2020-Reactionless propulsion

In the year 2020 a reactionless propulsion system was unveiled by Dr. Robert Kelsie.

Space tourism in Low-Earth-Orbit was already established by this time with a few LEO

space hotels and private research facilities.

With the advent of reactionless propulsion systems, or inertial propulsion, space tourism

increased substantially.

Within the course of ten years orbital tourism was common, only costing as much as an ocean

cruise.

Lunar tourism began to take hold in the late 2020’s with the establishment of the first hotels

and mining facilities.

2030-NanoTech, Immortality, new power sources

         By the 2030’s, nanotechnology had finally reached critical mass with the introduction of 

         general-purpose nano-factories that could produce almost anything on demand.

        Along with practical assemblers making nano-factories possible, medical nano-bots could be

        used to remove diseased or damaged tissue in the human body and repair it.

        This rendered age-old concepts of mortality obsolete, projected human life spans doubled in 

        few short years, but long before this first generation of immortals would approach the end of

        their life spans, death from old age and disease became a thing  of the past.

        This created a resounding emphasis to start off-world colonization immediately, but this

        decade was to herald one more discovery, that of practical zero-point energy generation.

        With all these tools in hand, humankind was ready to truly begin expansion into the cosmos.

2040-Expansion into the solar system

Spacecraft built with the new technologies came into large-scale use during this decade.

Nano factories built ships for far less than was previously possible and these new generation

ships used inertial propulsion systems coupled with zero-point energy systems which gave 

them capabilities undreamt of  before.

In less than a decade, large off-world settlement of the moon and Mars began. Construction

on large rotating space colonies began on the lunar surface in the latter part of the 2050’s.

Nano-tech made large-scale construction economically feasible and inertial propulsion space

tugs made it an effortless task to place such colonies at any point in cis-lunar space and

beyond.

2060-Large sub light transports

With experience gained from the first generation of space colony construction,

large human and cargo transports became widespread.

Large-scale in-sutu construction of space structures

was now the preferred method of construction using

nano-assembly fed by near-earth asteroids and mass

drivers. The first interplanetary space-liners began

tours of the inner-solar system, many were built with

the capability to land directly on the moon or Mars.

2070-FTL drive

        Plans were being made to send the first colonists to other star systems, but a breakthrough in

        FTL technology occurred early in the 2070’s.

        This breakthrough utilized electro static pulses to generate a curvature in space-time.

        Early FTL drives were capable of five times the speed of light from an Earth-frame of 

        reference; this enabled robotic reconnaissance of nearby stars out to 10 light-years.

       After a few generational upgrades in performance, due mostly to prizes given to those

       teams that could create the fastest and most reliable FTL drives, early FTL drives could soon

       attain 100 times light speed, this enabled human reconnaissance of star systems within 100 LY of Earth.

2080-Extensive survey of exo-planets

The first wave of exploratory vessels leaves Earth and stars within a 100 LY sphere of Earth

are explored.

Most star systems with singular stars would prove to have planets whose orbits were within

the habitable zone of their parent star.

A rough estimate placed habitable planets at about 1% of stellar systems with only one

significant parent star.

Many systems had Mars-like planets that were within the habitable zone of their parent star.

One of the earliest finds of life on an exoplanet was around the star Epsilon Indi, a K5 class star

that harbored a planet .38 AU from it.

This planet was close in size to Venus and almost the same distance from Epsilon Indi as Mercury

is from Sol; this was solidly in the habitable zone of the cooler K5-class star.

The world was mostly a desert world with rugged plant life that was suited for survival in a

desert climate.

There were a few small seas on this world that covered 20

percent of it's surface.

The first team to survey it in the late 2080's bequeathed the

name Aridulus to it, which means "arid" in Latin. The International

Astronomical Union accepted this name and the name was favored

by the public as well, even though there was a movement to name

it Tatooine, the name Aridulus was the one that really stuck in the

publics imagination.

It was a fairly hospitable world that possessed a mild

climate with steady weather that compensated somewhat

for its lack of water.

2090’s-Private colonization begins

        The first settlers left for Aridulus in the latter part of the decade, arriving in late 2099, a 

        rudimentary colony was established.      

       This was the first extra-solar colony and the closest to Earth at  11.8 LY’s away. Another 

       expedition departed for the 55 Cancri system, this system contained a planet that was very

       similar to Earth with almost 65 percent of its surface covered in water. The first settlers named

       this planet Portus, with its robust biosphere; tourism  quickly became a substantial industry on   

       Portus.

2100-Colonies Prosper

      With two hospitable worlds ripe for colonization, it took a while for large numbers of people to

        migrate to these places and for the colonies to establish themselves.

        Fortunately nano-tech aided greatly in the growth of the colonies, with nano-factories it

        was not necessary to struggle against an alien world. All of the necessities needed for survival

        could be easily provided for and all of the luxuries enjoyed on Earth were common to the

        colonies. 

2110-First colony governed by AI’s

         The citizens of Aridulus desired to fundamentally rethink how societies were governed and

         establish their own unique brand of governance.

They believed that AI was superior in making intelligent assessments of any given situation and

evaluating far more options to solve any given problem than any human, or group of humans

could do.

 If controlled appropriately, an AI could function as a “prime minister” with humans electing a

cabinet that could veto any suggestion of the AI with a simple majority.

The AI drew on the entire history of the human race and all of the theories of governance set

forth by the greatest philosophers.

 Within a very short time a very efficient, yet minimal tax system was set up and the AI soon

directed all sorts of projects to strengthen the infrastructure of Aridulus and increase the

general well being of the people.

The people of Portus soon adopted this new form of governance and the AI’s from both

colonies formed an alliance of mutual benefit and trade that brought great prosperity to both

worlds.

2130-First evidence of extra-terrestrial intelligence

A survey team in the system Lacaille 8760 , a M0 type star 12.87 LY’s from Earth, discovers

the ruins of an advanced civilization, yet nothing revealed what happened to them.

These remnants of lost civilizations will eventually be found on many more worlds.

2150-2250-The Great Expansion

A focused effort to expand colonization to hundreds of suitable star systems begins. This is

one of the greatest ages of exploration in the history of humankind.

The number of potential worlds for settlement is numbered in the thousands.

No evidence has yet emerged of intelligent life on any of these planets, yet primitive life seems

abundant on many of them.

2310 Stargates built

Utilizing the space-time warping capabilities of FTL technology, artificial wormholes were  built and

provided instantaneous transit to all off-world colonies. Some colonies opted not to allow use of stargates

except in very limited circumstances because of the desire for independence from any central authority.

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