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RE: RE: starship-design: Numbers needed for Colonization (was Antiproton-Cataly





> Given all developed world countries are having to few kids to
> sustain their
> population, assuming they tripple to quadruple their birth
> rate on a colony
> might be unjustified.  Cloning doesn't help to much since the
> problem is
> people not wanting enough kids.  (Thou genetic stock miight
> be exented with
> frozen sperm and ovum if nessisary.)
>
> Another factor is you need enough indeviduals to sustain your
> technical
> society.  Currently that takes millions, but its unlikely to
> take less then
> tens of thousands 50 years from now.  (We've had many
> arguments on that
> point.)
>

As Kelly says, we've had many arguements over this subject. I once pointed
out that the crew of a modern nuclear aircraft carrier is the closest thing
we have to a starship crew as currently proposed and tried to draw analogies
from it:

(1)	Nuclear aircraft carriers can remain at sea for lengths of time
equivalent to the missions we are talking about. Few other vessels can.

(2)	Even aircraft carriers have shore support nearby in an emergency, a
starship won't.

(3)	This analogy only applies to nuclear aircraft carriers (someone was
being picky).

(4)	Aircraft carriers are capable of maintenance and repair while under way.

(5)	Aircraft carriers have a similar size of crew complement.

(6)	How many barbers are necessary for a crew of ten thousand? Dentists?
Grocers? Seamstresses? Basically, we need to send a small city with all of
its many occupations.

(7)	The (dry) mass of the vessels is probably also comparable.

(8)	Unlike aircraft carriers, ALL water and food must be aboard initially.

(9)	Kelly established that for the mission durations we are typically
talking about, it was more economical to store all food rather than plan on
growing any onboard.

Kelly, can you think of any points I left out ( I'm tired).

Lee