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Yep. We haven't really figured out how to do a good government that lasts more than 200 years. Maybe unless you think monarchy is good, in which case I still don't want to share a spaceship with you.

by dingaling6 hours ago|

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Tynwald, the Isle of Man's parliament, has operated continuously for over 1000 years

by notahacker26 minutes ago|

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The Tynwald evolved from a jury into a legislature, didn't admit its first elected member until 1866, its first few hundred years of existence are assumed rather than documented, and actual power resided with a mixture of kings (most of whom were also kings of other places or answered to kings in other places) for most of its existence. So not an ideal example :)

by andrewflnr1 hours ago|

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How much of that time did it spend fully sovereign over its territory? I'd love to learn otherwise, but my impression is that it has mostly been under the shadow of England, and the pressures of a government under those circumstances are not comparable to those for, frankly, one that's more responsible for its destiny as a starship crew would be. I bet you can find lots of long-running tiny local governments with very little power, both dominated and protected by a string of larger, more powerful, but more volatile governments.

by cadamsdotcom5 hours ago|

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How's their space program coming along ;p pretty spacious place, ach!

by detritus6 hours ago|

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I have no doubt that even the most republican of cultures launched from Earth would end up thoroughly monarchistic by the time the generation ships arrived at their destination. At best monarchistic - who knows what savage new forms of society could evolve in that sort of context?

by andrewflnr1 hours ago|

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More optimistically, you might see some kind of "choosing a chief by consensus" type of situations that you see in some small hunter-gatherer societies (being careful with the word "savage", which is... usually misleading). It'll depend a lot on the size of the crew.

by oceanplexian5 hours ago|

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There is a lot of precedent for this. Even on Earth, in 2026, international maritime law states that there is no such thing as a vessel with "democracy" and that a captain always has supreme command. Ships, airplanes, etc are all in a category that operate as strict autocracies.

by detritus3 hours ago|

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Sure.

How long's the longest voyage these days?

Mutinies aren't so common nowadays, but they were when ocean voyages were measured in months and years.

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by oceanplexian5 hours ago|

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> Perhaps, but it is horrifically long in terms of human stuff.

Not really, unless you're obsessed with the idea that great works need to happen within your lifetime. Europe is chock full of cathedrals that took 400-600 years to build, worked on by countless generations who would never live to see them completed.

by detritus4 hours ago|

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The difference there being that at the end of your day, having spent it masoning, you could leave the cathedral and go back to your family and have a walk in the fields and drink and be merry with people loved and new. The project wasn't the entiriety of your existence, it was merely the means to pay for it.

Unless we have generational ships the size of small countries, I'm not sure the human brain - unaided and non-forcedly evolved to do so - would be able to handle essential incarceration in a series of metal tubes for its own and its descendents existences.

by allannienhuis4 hours ago|

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Generational ships would of course need to be very large, but I doubt it would need to be as large as you think. And it doesn't need to look like metal tubes. Many northern cities have extensive underground or between-building pedestrian bridges and large shopping malls, etc that can provide quite a lot of variety and the feeling of open and green spaces that is pretty attractive during long cold winters. Whether that's 'enough' to avoid mental health issues in a permanent setting is of course a different story, but that's just one of thousands of problems that would need to be solved before that ever comes close to reality :)

by detritus3 hours ago|

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Yeah, this is the problem though - ironically highlighted by my still-maintained love and hope for Starship: Beyond Earth orbit, the energy requirement to move even small tens of tons of useful life-sustaining mass is incredibly expensive.

Like, to get a useful amount of people to Mars would be... the wealth of a first world nation for tens of years. Even using nuclear engines.

A generational megaship travelling at some small percentage of c to a nearby useful star (not even the nearest ones, which are all a bit shit)?

There's just nothing within our current projected reality that could even begin to accomodate that possibility.

Never mind the fact you'd need redunancy, and at least a few hundred years of testing to ensure that whatever mega project you could ultimately send wouldn't simply get vaporised halfway through, from realities unknown.

by forgotaccount34 hours ago|

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Knowing the variety of lives lived on earth as we speak, I'm fairly certain the first space born generation would adapt to it.

Provided the Earthlings that were sent along don't let their incarceration induced insanity infect the youngin's.

by detritus4 hours ago|

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Maybe I'm over-thinking things. It seems like a lot of people's existences essentially revolve around a pocket-sized glowing rectangle.

Future AI and a database of all of humanity's experience before launch might be enough to keep the generational populace amused and distracted for the entiriety of their meagre, trapped existence... .

by 3 hours ago|

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