Design an interstellar 'generation ship' to spend decades among the stars with Project Hyperion competition

[Michel Lamontagne]

History seems to suggest that we humans carry very tribal behavioral traits with us. We seem to to have a tendency to splinter into small (often competing) factions, rather than working together in a unified monolithic group. It's been 15-20 year or so since I read the books, but I believe one of the follow-up books to Arthur C. Clarke's "Rendezvous with Rama" touched a little bit on that aspect.

There is some indication that humans are evolved for small groups of about 1000. That's why we asked for the design teams to include people in the social sciences. Clarke is a great thinker and writer, but it would be nice to get some inputs from people in history, biology and anthropology. Understanding and managing tribalism is important both in space and.. on Earth.

 

[Michel Lamontagne]

The declining birth rate is not a problem that can't be dealt with directly. And, anyway, it seems to be a result of socioeconomic stresses on the middle income population. Remove the stresses, and the birth rate would probably increase on its own.

Regarding "windows", I was thinking telescopes with viewers inside the space craft, intended to give the occupants a sense of where they are and an ability to study where they are headed. I think that is a psychological necessity.

The other issues are more realistic barriers.

Not even considering the issues related to travel speed, just maintaining a closed ecosystem in stable condition for the required period of time is not something we are currently capable of doing. Surely, we will learn a lot by having very isolated habitats in space - on the Moon and maybe Mars, and maybe in a solar orbit like the Lagrange points at L4 and L5. But, we would not have 200 years of continuous isolation experience to proof a system. It would be interesting to run the probabilistic analysis for the survival of the system design, if there ever is one.

Regarding propulsion and speed of travel, besides the barriers we currently have for getting enough mass to high enough speed and then stopping it once we arrive at the destination, there is the old joke about the umpteenth generation arriving after a 200 year long trip: As they debark, they are greeted by smiling Earthlings that arrived 100 years earlier on a faster ship that was invented 100 years after the slower travelers departed Earth.

The ship should be in constant communication with the Earth, and have at worst a few years of lag. If we do develop much faster vehicles, it would be expected that the first destination for these fast ships would be the generation ships. Seems like the humane thing to do. Communication is incredibly low power compared to propulsion, or even just the habitat energy required for growing plants.
It may be that such ships will be impossible before a few hundred years. On the other hand, the Singularity may come along in a few years and make the whole question of technology a moot point. The contest is also a way to get us thinking about our world today, and using a small example perhaps find some interesting generalities that could be of use now. It's a slim change, but worth a bit a thought.

 

[Michel Lamontagne]

in interstaller space there is NOTHING outside of the ship to see. It is pure black emptyness with only a background of stars. And those stars never change even over a person's lifetime. Your grand parents would have seen the same stars. And can not imagine how anyone would want to go outside into darkness so see a sight that is static and never different.

But I do agree that people like to "get away". It seems that the ship needs to be the size of a continent. If it really is the size of (say) Europe there will be places to go inside the ship.

As it turns out our technology really does depend on the size of the intercommunicating population. A group size of 1,000 would only support a society that supplements hunting a gathering with agriculture, you would not be able to support a "bronze age" technical level. One million people gets you to nearly the industrial revolution with coal powered steam engines. You do not get to 1930s aircraft until you have much larger politically connected populations. It is the supply chain issue.

Yes robots can help, but then you have "humans as cargo" and you might as well be carrying cartons of strawberry jello as the humans will be helpless after 100 generations of nothing to do.

Ok, you think the ship caries a vast library of human knowledge and culture? That will fail. Try this experiment. Find a kid and teach him to use a web browser. Then watch what he does. Does he spend 18 hours a day playing video games and watching reality TV or does he study advanced mathematics, physics and engineering? Not one in a thousand kids will do the later. But if you set him up in a society where either he goes out hunting for food or he dies of starvation, he learns to find food.

With only 1,000 people you can't even train the next generation of elemerty school teachers. You would never be able to stuff a university with only 1,000 people. You need the Ph.D.-level micro biologist to train the next generation of scientists, the same for every other specialty. You run this logic out until you see the need for a population size that compares to Japan or the UK at the very minimum

Again you can use robots. but then what is the role of the humans, they become useless cargo.



