James A. Rising

The goal of the Non-Renewable Spaceship project is to sketch the needs for a functioning ecosystem capable of sustaining a given population in space. Two motivations underlie this research: First, to construct a scenario which motivates society to set aside non-renewable resources for an indefinite future (in case of catastrophe, or if we find that “weak sustainability” is insufficient after all). Second, to try to answer E. O. Wilson’s question, “What do we need to save, for a healthy future world?” I’ve already worked out some of the principle resources: space, water, take-off fuel needs, and the ecosystem diversity that can be maintained under it.

See my presentation to the SDev student colloquium (results near the end). Try out different parameters of a partial model.