Though the term Banana Republic is usually used as a pejorative to denote corrupt failed states. However, it might be time to improve the meaning of this phrase.
Public bicycle system
As distances within a space habitat will be rather small, only a couple of kilometers in most designs , bicycles will be an excellent mode of transportation for space settlers. Promoting cycling will also have environmental and public health benefits. Continue reading Public bicycle system
Lead-free city
The Guardian has a good article about a campaign to make Cleveland, Ohia (USA) a lead-free city. The article also contains a table with some of the negative consequences of lead exposure on the health of children.
Solar sail explained
Real Engineering explains how solar sails work in the video below:
Recycled water
In orbital space settlements water recycling is essential. So it is quite worrisome when we read the following article on ScienceDaily:
Get over it? When it comes to recycled water, consumers won’t
To cite from this article (my emphasis):
If people are educated on recycled water, they may come to agree it’s perfectly safe and tastes as good — or better — than their drinking water. They may even agree it’s an answer to the critical water imbalance in California. But that doesn’t mean they’re going to use recycled water — and it sure doesn’t mean they’ll drink it.
The problem is that educated people are disgusted to use a perfectly safe product that is necessary for staying alive. Perhaps people should not think too much about the origin of their tap water – if education is apparently not sufficient in this case.
Wealth, poverty and crime
Though it is often said that crime is caused by poverty, there is little to no evidence to actually back up this claim. On the contrary it seems the more affluent people are more likely to commit property crimes. The Guardian has a nice article about this strange phenomenon:
Urban design & public health
Creating an optimal living climate is one of the Four Goals formulated by Gerard O’Neil. This means that urban planners should take public health into account.
We found an important study at ScienceDaily:
Adults in lower walkability neighborhoods found to have a higher predicted cardiovascular risk
One step forward…
ScienceDaily has the following report:
Scientists invent animal-free testing of lethal neurotoxins
We applaud every technology that will reduce the need for animal testing. The more alternatives there are available, the greater the pressure will be to abolish animal testing all together. Though we will still have a long way to go, but every single step counts.
WikiHouse
WikiHouse is a project that applies the concept of Open Source Design to architecture. The idea is to print patterns on a plate of plywood, which are then mechanically cut by a milling machine – resulting in a kind of construction set. Continue reading WikiHouse
A new home for 300M people
The Guardian reports a study that shows that about 300 million people live on land that will be flooded by 2050 as a result of rising sea levels. In comparison the US population was about 327 million in 2018. Continue reading A new home for 300M people
