Scenarios which may lead to the rise of an asteroid-based technical civilisation

摘要

In a previous paper, the author described a hypothetical development path of technical civilisations which has the following states; planet dwellers, asteroid dwellers, interstellar travellers, interstellar space dwellers. In this paper, several scenario are described which may cause the rise of an asteroid-based technical civilisation. Before such a transition may take place, certain space technologies must be developed fully (Now these exist only in very preliminary forms): closed-cycle biological life support systems, space manufacturing systems, electrical propulsion systems.