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Reagan Cylinders

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Mon, 2010-05-24 23:48
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Doc Solomon Doc Solomon's picture
Reagan Cylinders
I was re-reading the bit about the Jovian Junta & I noticed that the authors take care to inform us that the Reagan Cylinders that the JJ are so partial to are substandard in comparisons to other habitat designs, but I can't find what exactly is so shitty about them.
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Tue, 2010-05-25 00:03
Decivre Decivre's picture
Re: Reagan Cylinders
Doc Solomon wrote:
I was re-reading the bit about the Jovian Junta & I noticed that the authors take care to inform us that the Reagan Cylinders that the JJ are so partial to are substandard in comparisons to other habitat designs, but I can't find what exactly is so shitty about them.
A Reagan Cylinder is an archaic cylinder habitat design that has basically become obsolete in comparison to newer O'Niell cylinder models... like the Hamilton cylinder. A large part of this is due to their distaste for nanotechnology... O'Niell cylinders are built with construction machinery and maintained by more archaic machines, while newer cylinders are generally nanotech controlled... Hamilton cylinders are literally built by dropping a nanoswarm payload onto an asteroid and letting the buggers get to work. This means that newer cylinders are more efficient, better maintained, and just all-around good.
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Transhumans will one day be the Luddites of the posthuman age. [url=http://bit.ly/2p3wk7c]Help me get my gaming fix, if you want.[/url]
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Tue, 2010-05-25 23:13
Quincey Forder Quincey Forder's picture
Re: Reagan Cylinders
what do the Reagan cylinders of the JJ look like, from the inside? I kinda pegged the JJ to be a bunch of germophobic neat-freak, alike in Ultraviolet
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[center] Q U I N C E Y ^_*_^ F O R D E R [/center] Remember The Cant! [img]http://tinyurl.com/h8azy78[/img] [img]http://i249.photobucket.com/albums/gg205/tachistarfire/theeye_fanzine_us...
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Tue, 2010-05-25 23:30
Decivre Decivre's picture
Re: Reagan Cylinders
Quincey Forder wrote:
what do the Reagan cylinders of the JJ look like, from the inside? I kinda pegged the JJ to be a bunch of germophobic neat-freak, alike in Ultraviolet
I don't think so. The Junta is a bioconservative state. They don't have access to the intelligent robots and nanotechnology that other groups use for standard cleanliness and maintenance, because they refuse to use it. They have to utilize older forms of cleaning technology... and as such will never have a habitat quite as clean as those who use more modern tech. However, they are a fascist state which does pride itself in its image. I don't expect too much dirt, but likely more than you would find in, say, a hypercorp hab. That said, I'd imagine that Reagan cylinders look fairly the same as other O'Niell cylinder models from a distant glance. Up close, you might see some differences... larger circuitry that can be maintained with tools at higher than the nanoscopic level; seams conjoining expansion components of the hab, whereas those assembled with nanotech will be virtually seamless; on a more social level, a large number of people tasked with repairing and maintaining the habitat, rather than bots and nanohive assemblies. All around though, it won't have a difference all that dramatic.
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Transhumans will one day be the Luddites of the posthuman age. [url=http://bit.ly/2p3wk7c]Help me get my gaming fix, if you want.[/url]
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Wed, 2010-05-26 22:45
puke puke's picture
Re: Reagan Cylinders
I've recently been reading up on all the details I can find on the Junta as well as on real world information on space habitat design, so i'll kick around what i have found in the core book as well as what i have infered from context: its never actually explained, in what ways they are less efficient. o'neill cylendars were imagined in 1976, so its not like regan cylindars are older versions or something like that. theyre probably less efficient in terms of mass, since theyre bored out of solid asteroids and moonlets so as to withstand jupiter's radiation. for that reason, theyre probably also less efficient in terms of heat dissipation. theyre also likely less efficient in terms of expansion capacity. I would imagine that being bored out of local materials, they are actually more efficient in terms of material use and in terms of construction cost. as far as what they look like, I would imagine they look exactly like the picture on page 98, since thats a picture of the inside of Solano with its central fusion light tube and lake. The text describes 20th century office parks and suburbs. the text also mentions poor environmental controls, and all the buildings being sealed so that infections can be purged. in addition to the interior of the cylinder and its parks and buildings, there is mention that they include tunnel systems through the rock (at increasing rotational gravity the closer you get to the surface of the asteroid) much like a honeycomb or behive habitat, or whatever theyre called. Here is a random artist conception of something similar: http://visions2200.com/Images/SpaceHabitatAsteroid.jpg
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Wed, 2010-05-26 23:02
Decivre Decivre's picture
Re: Reagan Cylinders
puke wrote:
I've recently been reading up on all the details I can find on the Junta as well as on real world information on space habitat design, so i'll kick around what i have found in the core book as well as what i have infered from context: its never actually explained, in what ways they are less efficient. o'neill cylendars were imagined in 1976, so its not like regan cylindars are older versions or something like that. theyre probably less efficient in terms of mass, since theyre bored out of solid asteroids and moonlets so as to withstand jupiter's radiation. for that reason, theyre probably also less efficient in terms of heat dissipation. theyre also likely less efficient in terms of expansion capacity. I would imagine that being bored out of local materials, they are actually more efficient in terms of material use and in terms of construction cost. as far as what they look like, I would imagine they look exactly like the picture on page 98, since thats a picture of the inside of Solano with its central fusion light tube and lake. The text describes 20th century office parks and suburbs. the text also mentions poor environmental controls, and all the buildings being sealed so that infections can be purged. in addition to the interior of the cylinder and its parks and buildings, there is mention that they include tunnel systems through the rock (at increasing rotational gravity the closer you get to the surface of the asteroid) much like a honeycomb or behive habitat, or whatever theyre called. Here is a random artist conception of something similar: http://visions2200.com/Images/SpaceHabitatAsteroid.jpg
All cylinders are created by local materials. Hamilton cylinders are essentially created by dropping a nanoswarm payload on an asteroid, which then begins the process of creating a habitat from the local materials, while maintaining the asteroid's already-existing orbital path. The result is a very efficiently-built structure. On the other hand, Reagan cylinders are built with larger construction machines that are usually human-operated, without the use of nanotechnology. The result is less efficient than more advanced models that do use nanotechnology. A good example of this can be seen in the diamond trade as well. Most diamonds today are mined, and the end result is rough, imperfect and has to be cut for use. On the other hand, artificial diamonds are flawless, cut during production, and can be far more accurately-shaped.
