Sci-Fi Civilian Vehicles, Equipment and Technology

Umm... 1.5 second one-way latency? MEO and GEO have similar issues. Data centers need to connect to the rest of the Internet to be useful.

https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/lonestars-planned-moon-based-backup-data-centers-target-lunar-lava-tubes/#:~:text=A%20small%20startup%20that%20plans,its%20planned%20off%2Dworld%20backups. The use case for thatwould not be a content distribution network but rather as archives.

Edited by minseok42 on Mar 5th 2024 at 9:28:37 AM

Oh, you mean like some kind of civilizational backup if a dinosaur-killing meteor hits Earth? Okay, sure. I guess.

Said so in the first post. I don't think a data center can be fully unmanned, considering how quickly on-site hardware faults need to be solved for quality-of-service reasons.

Imagine being that person: "Hey, we're hiring you to go to space for six months. No, you aren't doing scientific research. You're going to be floating around a giant data center, fixing things that break. You won't see your family or touch another human being, save the other handful of people we send up with you. Hope you get along."

It makes more sense if the data center is an adjunct to an existing facility, like a space station. That kind of large-scale commercial habitation in orbit is still fairly far away. I'd say at least two decades, if not more, for the main reason that we don't (yet) have a vehicle capable of putting that much mass in space reliably, and we still have the power, radiation, and heat problems.

Starship and its ilk can transform some of that, of course. Will we get a singularity transition, like old sci-fi used to portray, with thousands of people living and working in space? Maybe. If so, then they'll probably need data centers.

Edited by Fighteer on Mar 5th 2024 at 12:28:11 PM

With that in consideration I don’t see any reason why a data center needs to be in orbit at all.

Why do you need a man to fix stuff any way, at a low distance just use a repair bot.

Even if you don't have that kind of AI yet, which I would think you would by the time your comeraclising space, that short of a distance allows for teleoperatation... put on a VR head set and get to work.

Something that's always interested me is the idea of commercial robotics industries. The idea of mass produced home robots is always fun for scifi, though I wonder if in any setting where easy mass production of robots exists, what would actually be different.

We already have roombas

Asimov did it with I, Robot. There was a Will Smith movie with the same title.

There are, in fact, quite a few companies working on robots that can be mass-produced and used in industrial, commercial, and even residential applications as labor substitutes. Boston Dynamics and Tesla are among them, but that's only the start of the list. Japanese companies have been experimenting with robotics for geriatric care for quite some time, spurred by the country's aging demographics.

It seems unlikely that any of these robots will be sapient — that is, conscious and capable of creative thought. Their AI will be limited in capability. No I, Robot situations.

To quote Scotty, "the right tool for the right job".

Why make a robot sentient if it does not need to be sentient in order to be able to perform its tasks? It's a blatantly overengineered waste of processing power. I, Robot at least had the excuse that the NS-5s are domestic bots designed to interact with humans on a regular basis, so sentience for them is a matter of ergonomics.

Edited by amitakartok on Apr 19th 2024 at 9:38:24 PM

I believe we all know this, but when talking about I, Robot, it should be remembered that the film has literally nothing to do with the Asimov novel except its name.

That aside, yeah really making commercial robots that have full on personality simulation is questionable. And even if we can make humanoid machines en masse cheap, there's still the problem of what role would they serve when a basic roomba fills its role much easier.

It's a question of specialization vs. generalization. Making specialist robots is relatively easy, although tell that to a Roomba owner when it gets into the dog's vomit. We do it all the time; just look at a modern auto factory or electronics plant.

Making generalist robots is a lot harder, but the idea is to have one, relatively cheap device that can not only handle a variety of tasks but be capable of understanding and learning new ones. Now, "understanding" is doing a bit of work there. In the case of Tesla's Optimus bot, it can be trained on new tasks in a centralized location, then those software updates would be distributed to the field. You couldn't teach your robot to play baseball by yourself.

Leaving aside ideological arguments, it's a matter of economics. Sure, you could build individual robots to vacuum, cook meals, do laundry, fold clothes, clean windows, take care of the plants, wash dishes, put away groceries, etc., but the cost and complexity start to stack up. In principle it should be more efficient to make a single bot that can do all of those things.

Will it be? That's yet to be proven.

We all suspect, I think, that the first generalist intelligent robots will be sex dolls. The one function you want to be as close to a real human as possible.

Ahh... not sure I want Skynet near my junk. But sure, why not?

That said, we've already demonstrated that we can make realistic "conversational" AI without it being self-aware. I'm more worried that lonely men (and women) will become so addicted to these sorts of simulated relationships that they become unable to function in reality.

What about deep sim VR? Red Dwarf covered that as ruining real life in general, hence why Better Than Life just gives you everything you want right away. If there's no gratification beyond instant you get bored after a short period of time and want out. Diminishing returns supposedly.

Already an issue in Japan. It makes me wonder if this is a possible way for advanced civilizations to collapse, people get too hooked on VR that they stop worrying about maintaining society or even having kids.

Edited by Belisaurius on Apr 22nd 2024 at 5:56:03 AM

I think that is a proposed solution to the Fermi Paradox. People ending up in escapist simulations that they do not want to escape and therefore would prefer life as digital beings rooted to the servers.

It need not preclude some form of space travel, but it can enable that the infrastructure there runs at a low enough temperature to evade heat based detection.

Does it make sense that in a system with rough space weather (i.e high ionizing and particle radiation), folks may buy space stations in/on asteroids rather than in empty space? Because it means that the mass needed to absorb radiation is already there. And their mass might also work effectively as a heat sink. Whereas in a system with calmer space weather, the fact that asteroids aren't going to be available wherever you need them means that assembling space stations de novo is more reasonable. See: The lack of asteroids in low Earth orbit.

I'm a little curious who's selling these hypothetical asteroids. Do they come pre-furnished? "Hi, this is Asteroid Bases R Us, which orbit were you looking to buy today?"

Yes, all things being equal, an asteroid would be a good place to shelter from radiation in. But you don't get to choose the orbit, which sort of goes to what you were saying earlier. If your civilization has the tech to move trillion-ton asteroids around, then it's game on for anything you want.

Who is making all these space stations, and for what purpose?

Edited by Fighteer on May 7th 2024 at 9:08:52 AM

Asteroids are not, generally speaking, structurally sound (they aren't dense enough). It makes sense to set your base near one, because you can then use the resources in situ, but in it or on it probably isn't the best choice.

Depends on the asteroid. The planet Ceres in the asteroid belt is dense enough and massive enough that it has achieved spheroidal shape.

Phobos and Deimos around Mars are while presently stressed enough by tidal forces that they’re beginning to fracture are more than sturdy enough to such a point their lifetime remaining is measured at 10 to 50 million years.

The asteroids that are so flimsy and prone to falling apart are the ones that either already in the process of disintegrating owing to being near a gravity source or are so small as to be unusable.

Tunnel Shields can easily burrow into sandy or unstable soil. You'd have to make the tunnel lining strong enough to withstand the weight of the asteroid but there are plenty of materials with high compressive strength. It shouldnt be too hard but you have to assume that the rock around you is not airtight.