ON THE WEB: WHATEVER HAPPENED TO SPACE COLONIES?
by Hazed
We were promised flying cars. We were supposed to be wearing silver jumpsuits, and eating our food in the form of pills. And above all, we were supposed to be living in space colonies. When I was a child that's what the future held. So what went wrong with the idea of building habitats out in space?
Here's a fascinating article which comes up with a reason. It takes as its starting point a feature in National Geographic magazine in 1976, by the famous science fiction author Isaac Asimov. In this piece, Asimov describes a visit to a functioning space colony. He's shown around and explains to readers how it all works and what it's like to live there. At the time, Asimov and many of his readers presumably genuinely believed that this was what the future held.
Read this article to discover just why space colonies never came to pass.
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