Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

[Clonus]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

The margin of safety could be provided by the fact that Trantor did in fact have native food production ability in the form of the infamous "yeast vats".

[Ian Mackinder]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

Well planets are big so there would be plenty of places to land' date=' and in a hugely overpopulated planet there would be plenty of labour force to load and unload. There are much, much bigger problems with the idea.[/quote']

 

Ain't just a matter of numbers, it is the organization needed to use those numbers effectively.

 

Easy to assume that ten guys will automatically do ten times as much work as one guy, but you also have to make sure they don't trip over each other, get in each other's way, duplicate effort, and so on. To say nothing of individuals that might slack off. This sort of problem gets worse as the numbers increase - as many who have ever worked in really large organizations can attest.

[LoresLost]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

I have only read some of Robot stories of Asimov (my SciFi basics are lacking), but they are part of the Foundation time line, So it could be assumed that Positronic intelligences, running by the three laws would ensure that humans of would be getting food they need. Running the the farming loading and unloading of the food supply ships. Would you not?

[Captain Obvious]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

I have only read some of Robot stories of Asimov (my SciFi basics are lacking)' date=' but they are part of the Foundation time line, So it could be assumed that Positronic intelligences, running by the three laws would ensure that humans of would be getting food they need. Running the the farming loading and unloading of the food supply ships. Would you not?[/quote']

 

The Galactic Empire didn't use robots. They fell out of fashion for whatever reason after the first wave of humans left Earth.

[Nyrath]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

The margin of safety could be provided by the fact that Trantor did in fact have native food production ability in the form of the infamous "yeast vats".

 

Used to have yeast vats.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trantor#Food_production

 

In Prelude to Foundation (1989), Asimov indicates that this was not always so: originally, most of Trantor's basic food needs were fulfilled by Trantor's "vast microorganism farms.". Yeast vats and algae farms produced basic nutrients, which were then processed with artificial flavors into palatable food. The subterranean farms, however, depended entirely on care provided by tik-toks (lesser robots), and their destruction following an abortive uprising (chronicled in Foundation's Fear) left the Imperial capital largely dependent upon food brought from other worlds. Hindsight observers might recognize that it is was therefore the tik-tok uprising, perhaps more than any other single event, that set the stage for Trantor's sack and the final collapse of the Galactic Empire. Foundation's Edge mentions algae growing on Trantor, which is called a totally inadequate source of food, so it is possible some of the later Emperors attempted to rectify the situation with limited success.

[austenandrews]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

Ain't just a matter of numbers, it is the organization needed to use those numbers effectively.

 

Easy to assume that ten guys will automatically do ten times as much work as one guy, but you also have to make sure they don't trip over each other, get in each other's way, duplicate effort, and so on. To say nothing of individuals that might slack off. This sort of problem gets worse as the numbers increase - as many who have ever worked in really large organizations can attest.

Which would be a problem if you tried to build an enormous city out of whole cloth. When they grow organically over time, though, such logistical issues tend to sort themselves out one way or another (or else they don't grow).

[Ian Mackinder]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

Which would be a problem if you tried to build an enormous city out of whole cloth. When they grow organically over time' date=' though, such logistical issues tend to sort themselves out one way or another (or else they don't grow).[/quote']

 

Well, we're talking about an Imperial Capital here. Might be that certain things HAVE to be fast-tracked (more or less), rather than letting them evolve at their own pace.

[Nyrath]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

More to the point' date=' the concept of Coruscant as single city encompassing the entire planet was .... borrowed ... from Trantor. This is because Isaac Asimov first wrote about Trantor in 1942.[/quote']

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trantor#Inspired_by_Trantor

 

There have been some serious attempts to illustrate a planet like Trantor in the Star Wars films by George Lucas, the first being Coruscant (which was in some early sources called "Jhantor", in homage to Trantor).

[Kristopher]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

Well, let's fiddle with some numbers.

 

Trantor at its height had a population of 45 billion people. The requirement is 2.3 kg of food per man per day. Multiplying it out, Trantor requires about 1x10^11 kilograms of food a day.

 

A supertanker has a DWT of about 550,000 DWT, which is about 5x10^8 kg.

