From: hess@stat.ncsu.edu (George Hess)
Newsgroups: alt.planning.urban
Subject: Re: Main Impediment to Survival
Summary: Author too glib on Starship Cities
Date: 7 Sep 92 13:15:33 GMT
Organization: Statistics, NCSU, Raleigh
Originator: hess@essss1.stat.ncsu.edu


     ". . .let numbers stand for themselves, except at the
      heads of sentences, rather then put them into words . . .
      numbers lose much of their potency when diluted
      by an alphabet."
                         Kurt Vonnegut. 1990. Hocus Pocus.


   In a earlier article, "Main Impediment to Survival", Jon Roland
essentially claims that the presence of humans living in scattered
cities and towns on the earth's surface is the main impediment
to the continued survival of human civilization.  He also claims
that the present world population of 5,500,000,000 is sustained
only by the consumption of geosystem resources.  The solution
he suggests is to build 1,000,000 "starship cities" holding
1,000,000 inhabitants each, with footprints totaling less than
1% of the earth`s land surface.  The alternative, Mr. Roland 
suggests, is a precipitous decline to a new stone age, and a
maximum sustainable global population of less than 100,000,000.

   The overall tone of Mr. Roland's article is that people are
NOT part of nature and have no place on the planet, save in some
hermetically sealed cities.  He would move everyone into these
cities and allow "perhaps for occasional visits [to the surface]
under strictly controlled circumstances".  These are frightening 
suggestions.

   While I agree that humans are making a fine mess of things in
the world, I philosophically disagree with the idea that people
are not a part of nature.  In fact, I would argue that that's
exactly the idea that got us into the sad state of ecological
affairs in which we currently find ourselves.  Once we make the
step of disassociating ourselves from nature, it's easy to think
of the world as both a supply of commodities for the taking and
a limitless sink for our waste products.  The starship city
solution is no different.

   Philosophical disagreements aside, I find Mr. Roland to be
overly glib about both the feasibility of these starship cites
and their ability to solve current problems.  First, a little
quick math.  The 1,000,000 cities holding 1,000,000
inhabitants each implies a total population of 1,000,000,000,000.
That's a cool 182 times the present population of 5,500,000,000.
Next, a little geography.  According to Goode's World Atlas
(18th edition - Rand McNally), the total land surface area
of the earth is 57,800,000 square miles.  Now, a little more
math.  That means that 1% of the earth's total land surface is
578,000 square miles, leaving .578 square miles for the footprint
of each of Mr. Roland's 1,000,000 cities; in other words, .578
square miles of land for 1,000,000 people.  While it is true that
one could pack 1,000,000 people into such a space (at about 17
square feet per person), that seems less than pleasant.  Sure, you
could go vertical, but by the time you allow for homes, places of
work, machinery, etc, I suspect this will be a rather tall structure.

   There is also no discussion of the energy supply for these
cities.  Is the reason all the people must leave the surface so
that we can cover it with solar colletors?  Or will we simply drain
the oceans for our fussion reactors.  What will 1,000,000,000,000
people eat?  What will they drink?

   In summary, I think this is exactly the kind of technocratic
thinking that got us where we are today.  Technology is not going
to bail us out this time.  In one area I agree with Mr. Roland - 
we are on a crash course with disaster.  Only a major change in attitude,
particularly in the manner in which humans relate to the rest of
the planet, will allow us to come even close to solving our
problems.  


george hess
North Carolina State University
hess@stat.ncsu.edu