I grew up reading old science fiction and dreaming of their retro space exploration futures. I was fascinated also by real space programs, with special emphasis on manned programs of old, Soviet vs USA space race, Apollo program, all that jazz. In certain way, I feel like I was born either too late to be witness of space race or too early to see new wave of exploration.
I bought that book on a hunch one day, but it waited and gathered dust on bookshelf for a while. When it was close to Artemis 2 mission, I decided to fetch it and finally read it. I was aware that this book is rather sceptical on prospects of space exploration, but progressively I have been growing more sceptical as well since my younger days.
It starts with succinct preamble that explore common myths and arguments for space colonialism and briefly gave authors personal views and rebuttals. It’s really good part and if someone wants to check if they would enjoy the book, it is perfect piece to read to get a taste of the book. Further parts of the book are in many ways elaboration on what was already said in this preamble.
After preamble it starts with human condition and how inadequate it is for space. What challenges we are facing when we want to put humans beyond the Earth, either to zero g space or on the surface of other celestial bodies. There is also whole chapter dedicated for speculation on sex in space. It’s put in the book not only to titillate reader’s curiosity, but also to touch the topic of births and babies which is unavoidable if we want to think about long time settlements. In this first part we also get a little bit about psychology in space. On one hand, it shows us how untrustworthy are astronauts regarding their mental health, because they didn’t want to loose their opportunities due to any suspected problem, so they lied to psychologists. On the other hand, authors convincingly argue that contrary to science fiction authors’ imagination, isolation in space didn’t lead to any substantial conflicts so far. As they point out though, astronauts are not regular people, so their example can’t be measure of how it would look like with bigger number of more regular settlers. This is proper base that gives context for next part.
Next we have more about various proposals for space settlements. The main ones are the Moon, Mars and rotating space station like those of O’Neill cylinder that would simulate Earth gravity. It goes through difficulties that Moon and Mars settlements would have to manage. With space stations, it explains how big and difficult to build they would have to be to have expected benefits. For any space colonisation enthusiast, it is really like cold shower, if the first part wasn’t enough already. Maybe that difficulties are not unmanageable potentially, but they give constraints that raise the doubts that we could build proper big settlements, and not just science outposts, in the coming century.
Shorter next part touches the subject that feels underexplored by space colonisation enthusiasts and by space programs themselves. Namely closed loop ecosystems. In science fiction it is often described as solved problem and rarely there is focus on those issues. Authors invoke story of experiment “Biosphere 2” which lacked in rigour and ended in “failure”, but still could serve as example for future better experiments. I agree with suggestion of the authors that if we want to seriously think about space settlements, we should focus on that first. A lot of smaller experiments of that type could be conducted with the budgets we have, but that kind of experiments don’t spark the same excitement among enthusiasts, being perhaps more like gardening with the twist. It could have potential important knock-off benefits of better understanding of ecology which could be of use here on Earth at this crucial time of climate change.
The last part of the book goes into details of space law. I must admit that it felt the weakest part of the book, which comes perhaps from my personal preferences, I cannot really focus on law that much. But I think that my mixed feelings about this part stem from something else than just personal preferences. I feel there should be more discussion of sociology, history and anthropology which was overshadowed by going into details of legal precedents. I understand authors’ argument that space enthusiasts often ignore established law, but in my opinion they should focus on other humanities disciplines.
It is worth to add that the book is full of nice, funny pictures drawn by one of the authors (Zach) who is professional cartoonist. Writing is also light and quite humorous, but arguments are clear and backed by good research.
Overall, it sealed in me skepticism that grew in me for a long time on the ground of enthusiasm of my younger days. In the same time, it was clear that the authors started from very similar starting point. They were big space enthusiasts and nerds and it was that starting point that gave them enough enthusiasm to deep dive into various disciplines relating to this topic. I would recommend that book to every space colonisation enthusiasts, science fiction fans and that sort of crowd.