Öjevind Lång
Deity
- Joined
- Aug 22, 2005
- Messages
- 2,371
Sid Meier's funding a Space Elevator? Wow, very cool. I had no idea the Civ franchise was that successful!
Wise guy!
Civilization 5
- Thread starter Swedishguy
- Start date
Wise guy!
Matthew5117
Emperor
It wouldn't take trillions of dollars(!); no more than the Beijing Olympics construction fees. The location in the Pacific Ocean is a place where the orbit will allow the Space Elevator to function, all they need to get is the materials and build it. Maintenance fees would be just functioning the elevator, with power, not a lot though.
Honestly guys, I don't know why you are disagreeing so much about the Space Elevator!
Onionsoilder
Reaver
- Joined
- Mar 19, 2007
- Messages
- 3,173
A space elevator has it's complications, but when we get it to work, it will provide gigantic benefits. For one, it will make transporting goods into space MUCH cheaper. Because of that, it could reduce the cost of space missions by almost 70%. It would also allow us to do things like remove satellite debris from orbit and place new satellites into orbit very cheaply.
I think Sid would fund a $30 million dollar trip to the ISS or be one of the first to travel on Virgin Galactic's Spaceship2 rather than build a space elevator. There are no real accounting numbers that can price the cost for construction, maintainence and operation of a space elevator whereas a space station the numbers can be retrieved from NASA, RSA, CSA, JAXA and ESA. Really people, we've never seen a photograph or watched a video of a astronaut/cosmonaut on a space elevator but on a space station we have.
I'd like to see where you are getting your numbers from. I've seen convincing plans in the few-billion-dollar range.
You think a serious off-planet presence is useless.
This would be why there has never in human history been any instituion or project on a scale larger than a single nation, then ?
True; but that is the way an object in a geosynchronous Clarke orbit behaves, it stays exactly in position. This is a non-problem.
70% ?
Talk about three or four orders of magnitude. It's the difference between having to build a Saturn V and taking a long-range train journey.
blitzkrieg1980
Octobrist
I agree with rysmiel. Shipments of material could be remote piloted up using new shuttles that no longer require life support or space for people. The people would be transported via the space elevator. Space station production would blossom and costs would be a fraction. They might even be able to make a cargo sized elevator that would make space shuttles obsolete. That would rock with regards to costs.
Eunomiac
Chieftain
I did my undergraduate thesis on the space elevator, so that makes me a Credible Forum Expert(TM) 
Pulling up my thesis, here are some of the relevant conclusions after a year of research:
1) Surprisingly cheap. While projects like this have a tendency to inflate costs way above estimates, it's still below what people would expect (i.e. tens of billions, not tens of trillions). People intuitively think that size means money, when in fact much of the space elevator's design is deceptively simple (i.e. a long cable). Apart from the cable, you basically have the elevator itself, the anchoring point on Earth and a counterweight at the end. Expensive, yes, but not as pricey as you'd expect given the scale of the project.
2) Surprisingly safe. It's not difficult to protect the airspace around a small island in the Pacific. Radar and the like would give plenty of warning of any kamikaze-style terrorism. Counter-intuitive dynamics between the Earth's atmosphere, the centrifugal pull of the counterweight and the length of the cable means that a break wouldn't be the disaster everyone imagines: the drag on the cable as it falls is multiplied across its entire length. This means the cable would fall gently, leaving plenty of time to clear the area (as much as one would have to, what with it being in the middle of the Pacific).
3) The economic benefits of such a project are hard to overstate. Right now, we're like a civilization trapped at the bottom of a well, forced to build a rocket pack every time we want to reach the world above. Each trip is risky and expensive and only worth it for sending up robotic probes or the odd human for a PR coup. Now imagine how quickly and how dramatically such a society would change if someone built a ladder! Space tourism would blossom, exploratory missions could become much more sophisticated for a fraction of the cost, colonization would become very feasible, and the unimaginable mineral wealth in our asteroid belt would suddenly appear quite attractive to any commodity-starved world power. It's quite analogous to the construction of the Panama Canal... if half the world were completely inaccessible before it was finished!
4) The political and diplomatic benefits of such a project make it almost inevitable. Imagine how powerful the individual who controlled that ladder would become, and it's not hard to see the kindling for that same frantic competition that took the US to the moon. Mark my words: serious development of this idea by any nation will launch us into another space race.
