Domain: seastead.org
Stories and comments across the archive that link to seastead.org.
Comments · 14
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Re:Ask that again in 20-30 years
...when the planet is so overpopulated, that the one and only resource the moon has, space, will actually become valuable enough to justify the expense and trouble of living there. I dare say that, given that 2/3rds of the Earth's surface is covered by water, seasteading will take off long before permanent moon bases with appreciable population are built. Then again, if living in low gravity turns out to have health benefits, the desirability of lunar real estate may increase dramatically. -
Seasteading
Check out seasteading. It's pretty much what you're talking about, a bunch of deep sea floating colonies. Of course, your internet traffic would likely still be monitored. The best way to deal with this is A two fold strategy:
One. Encryption, lots of it, with lots of people using it.
Two. Build a wireless network that never touches wire, a separate internet, if you will. -
Re:Outsourcing...
OK, I'm a little girl without enough time
You're a clueless asshole with too much.
Read this if you really want to know, otherwise just keep your head firmly inserted in your ass;
http://www.seastead.org/talk/ucboulder2005/UC-Boul der-talk.txt -
Re:Outsourcing...
I think the parameters of the outlined organisation should be limited by voluntary contract, and paid for in kind.
As for moving anywhere else, I've considered it, I live in Australia, not America, and we're even more fond of tax than you guys, but the simple fact is this, perhaps the best nations in the world in terms of small, efficient government with low to no tax are not places where I've lived my life so far, I have not spent eleven years already working there, investing in a social network, etc etc etc, I have not spent eleven years forcibly being robbed of my income by those governments and thus have not come to either expect anything from them or resent them for the damage they've already done and wish to take it out of their hide in kind.
That being said, it's also incredibly impractical to simply move governments everytime you disagree with a policy, even the best of nations are far from perfect, such as switzerland, andorra, lichtenstein or vanuatu. A better long term solution is probably something like http://www.seastead.org/ I'm currently just taking a wait and see approach, but I assure you as soon as a viable alternative to modern slavery becomes available, I'll be there. -
Re:All well and good
True for any ship, no? The seasteading folks have done some research on rogue waves and how to avoid or defend against them.
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Seastead business model
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Re:That guy that complained...
I wish there was someplace left on this earth I could go start my own nation.
There is. -
Re:I wish I could start a nation at sea
I agree, starting small is the better way to do things. Unfortunatel, I get the feeling that using a small nuclear plant would run into anti-proliferation problems -- maybe something like powering off ocean temperature differences or geothermal vents would work better.
FYI, here's another project I ran across: http://seastead.org/ -
Already Solved - Vanadium Redox
Vanadium Redox batteries solve a lot of these problems. You can fill them with charged solution in the same way you fill up a tank of gasoline.
These are already in industrial use. They are discussed here -
Re:DoJ: Preserving the Status Quo or Your Money Ba
But where can the persecuted flee today?
I propose we all move to the nation of Sealand.
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The problem with electro-accretionVarious people above mentioned other uses for electro-accretion, like building floating cities ala Marshall Savage. Unfortunately his energy numbers are off by a factor of 42 - he didn't integrate power over time, just used power as his energy number. It turns out to be just too inefficient to be useful for much except coral restoration. The main problem is that the accreting seament doesn't conduct, so it dissipates more and more energy as it builds up. So its way more expensive that just shipping cement from land (unless you are doing something tricky like restoring reefs).
Details and references here. (I replied with some comments about this, but I didn't have an account so they have 0-ratings, so I got an account to post this. Hope its not too bad form to comment in multiple places.)
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Re:Seacrete for underwater buildings
This commonly cited number of 4.2lbs/kWh is wrong. It is based on an erroneous computation that failed to integrate power over time to get energy. Instead, instantaneous power was used as the energy number. The real rate in that experiment was 0.10 lb/kWhr. Details and references here. Anyone who cites the 4.2lbs/kWh number has not done their homework.
-- Patri Friedman (patri-at-seastead-dot-org) -
Re:Underwater Habitat
You can read more about this idea in Marshall Savage's book _The Millenial Project_ (as mentioned in other comments). However, it turns out that seacrete is way too inefficient to be used for building real structures, I have an explanation with references here.
-- Patri Friedman (patri-at-seastead-dot-org) -
Re:The Millennial Project!
This coral regrowing idea is the only cost-effective method to use electroaccretion that I've ever heard of. The method is very cost-ineffective for making normal structures. Marshall Savage's numbers for kilograms/kilowatt hour were off by a factor of 40! When calculating, he didn't integrate power over time, he just took instantaneous power and called that energy. It turns out to be way more expensive than buying cement on land and shipping it.
Electroaccretion is incredibly inefficient because cement does not conduct. So as the "seament" forms, it acts like a resistor, dissipating electricity as heat. The thicker it gets, the more the losses, hence its uselessness for building structures.
I have a more detailed debunking of seacrete as a construction material, with references, in my Seasteading book here.
Patri Friedman (patri-at-seastead-dot-org)