It wasn't until maybe a year before we were done writing — and we wrote for four years — that we decided this book is actually about why space settlements aren't coming soon.
Not all the bad space-settlement discourse comes from rocket billionaires. Consider the 2015 Newsweek article “ ‘Star Wars’ Class Wars: Is Mars the Escape Hatch for the 1 Percent?” which claims “the red planet will likely only be for the rich, leaving the poor to suffer as earth’s environment collapses and conflict breaks out.” The only way you could believe this would be if you had no idea how thoroughly, incredibly, impossibly horrible Mars is. The average surface temperature is about -60°C. There’s no breathable air, but there are planetwide dust storms and a layer of toxic dust on the ground. Leaving a 2°C warmer Earth for Mars would be like leaving a messy room so you can live in a toxic waste dump.
I wish more people would get this through their heads instead of claiming the billionaires are preparing their escape hatch.
one billionaire seems to be really obsessed with it enough that I think perception spills over to the others (who are merely building bunkers and island fortresses for when shit hits the fan).
I can’t stand the “we’re going to mars” idiots who don’t realize we can’t even make AIR there, much less grow food. oh polar ice caps? yeah those are as much co2 ice as water. pfft.
From the book:
I wish more people would get this through their heads instead of claiming the billionaires are preparing their escape hatch.
one billionaire seems to be really obsessed with it enough that I think perception spills over to the others (who are merely building bunkers and island fortresses for when shit hits the fan).
I can’t stand the “we’re going to mars” idiots who don’t realize we can’t even make AIR there, much less grow food. oh polar ice caps? yeah those are as much co2 ice as water. pfft.