After all of the above, you're probably wondering why there isn't one being built already. First, they have to figure out how to propel the thing upwards. There are a few prizes (much like the X-Prize) out there, intended to encourage development in this direction. Second, they need to figure out what the cable will be made from. The obvious contender is carbon nanotubing, but we're still not at a stage where we can manufacture enough of it. Development in this area is moving really quickly, though, with improvements coming each year. Third and most importantly, they have to "overcome the giggle factor," as one NASA engineer put it. I don't think this will be a problem once the first two hurdles are overcome and someone has drawn up a comprehensive and feasible plan.
I for one fully expect to see a space elevator started, and perhaps finished, in my lifetime.
Pulling up my thesis, here are some of the relevant conclusions after a year of research:1) Surprisingly cheap. While projects like this have a tendency to inflate costs way above estimates, it's still below what people would expect (i.e. tens of billions, not tens of trillions). People intuitively think that size means money, when in fact much of the space elevator's design is deceptively simple (i.e. a long cable). Apart from the cable, you basically have the elevator itself, the anchoring point on Earth and a counterweight at the end. Expensive, yes, but not as pricey as you'd expect given the scale of the project.
2) Surprisingly safe. It's not difficult to protect the airspace around a small island in the Pacific. Radar and the like would give plenty of warning of any kamikaze-style terrorism. Counter-intuitive dynamics between the Earth's atmosphere, the centrifugal pull of the counterweight and the length of the cable means that a break wouldn't be the disaster everyone imagines: the drag on the cable as it falls is multiplied across its entire length. This means the cable would fall gently, leaving plenty of time to clear the area (as much as one would have to, what with it being in the middle of the Pacific).
3) The economic benefits of such a project are hard to overstate. Right now, we're like a civilization trapped at the bottom of a well, forced to build a rocket pack every time we want to reach the world above. Each trip is risky and expensive and only worth it for sending up robotic probes or the odd human for a PR coup. Now imagine how quickly and how dramatically such a society would change if someone built a ladder! Space tourism would blossom, exploratory missions could become much more sophisticated for a fraction of the cost, colonization would become very feasible, and the unimaginable mineral wealth in our asteroid belt would suddenly appear quite attractive to any commodity-starved world power. It's quite analogous to the construction of the Panama Canal... if half the world were completely inaccessible before it was finished!
4) The political and diplomatic benefits of such a project make it almost inevitable. Imagine how powerful the individual who controlled that ladder would become, and it's not hard to see the kindling for that same frantic competition that took the US to the moon. Mark my words: serious development of this idea by any nation will launch us into another space race.
After all of the above, you're probably wondering why there isn't one being built already. First, they have to figure out how to propel the thing upwards. There are a few prizes (much like the X-Prize) out there, intended to encourage development in this direction. Second, they need to figure out what the cable will be made from. The obvious contender is carbon nanotubing, but we're still not at a stage where we can manufacture enough of it. Development in this area is moving really quickly, though, with improvements coming each year. Third and most importantly, they have to "overcome the giggle factor," as one NASA engineer put it. I don't think this will be a problem once the first two hurdles are overcome and someone has drawn up a comprehensive and feasible plan.
I for one fully expect to see a space elevator started, and perhaps finished, in my lifetime.
EmperorFool
Deity
@Eunomiac - This is an internet forum. Rational arguments, sound reasoning, and above all actual research will not be tolerated! 
I did my undergraduate thesis on the space elevator, so that makes me a Credible Forum Expert(TM)
1) Surprisingly cheap. While projects like this have a tendency to inflate costs way above estimates, it's still below what people would expect (i.e. tens of billions, not tens of trillions). People intuitively think that size means money, when in fact much of the space elevator's design is deceptively simple (i.e. a long cable). Apart from the cable, you basically have the elevator itself, the anchoring point on Earth and a counterweight at the end. Expensive, yes, but not as pricey as you'd expect given the scale of the project.
