One of the three Chinese astronauts to launch this weekend will do a yearlong mission
The Tiangong-3 station, as presently configured,
with two Shenzou capsules docked to its main hub.
Though the decision won’t be made as to who until the mission is ongoing, one of the three Chinese astronauts scheduled to launch this weekend to China’s Tiangong-3 space station will do a yearlong mission, rather than the standard six month missions that they have been doing since the station became operational.
Chinese astronauts Zhu Yangzhu, Zhang Zhiyuan and Li Jiaying (or Lai Ka-ying in Cantonese) will carry out the Shenzhou-23 crewed spaceflight mission. The astronaut selected for the year-long stay will be determined based on how the mission unfolds in orbit, CMSA spokesperson Zhang Jingbo said at a press conference.
During the year-long residency, China will implement its first space-based human body research program to collect crucial data on astronaut exposed to long-duration spaceflight environments, Zhang noted.
I guarantee this is the preliminary to a longer mission that will break the 14.5 month record set by Valeri Polykov on Russia’s Mir station in 1994-95. China’s station program is solid and robust, and even includes plans to double the size of Tiangong-3 in the coming years. There will be nothing preventing them from doing missions even longer, from two to three years, as they develop the knowledge for interplanetary travel.
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”…one of the four Chinese astronauts scheduled to launch this weekend…”
Four Chinese astronauts?
mkent: I misread the Chinese press release. Careless of me. Now fixed. Thank you.
That sounds like a bad game show.
‘Lone Starman’
“Four tiakonauts enter: only three return. One must stay.”
Audience voting each week. The twist is, the loser (least popular), has to stay. “Great. We have to live with this guy for a year.”
Related:
“I see the two dominant powers on the planet have come to agree to essentially divide up the world and live in some degree of tolerable harmony for a few decades to come anyway. America needs China’s manufacturing and production. China needs Americas consumerism, and they will both transfer warfare in the physical world into the tech, A.I., virtual, drone world and begin to move onto the moon and into outer space. How long this condition of tolerance would last I assume would depend on how stable America’s politics remains and if the Communists can retain power within their own country. Communism and Orwellian, oppressive, parasitic government over time must fall IMO.”
DIVVYING UP THE WORLD: CHOOSE YOUR MAFIA: https://www.sigma3ioc.com/post/divvying-up-the-world-choose-your-mafia
Jerry Pournelle figured this would be the US and the Soviet Union entering the “Codominium” and dividing up the world.
He even wrote a series of stories on how that might go :-)
I wonder how they’ll divide up the Moon?
JP:
Keeping in mind over time America and its dominant model should / will prevail over authoritarian Communism.
In my opinion any way.
The only real unknown variable is this A.I. element and where it can deliver humanity.
And of course this unknown on the outer limits third rail subject which is today front and center in the Trump administrations attempt at tearing down the deep states strangle hold over such things and its implications, what ever “IT” is..
https://www.sigma3ioc.com/post/aliens-the-conditioning
“I wonder how they’ll divide up the Moon?”
Treaty of Tordesillas 1494
It seems Joss Whedon’s vision may be more likely than Jerry Pournelle’s.
Cotour,
An interesting piece, but it errs, as is far too commonly the case these days, in assuming that either Russia or the PRC has “decades” of life expectancy remaining. Neither does.
Russia may have as little as a year left, perhaps two. That is about how long I think it will take Ukraine to complete the effective de-industrialization/de-militarization of Russia via what it archly refers to as “long-range sanctions.” At whatever point Putin either falls or Russia is driven completely out of Ukraine I think Russia implodes and largely disintegrates.
The PRC, for its part, continues on its demographic free-fall. What is now the PRC will have only half of its current population by mid-century. The PRC, as a functioning government, is all but certain to implode well before that, probably because of either internal revolt of the military against Pooh Bear who has been decimating its upper ranks lately in a paranoid purge of Stalin-esque proportions, or because of unsuppressable popular revolt based on the PRC’s unstoppably declining economy.
Before the PRC itself goes down for the count we may see it first complete its absorption of large parts of Siberia from an imploded Russia. The PRC has been, in effect, buying these lands on the installment plan from a mendicant Russia for quite awhile and the rate of this transition has been notably higher since the Ukraine misadventure got underway.
What happens to Russia’s nukes when it falls apart will, needless to say, be a matter of some interest outside of Russia. I suspect the PRC will gobble up the Russian Pacific Fleet at Vladivostok as well as any far-eastern ICBM fields it can get to. The rest of Russia’s nukes will probably be grabbed off by NATO special ops teams.
What happens to the PRC’s nukes when it also implodes is less clear. We could well see multiple warlord states emerge, each with its own nuclear arsenal comprised of whatever ex-PRC nuke weapons were physically deployed in the relevant territories. With Pakistan and India also being nuclear-armed, we might be looking at some sort of Asian continental nuclear war breaking out at some point. More likely, even nuclear-armed rump warlord states on former PRC territory will restrain themselves precisely because either Pakistan or India – or both – could take advantage of any fratricidal nuke war between subsets of the Han.
As the Han ethnicity continues is slow recessional to oblivion at the end of the current century, the serial collapse of PRC-successor warlord states will provide periodic geopolitical tremors likely requiring outside interventions of at least a temporary nature to deprive such failed states of their revenant nuclear arsenals.
Related: From: MURDER AND BLACKMAIL: A.I. IS AS RUTHLESS AS HUMANS
“*A Capitalist that exists within the theoretically Objectively structured parameters of the Constitution defines success as being able to establish a business and offer a product or service that is of value to others and is able to make a profit and have some great degree of freedom and prosperity to provide it. Hopeful.
*And a Communist / Socialist / “progressive” that exists within the theoretically Subjectively structured parameters of a system that defines success as being able to control the maximum amount of confiscated production, freedom and power over others. Grim.”
https://www.sigma3ioc.com/post/murder-and-blackmail-a-i-is-as-ruthless-as-humans
I think the question remains regarding such oppressive “Mafias” such as the CCP, we can look today at Iran and their defiance in the face of massive military force potential and their citizens ability to resist their tyranny.
Whom ever possesses the guns almost always says what is what in any raw political power and control country.
And how many decades does that power and control condition last?
How long can Grim outlast Hopeful?
I am not certain, now plug A.I. into the equation.
https://static.wixstatic.com/media/e691e8_b98c130a25b44199a419bb04b8955c9d~mv2.jpg/v1/fill/w_925,h_519,al_c,q_85,usm_0.66_1.00_0.01,enc_avif,quality_auto/e691e8_b98c130a25b44199a419bb04b8955c9d~mv2.jpg
Here you go: As Long As Humans Exist:
https://youtube.com/shorts/3d1zGLSe2bg?si=b77DYKjzwUEyEaSs
I guess this sums it all up for eternity, alien overlords or no alien overlords.
Something must exist that attempts to counter balance the nature of man.
And that something is the Constitution.
Cotour:
I would argue that the Constitution doesn’t counterbalance Human nature, so much as provide a framework in which those natural proclivities are turned to the Common Good. Much discussion of this in the Federalist Papers. Human nature, indeed, the Universe in general, does not allow for rainbows and unicorns, but properly channeled, can provide a place for such.
Why, BI do you choose to complicate what is simply intended and stated?
Keep it simple BI.
Tell me Objectively, what exactly is “The Common Good”?
Ask that question to a full blood “progressive” / radical Democrat Socialist, a Communist and / or a rational Conservative, and I think you will better understand my simple point.
What is the nature of man related to power and control? It will be abused by those who posses them. What is theory in governance intended to counter balance that nature of man related to power and control? The Constitution of the United States of America.
Simple.