What way to go about interstellar colonization is likely to be the first one technically and monetarily feasible?
A recent question concerning generation ships made me come up with a rather original alternative in my answer. It was pointed out that the concept of embryo space colonization has already been thought of thoroughly although personally I never heard of anything alike despite being just as plausible as other ideas.
My question is not specifically aimed at the two aforementioned concepts "“ nor their perceived (in)popularity "“ but about colonization in general:
Considering the prospective technological advancement:
What way to go about interstellar colonization is likely to be the first one technically and monetarily feasible?
To get this going here a short list of approaches that will get updated as you suggest concepts that have not been mentioned.
Please note:
- A basic premise is humans will be still humans, i.e. concepts akin mind uploading to (humanoid) robots are not within the scope of this question.
- You might combine or modify known concepts.
Travel-oriented
Decreasing travel time
- traversable wormholes
- Alcubierre drive
- other faster than light traveling
Decreasing travel discomfort
- generation ships
- moving the planet
- suspended animation during flight
Other
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1 answer
While uploading human personalities to robots is out of the question, giving robots robot personalities, capabilities and intelligence is not. So:
Robotically Controlled Suspended Animation
This method, which I shall term RCSA, makes use of robots (who have no concept of time apart from milliseconds since some date or other) to control a colonising fleet.
On Earth
This method is very similar to just using great big generation ships. You build the fleet first. You then install the cryogenic SA modules. At the same time, you should be building a load of robot crew for each ship.
You give these robots advanced AI that is capable of moving a ship around space and responding to scenarios. You throw them in a simulator for thousands of hours each to iron out every possible problem.Launch
Once the ships and crews are ready, you load the colonisers. Each to his own cryo unit. (You could also freeze embryos or human gametes - there is another answer here detailing this). Activate the cryo units, launch off into space and get going.In Spaaaace
Since you've done all the simulations with the AI, they'll handle all the space travel, navigation, and calculation necessary to get you to the target planet. You did remember Sim 62A/4D "Extraterrestrial Contact", didn't you?
Note 1: now is not the best time to discover you should have given the AIs access to an emergency "wake people up" button.Landing
Since you thought of everything and have given the ships enough heat shielding and retro-rockets to safely enter an atmosphere, this is still an easy part: you can still rely on the AIs. Now, press the wake-up button, and let your humans loose on their new home.
Please note: RCSA does not deal with terraforming or infrastructure setup on the target planet. However, I imagine you could also fly a supply ship over and some other skilled robots to help.
Colonisation Systems, Inc. does not accept liability for any lack of simulation or consideration of required emergency features by You. The simulation list We provide may not be exhaustive.
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