2) Surprisingly safe. It's not difficult to protect the airspace around a small island in the Pacific. Radar and the like would give plenty of warning of any kamikaze-style terrorism. Counter-intuitive dynamics between the Earth's atmosphere, the centrifugal pull of the counterweight and the length of the cable means that a break wouldn't be the disaster everyone imagines: the drag on the cable as it falls is multiplied across its entire length. This means the cable would fall gently, leaving plenty of time to clear the area (as much as one would have to, what with it being in the middle of the Pacific).
3) The economic benefits of such a project are hard to overstate. Right now, we're like a civilization trapped at the bottom of a well, forced to build a rocket pack every time we want to reach the world above. Each trip is risky and expensive and only worth it for sending up robotic probes or the odd human for a PR coup. Now imagine how quickly and how dramatically such a society would change if someone built a ladder! Space tourism would blossom, exploratory missions could become much more sophisticated for a fraction of the cost, colonization would become very feasible, and the unimaginable mineral wealth in our asteroid belt would suddenly appear quite attractive to any commodity-starved world power. It's quite analogous to the construction of the Panama Canal... if half the world were completely inaccessible before it was finished!
4) The political and diplomatic benefits of such a project make it almost inevitable. Imagine how powerful the individual who controlled that ladder would become, and it's not hard to see the kindling for that same frantic competition that took the US to the moon. Mark my words: serious development of this idea by any nation will launch us into another space race.
After all of the above, you're probably wondering why there isn't one being built already. First, they have to figure out how to propel the thing upwards. There are a few prizes (much like the X-Prize) out there, intended to encourage development in this direction. Second, they need to figure out what the cable will be made from. The obvious contender is carbon nanotubing, but we're still not at a stage where we can manufacture enough of it. Development in this area is moving really quickly, though, with improvements coming each year. Third and most importantly, they have to "overcome the giggle factor," as one NASA engineer put it. I don't think this will be a problem once the first two hurdles are overcome and someone has drawn up a comprehensive and feasible plan.
I for one fully expect to see a space elevator started, and perhaps finished, in my lifetime.
Thank you, that was very informative.
Matthew5117
Emperor
Did you use sarcasm?
Zomgmeister
Emerged Lurker
Another suggestion, I believe it wasn't said before but I may be wrong.
First of all, check this picture.
Do I really have to say something else? Ok, I will.
1: Give us much more varied terrain types and effects. There is difference in deserts, there is difference in forests and mountains. Jungle are not really as bad as we are used to think, and they are pretty different too.
2: I adore geologically correct random map generator scripts so damn much. Their concept should be included in any map generator by default, except for some weird ones like Fantasy.
First of all, check this picture.
Do I really have to say something else? Ok, I will.
1: Give us much more varied terrain types and effects. There is difference in deserts, there is difference in forests and mountains. Jungle are not really as bad as we are used to think, and they are pretty different too.
2: I adore geologically correct random map generator scripts so damn much. Their concept should be included in any map generator by default, except for some weird ones like Fantasy.
Öjevind Lång
Deity
- Joined
- Aug 22, 2005
- Messages
- 2,371
A minor graphic detail: Include the active volcanoes from Civ III: only visible if you are within range (or have disovered Satellites). They were stunning.
And do away with the random events that let hurricanes and volcanic eruptions destroy buildings and improvements in Civ IV. They are just annoying. Well, one could keep them as a special treat for Isabella and Montezuma, of course.
And do away with the random events that let hurricanes and volcanic eruptions destroy buildings and improvements in Civ IV. They are just annoying. Well, one could keep them as a special treat for Isabella and Montezuma, of course.
Heavymachinegun
Chieftain
Hello to everyone! It's my first post in this forum....
1) For those who knows how combat mechanism works: recalculate round odd and round damage points every round, so the unrealistic "jump points" in the battle odds are eliminated.
2) The siege units can bombard city defenses, can bombard unit stack, but cannot attack directly or defend!!!
If an undefended catapult gets attacked by a horseman, should be destroyed without fight. Like the workers do.
3) Include the most important resource of the ancient and renaissance era: the Salt (food resource, +1
, +1 with Grocer, obsoletes with refrigeration)
4) The realistic possibility to make public dept. I want to fight a war but I have no money enough? No problem, like in the real world, I can make dept. The gold treasury goes negative and I have to pay a dept interest: -20% of your total dept every turn, for example. If your dept reaches a certain value, for example -2000
, it's the bankrupt 
. Most of your buildings and military units are sold automatically.