 

So to supply Trantor, you'd need to have 200 of these space supertankers to arrive every day, minimum. And unload them.

 

Reading the novels, I can make a WAG that it would take about 2 days to travel from one of the 20 agro worlds to Trantor. If I haven't overlooked anything, this would mean you'd need 800 supertankers total, to ensure a constant daily arrival of 200 supertankers. This is 40 supertankers per agro world.

 

This is a bare minimum, just-in-time arrangement. You'd want to have several times this, as a safety reserve. This will allow Trantor to stockpile extra food.

 

OK, so 45 billion is do-able.

 

But... is a worldwide city only 45 billion people?

 

Earth's land area is 58 million square miles. We'll use the the population density of Singapore to be conservative (~18200 per square mile). That's 1,055,600,000,000 people. One trillion. Right?

 

So you've be looking at the no-margin just-in-time delivery of offworld food arriving on almost 4700 "tankers" per day, right?

 

 

Now take one of the very dense real-life cities as an example for density, and you'd have more like three trillion people, and about 14000 "tankers".

[BlackSword]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

OK, so 45 billion is do-able.

 

But... is a worldwide city only 45 billion people?

 

Earth's land area is 58 million square miles. We'll use the the population density of Singapore to be conservative (~18200 per square mile). That's 1,055,600,000,000 people. One trillion. Right?

 

So you've be looking at the no-margin just-in-time delivery of offworld food arriving on almost 4700 "tankers" per day, right?

 

 

Now take one of the very dense real-life cities as an example for density, and you'd have more like three trillion people, and about 14000 "tankers".

Each tanker would provide for an area of ~4200 sq mi, an area slightly smaller than the state of Connecticut. But in that same area there will be 217 million people, which means they can probably find a few people capable of unloading and delivering the food from the tanker. It does go beyond what we can comprehend, and I imagine the bigger issue is dealing with waste and providing clean water for such a population.

[RexMundi]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

The True power behind the Empire. Imperial Waste Management.

 

~Rex

[Cancer]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

Well, that's easier with disintegrations.

[RexMundi]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

What? And waste All that Usable Organic material?

 

~Rex

[Nyrath]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

Well' date=' that's easier with disintegrations.[/quote']

 

True, but I imagine those twenty agricultural worlds would eventually like to have some of their fertilizer back.

[Kristopher]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

Each tanker would provide for an area of ~4200 sq mi' date=' an area slightly smaller than the state of Connecticut. But in that same area there will be 217 million people, which means they can probably find a few people capable of unloading and delivering the food from the tanker. It does go beyond what we can comprehend, and I imagine the bigger issue is dealing with waste and providing clean water for such a population.[/quote']

 

Why do people keep trying to bring this back to a matter of comprehension?

 

It's just numbers. If the numbers don't work, the system is impossible. If they do, it's not.

[Cancer]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

Well' date=' that's easier with disintegrations.[/quote']

 

What? And waste All that Usable Organic material?

 

True' date=' but I imagine those twenty agricultural worlds would eventually like to have some of their fertilizer back.[/quote']

 

OK, so that's why Vader said "No disintegrations." He was thinking green! How sweet.

[RexMundi]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

As another mentioned off in another thread (or maybe even this one). Soylent Brown. Heh. The Judge Dredd 2000AD setting takes a good approach to feeding the Mega Cities. Recyclers would be very happy, though they might wonder what's REALLY in their Justice Dept. Meal A. At least the Munce Roast, you know is a Munce Roast.

 

~Rex

[Nyrath]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

Each tanker would provide for an area of ~4200 sq mi' date=' an area slightly smaller than the state of Connecticut. But in that same area there will be 217 million people, which means they can probably find a few people capable of unloading and delivering the food from the tanker. It does go beyond what we can comprehend, and I imagine the bigger issue is dealing with waste and providing clean water for such a population.[/quote']

Why do people keep trying to bring this back to a matter of comprehension?

 

It's just numbers. If the numbers don't work, the system is impossible. If they do, it's not.

 

* blink * blink *

Where is the "matter of comprehension?

Blacksword is trying to see if the numbers will work.

