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I remember the painfully slow loading times as well as the excitement over these classic illustration scans back in the 90s.

IMHO though we live in a "post scifi" age now (2019!) and should rather discard most of the mainstream utopian/dystopian fantasies already. At least until we manage to envision some pragmatic solutions to the very real and pressing problems we have on this planet right now.

We need to work together if we want to even have a slight chance to survive the next couple of decades collectively. We need some genuinely new utopian thinking if we want us all to survive.

Most of these billionaire "backup" plans as well as middle class "prepper" movements are dangerous distractions (and unlikely to "work out" for the cohorts pushing for them anyways).

If we like it or not we are in this together.

1 comments

You are absolutely correct. We have absolutely no way to produce these fantasies without even further widespread environmental devastation. Think of all the metals that would need to be mined and carbon emitted to get this stuff in orbit. Even if we mine asteroids a colossal amount of resources will need to be spent on spacecraft and machinery to make that possible on a world already facing ecological collapse:

Insects may disappear by 2100: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/feb/10/why-are-...

Phytoplankton has nearly halved in the oceans since 1950: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/phytoplankton-pop...

Wildlife is becoming paralyzed and diving because of vitamin deficiencies: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6196476/

We have already knocked out the base of the food chains we depend on- we cannot consume our way out of this hole. The future of this species is already in question, we can't afford these fantasies.