 
ReSent-Message-ID: 
ReSent-Date: Wed, 18 Nov 1992 22:22:56 -0500 (EST)
ReSent-From: "Jon C. Slenk" 
ReSent-To: +dist+/afs/andrew/usr/js9b/Public/camc.dl@andrew.cmu.edu
To: angst+@CMU.EDU
Subject: more ocean col stuff
From: wce@hogbbs.scol.pa.us (Bill Eichman)
Comments: Validated
Message-Id: <2guguB1w165w@hogbbs.scol.pa.us>
Date: 	Wed, 18 Nov 1992 22:06:12 -0500
Organization: The Heart of Gold BBS, Lemont PA

(This is long-- skip now if the ocean thing bores you....)

>Tim Starr says
>I've got some objections to Bill Eichmann's idea of keeping an ocean colony
>within the US sphere of power - mainly that one of my principal motivations
>for doing this is to escape the USA.  I like the research institute idea,
>though, and could see having it within the USA for the short-term, with the
>long-term goal being the proliferation of ocean colonies globally.

That's pretty much what I'm assuming-- to start within the US umbrella,
but to push out into the status of planetary citizenship just as soon as
the technology matures. The US as a nationstate is already
self-obsoleted, and I'd agree that you're right in thinking that the US
government could be the most vicious and implacable enemy of a sea
colony effort.

Truly independent colonies will need (a) weapons and (b) something, some
product, that's very valuable to trade for protection and patronage. I
figure it'll take a few decades minimum to put that package, plus the
viable ocean technology, together.

Till then I want to invest my time and money in an effort that plays it
safe, a little on the quiet side, even. But that's just _my_ business
plan, it's not a perscription for extropians in general.

>on called an Extended Economic Zone (EEZ) that's much greatr in extent: 200
>nautical miles.  To be on the safe side, it's a good idea to stay out of
>these, as they may be contested by their countries.

Yes-- this is why I expect us to need something very valuable to trade
with neighboring land countries in exchange for their suffrage and
protection. Medical/surgical services to india and africa, for example.
Or the offer to teach the countries ocean agriculture...

>Which is why I like the Saya de Malha plain still.  It's big, it's shallow,
>and much of it is even outside the EEZs of Madagascar, Mauritius, and the
>Seychelles.  (If you draw a triangle between these two points, the location

It sounds like a superior choice.

The way I see it, the best thing we could hope to do is to form a number
of small teams of experts to study the hundreds of possibilities of
ocean colonization. Then, using the networks and our communications
technology expertise, sharing the discoveries of the teams to reduce
redundant efforts and maximize and dovetail all of our various projects.

Personally, I would regard the study and work you perform on the Saya de
Malha colony concept as a tremendous benefit to me. In effect, I back
you completely, even though I'm going to invest my money in the
caribbean, given my best understanding of the risks at this time.

>I'd also like to hear more about the houseboat trimaran he mentioned.

The essence of the idea I was proposing is not centered so much on the
houseboat, as on the building of an automated, possibly semi-robotized
factory to produce a low cost mass-produced basic houseboat shell. It's
the automation that we need to get the maximum bang for our buck in the
quest for living space and economic space.

Basically, I assume we start out with a garden-variety boatbuilding
business, and buy and build the tools needed to automate the process. I
figure it will take five years of serious work to establish the initial
automation, then another ten years to fine tune and develop the process
into a mature phase.

The first houseboats built by the company are used as housing for the
research center's staff, and when the designs are perfected, marketed
more generally. By that time solar panels should be much more cost
effective, and the houseboat shell should include power wiring, data
wiring, a communications and command core, and perhaps a kitchen-bath
module that concentrates, and therefore lowers the cost and space
requirements, of food,water, and waste handling. In effect, to make
practical use of the principles for efficiency expoused by Bucky Fuller
in his books.

I think it's easiest to start colonizing the ocean from the surface,
using houseboats and other floating platforms. After a few years of
this, studying the ocean and experimenting with undersea technologies,
we would begin the serious, non-test construction of the first group of
submerged structures.

I'm assuming there will always be a partnership between floating-surface
and undersea structures-- My guess is that most colonies would have a
storm-toughened floating platform on top of, and tethered to, a
semi-independent undersea complex with pressurized and surface pressure
zones.

You know what's going to be a trip? Going out on the first exploratory
free-floating complex, the first test models, and living out in the deep
open ocean, both on the surface and underneath it, for the first years
of testing. A lot like the feeling that jet pilots, astronauts, and the
hi-altitude ballon riders must get, I would imagine.

>One thing we could do is "fence" off areas with nets.  I predict that the
>invention of such ocean fencing will be a major step towards our goals, and
>sld probably be one of the main research projects of "our" Institute.
>The great plains weren't colonized until the invention of barbed wire.

Yep, I've been assuming that these types of experiments with ocean
agriculture would be one of the cornerstones of an ocean research
center's work.

Partly what you're saying is I think that we have to study plastics and
fibers, even to the point of trying to buy or start our own plastics and
fibers company

For the houseboats, to reinforce the calcium or concrete walls of boats
and undersea structures, for protective clothing, for netting, and
thousands of other uses-- we'll need massive quantities of tough,
corrosion and water resistant fiber, cable, and stiff reinforcement rod.

There's always that 'infamous' biotechnological possibility-- spider
silk-- to shoot for.... ;-)

>Lastly, in addition to solar and wind-generated water distillation, I've
>heard of a company that sells wave-powered machines that hydrolyze seawater,
>let the hydrogen go up a tube, powering a turbine, then combusts it, making
>heat and pure water.  So, it produces electricity, heat, and distills water.
>Apparently it's a series of barge-like things that float on the surface, or
>(of) unknown size that requires a 4-foot differential between wave crests
>and troughs to work.  The Saya de Malha plain appears to have that, too.

Yes, I've seen drawings of such equipment, but I wasn't aware that any
companies had such devices for sale. This is the sort of information
that has to be collected. I try to follow the literature, but there's an
enormous amount of vital material that I know exists, but have never had
time to study. Much less get down the the necessary practical step of
calling the companies involved to get prices and specs.

This brings to my mind an issue that I've wanted to raise in these
'Extropian Halls'-- the question of co-operation, and the
super-co-operation that seems inherent to technological society, to the
corporate and academic research facility and workplace, and to the
success of large projects such as space travel, fusion research, or,
naturally of ocean colonization.

As I see it, we have to learn to co-operate in new ways, just as we'll
have to learn new ways of independence and responsibility in a free
planetary culture.

And if we don't learn to co-operate in these new ways, then we'll not be
able to compete in the planetary economy, and thus possibly default into
Statism and state/social protectionism. Co-operation is a business
thing, profit, the bottom line-- even though at times it looks like
altruism, or even fuedalism or, worse yet, mercantilism.

And, in the frontier, co-operation can spell the difference between life
and death.

Later, Bill
wce@hogbbs.scol.pa.us


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