[Kristopher]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

* blink * blink *

Where is the "matter of comprehension?

Blacksword is trying to see if the numbers will work.

 

"It does go beyond what we can comprehend", which is the second time someone has made that sort of comment in this thread.

[austenandrews]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

The point seems to be that while we don't know exactly how the numbers would work out, because nobody's ever operated on that scale, there's no reason to believe that the numbers couldn't work out.

[Nyrath]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

OK, so 45 billion is do-able.

 

But... is a worldwide city only 45 billion people?

 

Earth's land area is 58 million square miles. We'll use the the population density of Singapore to be conservative (~18200 per square mile). That's 1,055,600,000,000 people. One trillion. Right?

 

So you've be looking at the no-margin just-in-time delivery of offworld food arriving on almost 4700 "tankers" per day, right?

 

 

Now take one of the very dense real-life cities as an example for density, and you'd have more like three trillion people, and about 14000 "tankers".

 

Your figures are slightly low, Trantor has a land area of 194,000,000 square kilometers, about 130% of Earth's land area.

 

Trantor as per the novel has a population density of 232 people per square kilometer. New York City has 842, Tokyo has 5,847, and the nation of Singapore is up there with 6,852 (not 7,027 as you stated, "18200 per square mile" ).

Assuming a 2 day transit time:

Trantor: 207 ships daily, 828 total

Trantor with New York City density: 751 daily, 3,006 total

with Tokyo density: 5,218 daily, 20,871 total

with Singapore density: 6,116 daily, 24,459 total.

(for comparison purposes, the number of daily commercial air liner flight in the US is about 37,000)

 

Now you delegate. For each daily ship, have one landing pad evenly spaced over the available land area. Each pad will have the infrastructure to unload the ship, and deliver the food to the distribution network.

Land surface area per ship (square kilometers)

Std Trantor: 937,031

New York Trantor: 258,184

Tokyo Trantor: 37,180

Singapore Trantor: 31,727

 

The surface area of Connecticut is about 14,356 square kilometers, so even at Singapore Trantor population densities each landing pad will be in a area more than twice the size of Connecticut.

[Nyrath]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

"It does go beyond what we can comprehend"' date=' which is the second time someone has made that sort of comment in this thread.[/quote']

 

So?

[Kristopher]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

Your figures are slightly low, Trantor has a land area of 194,000,000 square kilometers, about 130% of Earth's land area.

 

Trantor as per the novel has a population density of 232 people per square kilometer. New York City has 842, Tokyo has 5,847, and the nation of Singapore is up there with 6,852 (not 7,027 as you stated, "18200 per square mile" ).

Assuming a 2 day transit time:

Trantor: 207 ships daily, 828 total

Trantor with New York City density: 751 daily, 3,006 total

with Tokyo density: 5,218 daily, 20,871 total

with Singapore density: 6,116 daily, 24,459 total.

(for comparison purposes, the number of daily commercial air liner flight in the US is about 37,000)

 

Now you delegate. For each daily ship, have one landing pad evenly spaced over the available land area. Each pad will have the infrastructure to unload the ship, and deliver the food to the distribution network.

Land surface area per ship (square kilometers)

Std Trantor: 937,031

New York Trantor: 258,184

Tokyo Trantor: 37,180

Singapore Trantor: 31,727

 

The surface area of Connecticut is about 14,356 square kilometers, so even at Singapore Trantor population densities each landing pad will be in a area more than twice the size of Connecticut.

 

I was bouncing around Wiki for rough numbers, here's the page I started out on: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population_density. I had no idea how big Trantor was supposed to be, or how much land area to base the figures on, so I fudged with the numbers for Earth. I started out with Singapore to be conservative.

[Kristopher]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

So?

 

So it's not beyond our comprehension.

[Nyrath]

Re: Are single climate/habitat worlds really possible?

 

I was bouncing around Wiki for rough numbers' date=' here's the page I started out on: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population_density. I had no idea how big Trantor was supposed to be, or how much land area to base the figures on, so I fudged with the numbers for Earth.[/quote']

Well, you might have taken a glance at the Wikipedia entry for "Trantor"