Morning Ed: Space {2018.07.24.T}
[Sp1] More on the fascinating Saturnian moon Enceladus.
[Sp2] Looks like space truckers’ future jobs are not safe from automation.
[Sp3] Is China about to take the lead in the space race?
[Sp4] Sex positions… in space!
[Sp5] Scientists managed to spot a planet being born.
[Sp6] Douglas Rushkoff warns the the rich are going to leave the rest of us behind with space exploration, and the digitization of our minds. And Alex Knapp writes about their space adventurism.
[Sp7] Next year, Mercury will travel across the face of the sun (from our vantage, naturally), which is actually pretty rare.
[Sp8] I only happened to know about Io’s volcanic infrastructure thanks to The Expanse.
[Sp9] James Poulos looks at our attraction to Mars.
Sp4: Its titillating but is this really what we should be sending astronauts into space to do? Though I suppose once you are in space it doesn’t cost extra.Report
Sp6: Rushkoff extrapolates a whole lot about an entire class of people based on the fact that five guys asked him some questions. People who work in finance deal with risk; it shouldn’t be shocking that they think about risk outside of finance. And just because someone is preparing for the worst doesn’t mean that they want the worst or even think that the worst is likely to happen.
Also, I’m not sure that I see some grand connection between one rich guy who wants to build a bunker in case the sh*t hits the fan, another rich guy who wants to colonize Mars, or another rich guy who wants to upload his consciousness tot he web.Report
I like the idea that a bunch of rich people are going to leave the Earth all by themselves without taking a veritable army of engineers, scientists, and other specialized labor along with them (at least, if they want to live long enough to enjoy leaving the Earth behind).Report
…or lock themselves in an underground bunker surrounded by men with guns and no loyalty, or improv on their genetic code, or…Report
They originally hired a team of engineers, but then laid them all off to reduce costs.Report
Just call it ‘Evolution in Action’Report
As someone with a particular set of skills (mostly botany related), you couldn’t pay me enough to get on that rocket. You know those people would be demanding to speak to my manager or similar the first time I couldn’t make coffee plants or aspirin magically appear on their godforsaken planet.Report
Since my 20s, Rushkoff has been the person I read when I want to feel irritated at the writer. It’s a rare desire, but he fulfills it admirably. (Also Jared Lanier, though he is a comparatively late arrival on that front.)Report
I remember an earlier article about hedge fund managers buying mini-fortresses in the third world. I don’t know if it’s a legitimate trend or just the kind of story that writes itself.Report
There’s a mini-scandal (scandalette?) here about some dude who was promoting one of those bunker set-ups in my general area (I don’t know exactly where, other than what town it was near, the location was kept hush-hush but I bet if I cared I could find it using Google Earth). Turns out he was actually a crook and a money launderer, and there are apparently some rich dudes out some bucks: Trident Lakes
It had a nice fountain, though, which will now probably become some rancher’s cattle waterer.Report
Of course. Shame on any would-be scammer who doesn’t try this. “Give me $10 million and I’ll build you a bunker so secret that you won’t even know where it is”? That’s golden.Report
Done right, with the right actors, it would make the plot for a very entertaining caper movie.Report
There was an episode of Elementary that had this kind of scam.Report
Even if you tell them where it is and show them the bunker, you can at least sell it a bunch of times to a bunch of different rich kooks. It’s not like they’re going to live in it once they’ve bought it. You can sell it over and over again until the zombie apocalypse.Report
Sp4: Well, duh!Report
Remember Biosphere 2? They lost 28% of their oxygen AND THEY DIDN’T KNOW WHY.
As it turns out, it was exposed concrete sequestering both Carbon and Oxygen.Report
The people who complained about the oxygen that got pumped into Biosphere 2 were kinda jerks.Report