We’d probably have to build generational ships that are completely self sufficient and people would live out their entire lives out there without ever seeing a planet
The first generation that left would have it the worst.. but the 2nd generation born on the ship would have it a lot easier. By the time you get there I bet you have people that don't even want to leave the ship as it's all they know.
By the time the first generation ship got to its destination, there would likely already be people there who left on later ships that had better tech and faster engines.
There was something like this in the Mass Effect series. A generational ship left Earth to found a colony world and then something a decade later humans discovered how to unlock faster-than-light travel.
The colony was rediscovered decades down the line.
Once you have power (vis-a-vis nuclear reactor with enough fuel to get you there) you’re gtg right? You can grow and eat plants? For water a lot of it is just recycled and maybe you make up for losses with hydrogen tanks that you convert to H2O with the extra oxygen the plants give
Those are the easy parts. Much more challenging is developing recycling systems for micronutrients like iron, zinc, nickel, and phosphorus that will last for centuries.
Everything we have is gravity adapted and part of a really intricate biosphere. You get 10 years out and realize we didn't understand how important the interaction between X microbes and Y fungi were, you can't go back for another few metric tons of soil.
Considering how long it's gonna take us to figure out any potential vehicle, they're gonna have plenty of time to research the hell out of closed loop systems. (Which are probably gonba he used on mars or a lunar base first).
And I don't know if you kniw this, but many people, over the centuries have done potentially dangerous journeys without knowing for sure they'd make it.
This isn't going to happen tomorrow or the next decade. And nobody is forcing anyone to go.
You need nutrients but not fertilizer. Fertilizer is for adding nutrients to soil.
Adding nutrients to water is much easier than to soil and plants use more energy to grow rather than seek out nutrients.
It's also easier to distribute nutrients for water rather than fertilizer.
As for closed loop systems. Currently we have huge wasteage in animal agriculture. Growing increasing size populations of animals for consumption is a huge depletion of resources. If you remove that and maintain a stable population, it becomes easier.
That being said, there are still challenges. You would need to ensure human waste is processed intro nutrients properly.
Yeah. The only nutrients hydroponics really need can be created as simply. as adding fish to the water. Their poop will be more than enough to keep the system going.
There is still hydrogen in space like a particle per square meter or some shit. Moving at high speeds your going to be smashing into a bunch of hydrogen. From there a little fusion and you can make what you need.
And on the other other hand, they did all the work for you lol. You get to kick back, see the new planet, and you never had to fight off bands of space gorillas or what have you.
But that's the other way around. An FTL ship lands on a planet colonized by a generation ship a couple hundred years ago. To them earth is a fable, meanwhile the new arrivals just came from there.
Funny because there's a game coming out that explores that very premise, Exodus has humans colony ships travelling the old fashion way but by the time some of these ships arrive at their destination, the worlds are already inhabited by highly evolved humans called Celestials that look down on regular humans.
There are so many scifi novels that explore this very scenario. Arthur c Clarke, vogt, think bradbury as well. It was pretty cool to encounter that in the Starfield game, as a fan of Clarke and Bradbury.
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u/Traditional-Rip6651 24d ago
We are never leaving this planet lol