Updated: 1/30/2025 Beauty will save the world. This has been true at least since the times of Total Violence when (non-combatant) women being beautiful (not attractive or God forbid sexy) greatly increased the chance of their survival and the survival of their children (in the case of a hostile takeover) - our little world. This also translates to the survival of our entire planet. It's beauty (and our emotional connection to it) will ultimately be the reason that will prevent us (and others who observe it) from overexploiting or utterly destroying it. And eventually the same will translate to our Sun and beyond.
But very few of us now live and work in direct contact with the wild nature. By far most of us live and work in increasingly larger cities. When the Orbital Fleet headquarters are established across the globe they will be established in cities. In cities that will already be large or will grow large with time.
The only place that exists in the world that everyone on its surface wants to see and experience is inner Paris. The rest are not symmetrical enough, are not properly enough accented, or are generally not nearly as well planned.
Thus it makes sense to build new cities. And there are plenty of other reasons to build them like the need for a safe distance from the kinetically threatened seas and separation from national (and thus not sufficiently holistically oriented) control centers. For (a la internet) redundancy reasons (as well as prevention of hegemon regions) at least one center must (eventually) exist per populated continent, and at least one must exist in (at least) our two oldest cultural sub-continents. The general proposal is to (within a century from the establishment of Orbital Fleet) have centers in (at least):
It only makes sense to ensure that these cities are as beautiful as we can make them. There are a multitude of reasons why they must be beautiful (including safety concerns) but most importantly their beauty will help maintain the culture of Orbital Fleet as AWU and taut for eons to come.
These cities should be built in alignment with the longest-term common goals we are capable of envisioning at the time of their initial layout. There must never be a hint of a reason that would justify their (whole or partial, hostile) destruction based on a (direct or implied) justification of them conflicting with the new course of events.
Update 6/25/2024Orbital Fleet operational center cities should be leaders in the culture of their macro-regions. If two cultures clash and one of them is less refined (and can be deemed as primitive) then the more refined culture has the high ground and can find justifications for encroaching on (and assimilating in) the less refined culture. Thus the Orbital Fleet (our first, future, interface with the greater Cosmic world) cities must maintain the highest possible cultural standards. This includes the maintenance of our roots in our multi-million year long evolutionary history and the continuous refinement of our time-tested (and within reason latest) high-cultural branches.
Inner Paris (the default proposed seed location for Orbital Fleet) demonstrates this well. Containing dedicated places of culture and ideology (like religion) it brings up the general cultural level of its population. The same goes for all other cultural centers on the planet, which for that reason should (arguably) host secondary Orbital Fleet locations.
While our evolutionary roots and humanity are common and there should be a common Orbital Fleet culture, the cities should maintain their regional cultural flavor. Just as genetic variation improves the survivability of a species cultural evolution improves survivability of identity. We do not know what cultural traits will eventually make us more competitive in the greater Cosmic world. Perhaps (and likely) we will need many (and probably all) of them to successfully interface with different external parties.
Culture undoubtedly includes religion. Orbital Fleet cities should act as both preservation centers of our distinct religious heritages and as centers of agreement. The regions most prevalent in the respective macro-regions should certainly be more prominent in the corresponding cities. At the same time, communication between various religious groups and the ability to act in coordination should be facilitated.
Places of physical culture are integral parts of general cultural presence. While institutions associated with sports may not be appropriate in defense-focused cities, institutions associated with the maintenance and improvement of physical culture are essential. Emphasizing culture builds a cultivation of health and fitness for the (probably, among others) ultimate reason - secure longevity.
Militaries have a long history of stationing warriors in distant but strategically important places. More recently the officer core has been able to have their families living with them. Going forward, as many personnel as possible need to have the opportunity to have their families near the stations. There are many benefits to maintaining a family-oriented culture, but at the very least this will boost morale and improve decision-making. Thus the cities need to have places of primary and secondary education and recreation.
And certainly Orbital Fleet will need to have a culture of higher knowledge and wisdom, with appropriate installations and institutions placed in its cities.
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