My guess: Advanced civilizations and we humans will all come to the same conclusion: Send "generation ships" that contain advanced AI and robots but there is zero need to also have human cargo. The robots have no need for people. But you do need a population of robots who can build more robots and recycle parts and so on. It will need to be a complex society if it is to last 1,000 or 10,000 years. The entire ship might need to be rebuilt several times. But you just don't need the humans. Ok, if you want humans, all you need to send is copies of the human genome in computer files and the robots can make people later. But there is no role for humans during the 10,000 year flight

I prefer the solution of sending larger ships. There is probably a size of ship that is best for each destination, and smaller ships may be limited to a few generations. It's part of why the contest was created. But you don't really need humans for anything. The only reason you have needs themselves is that humans have them. You don't need to expand a robot society, and robots don't need information. It's the humans that do. Anyway, the ships are not really autonomous societies, they will remain an advanced part of the larger society of humans. Many problems go away if you suppose the ship stays in communication with the rest of society, and call upon a genius to solve 'problem X'. As long as problem X can wait a few years for the solution. But at a very large scale problems should happen more slowly? I hope so.
The Interstellar ship thought experiment is applicable to Earth. Robots make humans useless here as well. So why will we keep living on Earth if robots do everything? One of the oldest questions of science fiction, BTW.

 

[Michel Lamontagne]

One huge problem. Almost every first-world country now has a birth rate less than 2.1. This means their population is shrinking. Yes, The US is still growing its population but only because of immigration. If people stopped moving to the US, it too would be in decline.

So even if you fill the ship with 1,000 people. If the ship is like many modern countries the population will decline over the coming years. To maintain a stable population, each woman will need to have slightly more than 2 kids in her lifetime.

The other problem is that 1,000 people is far too few. There is a certain minimum size that the technological society must have. That number might be closer to 100 million then only 1,000. Our society needs many specialists. We need universities and farmers and kindergarten teachers and barbers and fashion designers andengineers of all kinds plus the schools to train all these people.

Mmaybe some AI-powered robots can remember skilled trades like semiconductor manufacturing, computer programming and medical care. But if you do that you end up at the destination with unskilled primitive humans who only know how to watch 250 year old films while being taken care of by robot baby sitters.

It will be very interesting to see how people deal with the possibility of an impact with a speed of 10% of light. The kinetic energy of a small space-rock at that speed is kind of like a nuclear bomb. Then of course space is not a pure vacuum. There are quite a large number of hydrogen atoms in every square meter of space. These will continuously rain down on the ship, collide with the hull, and set off a cascade of particles. The usual sci-fi solution is to invent a magic "deflector beam". But is magic allowed here?

I strongly suspect the winning design will all be from non-engineers and based on a very naive and shallow understanding of science so this winning design will only serve to perpetuate the idea that a generation ship is possible. The contest requirements are after all to "design a science-fiction ship"

Realistically the ship will need to hold a population that is compatible with Japan or California and there must be enough interior space that people can find a way to "travel" to "far away" parts of the ship where conditions are different

As for windows, why? There is nothing to see in interstellar space. Ok, stars. But these stars are unchanging in one person's lifetime. They would seem motionless for decades and there is no reason to look. So maybe just a tiny section of the ship has windows that a few people might go to once in their lifetime.

The declining birth rate is a big problem, You might get to the destination with only half the number of people you started with or even less.

We tried to create rules forcing a diverse group. If you want to make a better design and include engineers, feel free to enter the contest! https://www.projecthyperion.org/
The reasons why birth rates are declining are probably complex and mutifactorial. It should be an interesting challenge to design an environment where humans do not want to have a declining birth rate, and at least there should be plenty of energy available to get things done on the ship. Not quite Star Trek replicator level, but pretty fun tech.
Windows are nice. feel free to exclude them, but rational is not always best, IMHO. I like to look at the stars, and they definitively don't move much.
How about sending a flotilla of ships? A single ship seems like a bad idea at the base. A dozen ships would be safer, and at scale offer variety and places to go that aren't 'home'. Avoid them going to war with one another is an interesting policy question, no?