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Transhumans will one day be the Luddites of the posthuman age. [url=http://bit.ly/2p3wk7c]Help me get my gaming fix, if you want.[/url]
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Thu, 2010-05-27 18:34
Quincey Forder Quincey Forder's picture
Re: Reagan Cylinders
I've tried to get the pic of Soleno's Reagan habitat, but only get the background. Can someone help me with it?
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Thu, 2010-05-27 21:24
Decivre Decivre's picture
Re: Reagan Cylinders
[url=http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/5622166/images/12514932397... Is this what you want?[/url]
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Transhumans will one day be the Luddites of the posthuman age. [url=http://bit.ly/2p3wk7c]Help me get my gaming fix, if you want.[/url]
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Sat, 2010-05-29 19:54
Quincey Forder Quincey Forder's picture
Re: Reagan Cylinders
odd, I'd think that I had replied to this topic Thanks, by the way! that's exactly it!
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[center] Q U I N C E Y ^_*_^ F O R D E R [/center] Remember The Cant! [img]http://tinyurl.com/h8azy78[/img] [img]http://i249.photobucket.com/albums/gg205/tachistarfire/theeye_fanzine_us...
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Mon, 2010-06-14 10:43
jackgraham jackgraham's picture
Re: Reagan Cylinders
Doc Solomon wrote:
I was re-reading the bit about the Jovian Junta & I noticed that the authors take care to inform us that the Reagan Cylinders that the JJ are so partial to are substandard in comparisons to other habitat designs, but I can't find what exactly is so shitty about them.
As space stations having gravity, internal buildings, transit infrastructure, space ports, and an attendant cloud of support structures, they're not especially bad. The problem is quality of life. The Junta is way behind the rest of the Solar System in the life sciences, so they suck at balancing the ecosystem within a hab. (Hab Ecosystem Engineering is a whole profession/discipline in EP; one of the Qeng Ho characters in Vinge's _Deepness in the Sky_ provides a good model from fiction). Outbreaks of mold, infestations of vermin, die-offs of oxygen supplying vegetation, and other forms of environmental sepsis are much more common than in habs with advanced biotech and nanotech. The severity of this varies; the Junta keeps their most talented ecosystem people working where they benefit the powerful. Also, Jovian citizens usually lack Basic Mesh Inserts, so some of the quality of life improvements offered by augmented reality (an ersatz sky & clouds, for instance) are either absent or much less realistic. This in turn leads to mental health problems, which again the Junta isn't as good at dealing with as other cultures.
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J A C K   G R A H A M :: Hooray for Earth!   http://eclipsephase.com :: twitter @jackgraham @faketsr :: Google+Jack Graham
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Mon, 2010-06-14 18:27
nezumi.hebereke nezumi.hebereke's picture
Re: Reagan Cylinders
So it's like that one cylinder in Schismatrix where green stuff keeps growing over the windows and they have to clean it off? I was hoping to be able to use that. Reading about how super nanobots are, I got the image of any station large enough to host a few thousand people never getting gross and run-down.
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Tue, 2010-06-15 10:32
jackgraham jackgraham's picture
Re: Reagan Cylinders
nezumi.hebereke wrote:
So it's like that one cylinder in Schismatrix where green stuff keeps growing over the windows and they have to clean it off?
Exactly. My two favorite examples of habitat sepsis are that one from Schismatrix, and then I think in Hamilton's Night's Dawn they go inside of a sick/dying Hamilton cylinder (or maybe I just imagined that).
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J A C K   G R A H A M :: Hooray for Earth!   http://eclipsephase.com :: twitter @jackgraham @faketsr :: Google+Jack Graham
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Tue, 2010-06-15 12:58
GreyBrother GreyBrother's picture
Re: Reagan Cylinders
How can a Hamilton Cylinder get sick? O_o Except its something like a meathab, of course...
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Tue, 2010-06-15 14:05
Kanada Ten Kanada Ten's picture
Re: Reagan Cylinders
If the habitat's ecosystems are out of balance - i.e. suffering from invasive species, plagues (both computer and biological), disrepair, orbital irregularities, etc, it is said to be "sick" - especially if the problems are beyond self-corrective measures. When the balance is such that it cannot support the native population, it is said to be "dying".
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Tue, 2010-06-15 15:18
jackgraham jackgraham's picture
Re: Reagan Cylinders
GreyBrother wrote:
How can a Hamilton Cylinder get sick? O_o Except its something like a meathab, of course...
Hamilton cylinders as presented in EP are based on nanotech, and while their behavior is organism-like, they have few organic parts. The space habits in Hamilton's work that inspired them, however, have a lot of biological parts and could therefore get sick, with all of the attendant grossness. The thing that makes Turn Yourself Into A Giant Mass of Space Meat For Art! such a phenom in the genehacker world is that it's actually very healthy -- an impressive achievement on the part of the designer.
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J A C K   G R A H A M :: Hooray for Earth!   http://eclipsephase.com :: twitter @jackgraham @faketsr :: Google+Jack Graham
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