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Old 17-December-2007, 08:49 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Damburger View Post
I'm aware of that concept, I'm also aware of the monumental engineering challenges involved in getting a decent amount of land from it. A complex society has to be able to provide itself with basic supplies using only a fraction of its labour force, and that might not be possible if every plot of agricultural land requires a huge structure to be built and maintained around it.

If your entire population has to work full time just to feed itself, your development simply stops.
The level of effort needed to build a geodesic dome is not great. An inflated dome is even simpler. And any manned structure in space will require maintainance. I don't see it as nearly the challenge of deveolping a sustainable enclosed ecosystem for such colonies. And certainly far, far, FAR less of an engineering and ecological challenge than terraforming a planet!
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