 

[Michel Lamontagne]

Perhaps a way to skirt the generational travel time issue is to devise a true means of cryostasis, and/or have that method reserved for the second generation (born in space) so that the original astronauts and their progeny could arrive together after being "frozen" for a period of time. That would help to resolve some of the knowledge-retention issues faced. and the astronauts would have real memories of their original planet, Earth (plus all learned experiences, etc., of course).

If the trip is, truly, to be 250+ years, with normal procreation/lifetimes occurring, I think it would be wise to consider a means to experience time outside the ship -- perhaps in flyable "mini-ships" that could dock back to mother after getting some leisure/science time outside of the main. I can see the confines of even a gigantic ship becoming problematic for the psyches of some, and being able to "go outside" -- while introducing a whole host of new implications to sort through -- might do much for preserving stable mental health.

Of course, this all assumes undeveloped technologies, but it's all hypothetical, at this point, anyway.

Yes, flotilla of ships are allowed. Multi lobed ships might offer the same degree of variation.

 

[Unclear Engineer]

I think a big problem is going to be the psychology of the generations that are born and die on the ship.

Once someone has produced the allotted number of children, is that person only waiting to die? Or, does that person have a continuing function in the ship-bound society that has some "meaningfulness" that will keep the person from becoming suicidal and perhaps dangerously destructive? Having robots do all the "essential" work would actually make this problem more acute.

If we want the generation that reaches the distant planet to be what we think of as "the best" of our society, we will have to provide a transit habitat that continuously empowers and induces the residents to strive for something constructive.

My thinking is that will need to involve both arts and sciences. Arts need inspiration, and sciences need tools.

And that is why I previously posted that there needs to be something like "windows" to what is beyond the ship. Otherwise, expect the crew that lands on the distant planet to suffer from agoraphobia as the "norm".

"Windows" don't need to be transparent panels to be looked through directly. They can be monitors for cameras that view the outside. And, they would need to include advanced telescopic capabilities to look at Earth, the destination planet, anything of interest sighted along the way (don't exclude that possibility), and probably advanced astronomy capabilities.

Long-base interferometry could be a continuing mission in conjunction with Earth that would maintain some ties to the "home world". And getting ever improving views of the target planet would help with keeping focus on the mission goal, as well as helping to improve the planning for what the arriving generation will do.

But, I think it would be a challenge to manage whatever aberrant personalities were birthed during the trip. At least at present, we think that psychopaths are genetically based, not solely the result of environment during development. Unless we are able to identify 100% of the causes for such behaviors and develop means for dealing with 100% of the causes with 100% effectiveness for each, the crew is going to need to deal with psychopaths.

And, that gets me to some reliability issues that are more engineering than sociological, so I will put them into a later post.

 

[Michel Lamontagne]

I think a big problem is going to be the psychology of the generations that are born and die on the ship.

Once someone has produced the allotted number of children, is that person only waiting to die? Or, does that person have a continuing function in the ship-bound society that has some "meaningfulness" that will keep the person from becoming suicidal and perhaps dangerously destructive? Having robots do all the "essential" work would actually make this problem more acute.

If we want the generation that reaches the distant planet to be what we think of as "the best" of our society, we will have to provide a transit habitat that continuously empowers and induces the residents to strive for something constructive.

My thinking is that will need to involve both arts and sciences. Arts need inspiration, and sciences need tools.

And that is why I previously posted that there needs to be something like "windows" to what is beyond the ship. Otherwise, expect the crew that lands on the distant planet to suffer from agoraphobia as the "norm".

"Windows" don't need to be transparent panels to be looked through directly. They can be monitors for cameras that view the outside. And, they would need to include advanced telescopic capabilities to look at Earth, the destination planet, anything of interest sighted along the way (don't exclude that possibility), and probably advanced astronomy capabilities.