5) Add Hitler to the leaders. Stalin, Churchill, Roosevelt... and no Hitler? Aggressive Industrious or something like that... I want to make war on Hitler!!!
6) Two or more religions in the same city should create "religious tensions". I don't know how should work this... maybe a +0.4 for every religion after the first... Can construct "the Pantheon" for alleviate religious tensions. "Free religion" puts to zero religion tensions in your cities.
7) Like CivII, who completes Manhattan Project should receive some production bonus when building nukes.
8) The diplomatic damage when a war is declared must be cleared after some turns.
9) Instead of "Future technology", some possibilities:
- Future military technology: adds some strength to your tanks.
- Future science technology: adds some
- Future social technology: adds some
- Future medicine technology: adds some
- ... and so on
10) More options for automated actions to avoid annoying micromanagements. For the workers: a button "Build cottages around this city", "Build farms around this city" and similar. In the city screen a button "Grow until the happy/health limit, then stop".
11) The "Find city" button, like CivII had.
1) For those who knows how combat mechanism works: recalculate round odd and round damage points every round, so the unrealistic "jump points" in the battle odds are eliminated.
2) The siege units can bombard city defenses, can bombard unit stack, but cannot attack directly or defend!!!
If an undefended catapult gets attacked by a horseman, should be destroyed without fight. Like the workers do.3) Include the most important resource of the ancient and renaissance era: the Salt (food resource, +1
, +1 with Grocer, obsoletes with refrigeration)4) The realistic possibility to make public dept. I want to fight a war but I have no money enough? No problem, like in the real world, I can make dept. The gold treasury goes negative and I have to pay a dept interest: -20% of your total dept every turn, for example. If your dept reaches a certain value, for example -2000
, it's the bankrupt . Most of your buildings and military units are sold automatically.5) Add Hitler to the leaders. Stalin, Churchill, Roosevelt... and no Hitler? Aggressive Industrious or something like that... I want to make war on Hitler!!!
6) Two or more religions in the same city should create "religious tensions". I don't know how should work this... maybe a +0.4
for every religion after the first... Can construct "the Pantheon" for alleviate religious tensions. "Free religion" puts to zero religion tensions in your cities.7) Like CivII, who completes Manhattan Project should receive some production bonus when building nukes.
8) The diplomatic damage when a war is declared must be cleared after some turns.
9) Instead of "Future technology", some possibilities:
- Future military technology: adds some strength to your tanks.
- Future science technology: adds some
- Future social technology: adds some
- Future medicine technology: adds some
- ... and so on
10) More options for automated actions to avoid annoying micromanagements. For the workers: a button "Build cottages around this city", "Build farms around this city" and similar. In the city screen a button "Grow until the happy/health limit, then stop".
11) The "Find city" button, like CivII had.
KaiserElectric
Total Freakin Besties
- Joined
- Dec 2, 2007
- Messages
- 3,461
I completely agree
. It makes absolutely no sense that the builder of the Manhattan Project gets nothing for the effort. However, the builder should get a bonus to or a free scientist instead of a bonus to nuke production.
Matthew5117
Emperor
These are small changes, not huge differences or mechanisms. These changes can easily be applied to Civ 4 with a mod.
Either way, welcome to Civ Fanatics!
Either way, welcome to Civ Fanatics!
Onionsoilder
Reaver
- Joined
- Mar 19, 2007
- Messages
- 3,173
These are small changes, not huge differences or mechanisms. These changes can easily be applied to Civ 4 with a mod.
Either way, welcome to Civ Fanatics!
Not only can they, they already have been. There is already a hitler leaderhead out there, and the Revolution mod increases the chance of a revolt if you have a non-state religion in a city.
I completely agree
how about a single free nuke on completion? sort of like the small set of prototypes the historical manhattan project produced. that wouldnt result in a permanent advantage, but a head start in nuclear arms race. you could make it more than one, but a bit less effective than later versions.
Heavymachinegun
Chieftain
These are small changes, not huge differences or mechanisms. These changes can easily be applied to Civ 4 with a mod.
Either way, welcome to Civ Fanatics!
Well, for big changes... the hexagonal grid (instead of square one) would be interesting. But I'm afraid that Sid considers square grid a sort of tradition of the Civilization series...
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