MMM Classics Year 10: MMM #s 91-100 - Moon Society

eventual resource-using settlement.
8. Candidates for national office should foster policies in other
areas that are compatible with an “open” space frontier. We
need a “Pro-Space Terrestrial Policy. This will include
vigorous pursuit of
the “reindustrialization” of this country
tax and other incentives for industry initiated research and
development in general
a policy for environmentally friendly industrialization of
the Third World, one that puts a strong premium on taping
space-based energy solutions
promotion of power generation options beyond the scope of
current vested interests: hydrogen especially
increased funding for fusion power research and into the
He-3 fueling option.
Anyway, here is our “trial balloon litmus test” PK
[Conclusion to the Current MMM Series]
The primitive roots of “Lunan” Culture, IV
Last month , we jumped the gun by inferring that that
issue’s essays were our concluding installment to the now yearlong
series of articles on lunar beginnings that debuted in issue
# 88. We soon realized that there was yet more to be read in the
crystal glass of “the lunar environment”, promising new
vantage points from which to preview the shape of any lunar
settlement culture to arise.
Here are three additional pieces continuing this webthread
of thought for you this month. While we are sure that
these as well will still not have exhausted the ways in which
the Lunan character will inevitably be shaped by the physical
nature of this brave and raw new world. But any other cultural
aspects with environment-based underpinnings we might detect
will be deferred for future discussion. PK
© Dennis Cripps
The Quest for Var iety
by Peter Kokh
Relevant Readings from Back Issues of MMM
MMM # 3 MAR ‘87, “Moon Mall”
MMM # 13 MAR ‘88, “Apparel”
MMM # 18, SEP ‘88, “Industrial M.U.S./c.l.e.”
MMM # 22, FEB ‘89, p 6, “Hair”
MMM # 26 JUN ‘89, p 4, “Toy Chest”
MMM # 29 OCT ‘89 “The Role of Cottage Industries”
MMM # 32 FEB ‘90 pp 3-5 “Import/Export Equation”
MMM # 24 APR ‘91, pp 5-6, “The Fourth ‘R’”
MMM # 65 MAY ‘93, p 3 “The Substitution Game”;
p 7 “Fast Road to Industrial M.U.S./c.l.e.”;
pp 8-9 “Stowaway Imports”
MMM # 68 SEP ‘93, p. 3, “Cornucopia Crops”
MMM # 77 JUL ‘94, pp 4-5 “Cinderella Style”; “Furniture”
MMM # 85 MAY ‘95, p 1 “Safety Valve ...”
I’ll never forget an experience as a fresh high school
graduate of seventeen, browsing through the Hudson’s Bay
Company department store in Calgary, Alberta. The variety of
goods seemed much greater than that at similar stores in my
native Milwaukee. Here were to be found samplings of wears
and wares from all the domains of the British Commonwealth,
as diversified a market potluck of humanity as has ever existed.
On the Moon, shoppers are likely, at least in the early
years, to have an experience just the opposite. Imported goods
will be all but nonexistent and the exceptions will be prohibitively,
obscenely expensive. The lunar domestic market will
have to rely on its own resources primarily, other space-based
markets eventually contributing their own offerings in trade.
“Small Market Syndrome” we might call it. Few
people making few products to sell to few people. How do we
avoid the expected consequence: little choice, little variety?
prohibitive imports vs. small manufacturing base
The challenge for variety (unavailable either from
terrestrially made imports or from the small local labor pool)
will affect almost all categories of goods: building materials,
vehicles and other conveyances, home furnishings, accessories
and artifacts and giftware, clothing, appliances - you name it.
Not only will it be harder to find items one really likes, but it
will be harder to put a distinctive custom personality on one’s
home, even on one’s wardrobe. Such a forecast presumes that
the principal entry for variety is mass produced goods from a
variety of sources. But there are at lest two other avenues by
which satisfying variety can be provided under these constricting
circumstances.
Moon Miners’ Manifesto Classics - Year 10 - Republished January 2006 - Page 64