Long-base interferometry could be a continuing mission in conjunction with Earth that would maintain some ties to the "home world". And getting ever improving views of the target planet would help with keeping focus on the mission goal, as well as helping to improve the planning for what the arriving generation will do.

But, I think it would be a challenge to manage whatever aberrant personalities were birthed during the trip. At least at present, we think that psychopaths are genetically based, not solely the result of environment during development. Unless we are able to identify 100% of the causes for such behaviors and develop means for dealing with 100% of the causes with 100% effectiveness for each, the crew is going to need to deal with psychopaths.

And, that gets me to some reliability issues that are more engineering than sociological, so I will put them into a later post.

Interesting thoughts. That also apply directly to our current world. Yes, I think dealing with psychopaths will be required, as well as age related dementia and other medical problems. And I would expect a clear view of both our past and our future is good for people on Earth as well.
It has been proposed in paper of the JBIs ( journal of the British Interplanetary Society) that the habitats should be provided incomplete, so that completing the habitat is one of the main activities of the crew. I think it's an interesting idea. Having agency on one's immediate environment is good, I believe. Meaningful activities for humans in a world were robots are very present will need to be solved on Earth as well in a few years, perhaps within the current generation. Windows might be translated as transparency, and I think external communications from both Earth and the target is essential. The contest parameters include an advanced presence of robotic probes, and even automated terraforming equipment a target is allowed. So there should be no stress concerning the state of the planet they are going to. If we can send a worldship, we can send a much faster robotic probe ahead of it.
I think we need to plan for maintenance, and this vehicle can be either 'perfect' or repairable. although the maintenance may be done by robots, likely some decisions will need to be taken by the humans on the ship.

 

[Unclear Engineer]

Putting on my engineer's hat, I will start with the notion that nothing is "perfect" and assuming that something is can easily become the fatal flaw over a multi-generation time period.

There would be no rescue of turning back for a "generational starship". So, it needs to have a very high probability of functioning reliably for a very long time.

High reliability with engineered systems usually requires redundancy and diversity, along with resilience. There needs to be a backup for whatever could fail, and it is best if the backup is not susceptible to the same cause of failure. Plus, systems need to be repairable with available personnel and equipment.

Those concepts are also applicable to societies, but it is not so clear how they can be accomplished with humans and regulations.

On Earth, there is plenty of diversity, redundancy and opportunity for repair, and even replacement. Societies previously have collapsed on Earth, only to be replaced or absorbed by other societies. All of humanity was never in jeopardy of extinction, as far back as we can get information. Perhaps that has now changed, due to the potential for all-out nuclear war. But, collapse of technological society and world order still seems much more probable than the extinction of our whole species. And, with our planet-sized self-regulating habitat, we are in a much better position to recover from a decimation of our population than would be the case for a closed society in an isolated shell that needs engineered equipment to keep functioning without lapse for many generations.

On a limited population space ship isolated from all other populations by distance and time, extinction of the whole ships population seems far more probable. And, the means of preventing that seem far more limited than the means available on Earth.

This exercise seems to be aimed at the sociological aspects of the ship's design, rather than the engineering aspects. That seems necessary, considering that we do not have the capability to design such a ship with today's technology, and cannot know the reliability and resilience, or even that various redundant approaches to creating a viable ship for such a mission. We don't even know of a suitable destination, nor what human survival on a future destination would require.

So, doing it now seems futile and useless, unless the thought experiment helps us with learning how to do better for ourselves here on Earth. Coming to grips with our own self-caused problems. But, would societal measures suitable for such a space ship really be applicable here on Earth for our entire species?

It seems that what we really want to understand better is how human's react to environmental limitations, and now to channel those reactions into constructive behaviors instead of destructive behaviors.

Which reminds me of an interaction long ago, when I was trying to hire for a position on the east coast of the U.S. and got an application from a person then living in Hawaii. I asked the applicant why he would consider leaving Hawaii to live where this job was located. His response was "Hawaii is nice, but it's an island - you would not understand unless you lived where you can get 'island fever'".