through advancing technology, and through the marketplace of competitive free enterprise that works for you, the consumer, we can raise the living standard of our human race, but will we? Ignorance stands in the way. To make progress, it will help to overcome Ignorance. Say, “Get thee behind me, Ignorance.”

To advance our fascinating technology, it will help us to lessen our human ignorance, and we are making progress. We have worldwide problems, Spaceship Earth-wide problems … problems, such as worldwide unemployment … because many brainy humans choose not to use their brains … yet. But the people who do use their brains are actually making progress in improving our technology and knowledge. (I, Goodspaceguy, think it would even help to open our existing libraries more.) Is it true that a closed library is a non-working library? Is it true that a closed library is a crippled library? Is it true that a closed public library is a waste of the peoples’ property?





THE FAMILY REUNION OF THE HUMAN RACE:

The human race that wandered out of Africa and diverged and separated into isolated regions of our world and mutated is now coming back together by way of the worldwide market place and the worldwide Internet for a family re-union on Spaceship Earth in this present 21st Century.

But as the human race colonizes orbital space, will the human race diverge again in the coming and varying and different and isolated space settlements that will be built in orbit around our Sun? Or is it more likely that your descendants will build a solar-system-wide marketplace and solar-system wide Internet that will help keep our human race united?

We don’t yet have the technological ability to colonize any of the other billions of other solar systems within our Milky Way Galaxy. Currently we have kept ourselves confined to our own Spaceship Earth. We have been slow to start the colonization of the orbital space of our own solar system. Colonizing orbital space should be much cheaper than colonizing the surface of Mars. Colonizing the surface of Mars will probably be a real money loser. I, Goodspaceguy, predict that the real progress is to be made in orbital space.

But now we have gained the knowledge and technology to go up to the high frontier from our Spaceship Earth. We can now learn how to live in orbital space. We can now advance our ability to colonize the orbital space in our own solar system. We have the International Space Station. Now, learning-how-to-live-in-orbital-space should be the new goal and research project of NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration.)





FAR IN OUR FUTURE:

By the time we, the human family of Spaceship Earth, have succeeded in spreading our advancing civilization throughout the Forbidden Zone of Cold of our outer solar system, we may then find that we have also gained enough knowledge and technology to be able to reach a few of our neighboring solar systems in our Milky Way Galaxy.

Amazing advancement is coming for our re-united human family that originated on the home continent of Africa, the land of our forgotten ancestors of long ago.

But when we do gain the ability to go to the neighboring solar systems, our human race will probably again diverge into new and different and mutated separate branches. The vast distances between solar systems will be an unusually big barrier to continued unity … just like the isolation and separation and divergence that developed in our human race when our human race wandered out of the home continent of Africa. The Stone Age technology of the time of the Out-wandering from Africa could not keep the human race together. Our human race diverged and mutated in the isolation of India, in the isolation of China, in the isolation of Europe, in the isolation of Australia, in the isolation of America, and in the isolation of the islands.

Our human race diverged and adapted to succeed in the different and hostile environments that were found. For example, back in the Stone Age in the northern lands of weak sunshine and water so cold that it turned to ice, it became important for Stone Age humans to learn to make and wear an abundance of animal skins and develop technology that would protect them from the freezing cold.

After we and your descendants colonize our solar system during this 21st Century and the 22nd Century and beyond, then, eventually, your descendants will diverge again.

Some of them will go out from our home solar system (as our ancestors left our home continent of Africa,) and they will begin the colonization of the billions of other solar system within our Milky Way Galaxy.

As the Stone Age, African hunter/gatherers mutated and became different as they colonized different isolated sections of our Earth, your distant descendants will diverge and mutate because the distances between the solar systems are so vast.

They might create a Star Trek divergence of humanoids within our Milky Way galaxy. Your diverging descendants in the different solar systems might turn Star Trek into a prophecy. Far, far in the future, your descendants out in the different solar systems of the Milky Way Galaxy might diverge to become different races of humanoids.

The humanoid races of the Star Trek fantasy such as Bajorans and Cardassians and Ferengi and Klingons and Romulans and Vulcans and billions of other intelligent races might be predicting what will happen to your descendants in the distant future. Wow! There might be more than 300 billion or 400 billion solar systems in our Milky Way Galaxy all waiting to bring forth new, mutated branches of your human family.

In this 21st Century, our human race will have a family reunion. Enjoy. Later, our human race will diverge again among the two hundred billion to four hundred billion solar systems that make up our Milky Way Galaxy.

The 21st Century, the century of the family reunion of our human race, the century of improving technology within the Life Zone of our solar system, will be a good century. A time of celebration. A time for improving life. A time of new abilities.

And then in the 22nd Century and the 23rd Century, with their amazing technology, their still advancing technology, your descendants might have gained the ability to go out to other solar systems within our arm of our Milky Way Galaxy. If so, they will start the dispersal of the seeds of the human race to other solar systems that may further protect our human race from the terrible destruction of nuclear war.

Will the 23rd Century become the Century of the start of the Great Dispersal of humans colonists into other solar systems of the Milky Way Galaxy? Will it be the start of the Great Mutations to adapt to the conditions encountered in the other solar systems of our Milky Way Galaxy?

In the distant future, will your descendants become magical and colonize the billions of other galaxies in the visible universe? The other galaxies are so, so far away. Some people say, “Never say never.” We have been stuck on Earth for ages. But now we have gained the ability to start colonizing the Habitable Life Zone of orbital space in our own solar system. Future generations of your descendants will work on colonizing the Forbidden Zone of Cold in our own solar system. Then future generations will work on the colonization of other solar systems of our huge Milky Way Galaxy and they will diverge and mutate.

Your distant, mutating descendants will be sufficiently occupied with the colonizing of the billions of solar systems in our own Milky Way Galaxy. That’s enough for me, Goodspaceguy, for now as a 2012 candidate for the U.S. Congress.



There are billions of galaxies in the observable universe. But the neighboring galaxies are so, so far away that even with a tremendous advancement of our technology, the neighboring galaxies still remain so, so far away. But our rapidly moving Milky Way Galaxy has grown to its present size by absorbing other smaller galaxies. Galaxies do grow by colliding with other galaxies. Sometimes the galaxies (which contain mostly empty space) pass through each other, gravitationally distorted. Sometimes the colliding galaxies merge.

Enjoy the present. Learn well. To improve your democracy, study economics. Work well, and from the wealth of resources in your solar system, now build a high civilization of many, many, orbital, spinning, towering towns and cultured cities.

Goodspaceguy