Fallout from Living with a Toddler

[filker0]

Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star
    now I know just where you are.
Buried deep beneath my feet;
    Dyson Spheres are really neat!
Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star
    now I know just where you are.

Comments

[redaxe]

Heh. I always thought that the most effective method of living in a Dyson Sphere would be to make it double-walled, and live between the surfaces, with the inner one being a collector/converter of energy. So it makes perfect sense to me. (Then again, perhaps it has something to do with having lived with toddlers... :-)

[mdlbear]

In fact, you'd have to do this in order to prevent the atmosphere from escaping. Or you could live on the outside and let the star's gravity hold in the atmosphere.

[redaxe]

Not necessarily, if we stipulate (as many have) that the inhabitants have gravity generator technology. But multiple walls makes more sense to me; it provides for energy acquisition at a maximum of efficiency, for atmosphere retention, and all sorts of other good things. Sure, it takes more mass -- but at the point where you're building a Sphere, that seems like a far lesser problem.

[orawnzva]

Wikipedia points out that a solid shell is the least plausible of the several things that "Dyson sphere" might mean, and is certainly not what Dyson was thinking of when he originally proposed it.

[gorgeousgary]

Heh. Like the icon! 8-)

[peteralway]

But I thought that the twinkling little star would be one of the distant stars, not the sun at the center, so that this does make sense if you are living on the inside surface.

But then it's not beneath

[filker0]

But then it's overhead, not below.

Re: But then it's not beneath

[braider]

....erm, no.... Not if I'm reading that correctly. If you're feet are pointing away from the sun, then the stars will be beneath your feet.

Re: But then it's not beneath

[catsittingstill]

half the stars will be below, anyway.