alec33

There are immense untapped resources beyond the Earth. For example, the solar energy that passes closer than the Moon is equal to the whole world's fossil fuel reserves *every minute*. You just have to figure out a way to tap it economically, though it's quite a difficult engineering homework to do. Cheaper access to space is part of the solution. If you are going to have big industry in space, then people can and will live there.

Mars may be an eight month ride but the fact remains that most destinations in the cosmos are too far for the human lifespan with the present technology. So in addition to life support, and communication our vehicles need equipment for making required time to cover a given distance fit, say, the nine hours a jet needs to go from San Francisco to Osaka. Boredom will join noise, vibration, and harshness as engineer's goals. Maybe it's about surfing waves of interstellar energy or catching it like wind for propulsion at multiples of light speed using superconductors in the vacuum of space suspending physics in the cabin by preserving the exact molecular order of the human body (no aging, no burns or deformities) as the vehicle it rides in becomes pure energy. Maybe there are numbers on the periodic table we don't know about that are up to the job? Of course we'll have to figure out how to de energize the thing at arrival with all the molecules in the order they were at departure, or a reasonable surrogate. Avionics in a rig like this poses a few challenges. Plenty of power though.