This sunny afternoon, I enjoyed a brief coffee while I revisited astronomer Martin Beech's Rejuvenating the Sun and Avoiding Other Global Catastrophes.
I was very impressed with the book's scope back when I first read it back in 2010, and I remain impressed. For Beech, the idea that an advanced civilization like ours could let its worlds succumb, if not to strictly planetary catastrophes then to the steady evolution of our stars off of the main sequence, is intolerable. The book is all about the sorts of megascale engineering that could remedy this existential plight. The idea of terraforming Venus and Mars appeals to him, but as only the first step of several. Terraforming Uranus into a water world, perhaps with a supramundane layer added, when Sol moves into its red giant phase and pushes its habitable zone beyond Saturn a few billions years from now is another one. Moving planets to more suitable orbits is more ambitious still, while Beech gives considerable thought as to how stars could be radically engineered to husband as much of their hydrogen fuel as possible for as long as possible. (Beech's vision of most of our sun's mass beyond vacuumed off to form a Klemperer rosette of red dwarf stars orbiting a smaller stabler sun a thousand or so AUs off is intoxicating.) Plausible? Maybe after who knows how much technological development, sure. Fun? Hell yes.
What sort of megascale engineering exists in the Trekverse? I'd argue that the sheer number of class-M planets orbiting nearby stars is suggestive of some ancient civilization's activity, at least in the area of the Federation core. Glancing at Sol Station's shortlist of nearby stars, almost all of the Sol-like stars do support class-M worlds: 40 Eridani, Procyon, Epsilon Indi, Epsilon Eridani, Sigma Draconis, Tau Ceti, one of the two stars in 61 Cygni and Eta Cassiopeiae, and both of the Sun-like stars in Alpha Centauri, in addition to Sol. (Sigma Draconis even has multiple class-M worlds.) Other non-sun-like stars also seem to host class-M planets. Going by what we know of planetary formation and life, such a high frequency of Earth-like worlds is unexpected. Some of these worlds shouldn't even exist: Vulcan orbiting 40 Eridani A and Andor ultimately orbiting Procyon A should have been baked when their white-dwarf companion stars passed from the red giant phase and shed half their mass into nearby space, for instance. Some Preserves save cultures, or species; why mightn't others preserve planets?
Thoughts? What examples of megascale engineering have featured in the Trekverse, whether explicitly or by implication? Christopher's The Buried Age postulated an advanced civilization that had made vast constructs throughout the area of the Local Group. Are there others?
I was very impressed with the book's scope back when I first read it back in 2010, and I remain impressed. For Beech, the idea that an advanced civilization like ours could let its worlds succumb, if not to strictly planetary catastrophes then to the steady evolution of our stars off of the main sequence, is intolerable. The book is all about the sorts of megascale engineering that could remedy this existential plight. The idea of terraforming Venus and Mars appeals to him, but as only the first step of several. Terraforming Uranus into a water world, perhaps with a supramundane layer added, when Sol moves into its red giant phase and pushes its habitable zone beyond Saturn a few billions years from now is another one. Moving planets to more suitable orbits is more ambitious still, while Beech gives considerable thought as to how stars could be radically engineered to husband as much of their hydrogen fuel as possible for as long as possible. (Beech's vision of most of our sun's mass beyond vacuumed off to form a Klemperer rosette of red dwarf stars orbiting a smaller stabler sun a thousand or so AUs off is intoxicating.) Plausible? Maybe after who knows how much technological development, sure. Fun? Hell yes.
What sort of megascale engineering exists in the Trekverse? I'd argue that the sheer number of class-M planets orbiting nearby stars is suggestive of some ancient civilization's activity, at least in the area of the Federation core. Glancing at Sol Station's shortlist of nearby stars, almost all of the Sol-like stars do support class-M worlds: 40 Eridani, Procyon, Epsilon Indi, Epsilon Eridani, Sigma Draconis, Tau Ceti, one of the two stars in 61 Cygni and Eta Cassiopeiae, and both of the Sun-like stars in Alpha Centauri, in addition to Sol. (Sigma Draconis even has multiple class-M worlds.) Other non-sun-like stars also seem to host class-M planets. Going by what we know of planetary formation and life, such a high frequency of Earth-like worlds is unexpected. Some of these worlds shouldn't even exist: Vulcan orbiting 40 Eridani A and Andor ultimately orbiting Procyon A should have been baked when their white-dwarf companion stars passed from the red giant phase and shed half their mass into nearby space, for instance. Some Preserves save cultures, or species; why mightn't others preserve planets?
Thoughts? What examples of megascale engineering have featured in the Trekverse, whether explicitly or by implication? Christopher's The Buried Age postulated an advanced civilization that had made vast constructs throughout the area of the Local Group. Are there others?
