We have technology so we can live anywhere we want, in offshore drill rigs, Antarctic research bases, remote desert observatories etc, but all depend completely on frequent re-supply and support from the entire global industrial complex. Even cities we have continuously settled in for hundreds of years have to import vast quantities of just about everything from the world economy.
Yes, its a good idea to maintain backup stashes of critical things and knowledge in safe, remote outposts, but 'self-sustaining' redoubts are no longer possible even on earth, much less in space.
Neolithic humans lived off the land, the local environment provided everything they needed to survive, even prosper. Independent human communities thrived in the Sahara, the Andes, the Amazon, the Arctic, the boreal and mid-latitude forests, the steppes, the scattered archipelagoes of the Pacific Basin. But we forgot that skill a long, long time ago.
Yes, we can now live anywhere we want, but we have paid a great price for that freedom: we have to bring with us almost everything we need. We have become addicted to our whole civilization and to the rest of humanity, we can no longer flourish on our own.
Space/Science » in reply to "If we had to evacuate Earth in a hurry..."
There is no such thing as a 'self-sustaining outpost'.
The whole thread (35 posts)
- NASA's Moon Base User’s Guide
- Corrosion?
- The abandoning of the Lunar Gateway station was effectively spitting in the face of our European partners
- Mixed feelings
- No space station?