A special five-years-later bonus episode, with updates on a few projects that might interest listeners of Making New Worlds. You can preorder Off-Earth: Ethical Questions and Quandaries for Living in Outer Space now from Penguin Random House us

Ep 13: Should We Settle Space?

Feb 28th, 2018 20m 12s

For the last episode of Making New Worlds, we ask the question we skipped at the very beginning: Should we settle space? Featuring answers by many of our guests from previous episodes. The transcript for this episode is below. Imagine this: You

Ep 12: What Do You Think?

Feb 21st, 2018 13m 21s

What do you think about the space settlement ethics topics we’ve covered in the podcast so far? This episode includes comments and feedback from members of the Making New Worlds audience. The transcript for this episode is below. Welcome to Mak

Ep 11: Which Way Is Mecca?

Feb 7th, 2018 33m 58s

How will people of faith adapt their religious practices to the space environment? How will our cultural values help us adapt to life in space? Christian theologian Michael Waltemathe and Muslim theologian Mehmet Ozalp discuss examples of how t

Ep 10: What If I Get Sick?

Jan 31st, 2018 27m 13s

How can we prepare for medical emergencies in a space settlement? What equipment should we bring? What kinds of doctors? When resources are limited, who do we decide to treat first? Physician Ken Iserson talks about the lessons we can learn fro

Ep 09: What If There’s Already Life on Mars?

Jan 24th, 2018 30m 34s

How do we make sure we don’t bring harmful extraterrestrial microorganisms back to Earth from space? How do we keep our Earth microbes from contaminating potentially habitable worlds like Mars or Europa? How much effort do we really need to put

Ep 08: Should We Make Mars More Like Earth?

Jan 17th, 2018 23m 55s

How do we balance out our hunger for resources in space with the desire to preserve the space environment for future generations? Will something inherently valuable and important be lost when we start transforming the Moon or Mars to extract re

Ep 07: What If I Want to Have Kids?

Jan 3rd, 2018 27m 15s

How do we sustain a stable population in our future space settlements? Do we require settlers to reproduce? How do we limit population growth when resources are scarce? What rights do children born in space have? Is it even possible to safely

Call for Feedback

Dec 27th, 2017 1m

Making New Worlds will resume in 2018, but today we have a quick announcement to make about our upcoming audience feedback episode. The transcript for this announcement is below. Hi, everyone! This is Erika Nesvold. Making New Worlds will retur

Ep 06: Who’s in Charge?

Dec 20th, 2017 29m 40s

Who will make the decisions in future space settlements? Will they be governed remotely by nations on Earth? Will settlements develop their own local governments? How will conflicts between settlements and with nations back on Earth be resolved

Ep 05: What If Someone Steals My Stuff?

Dec 13th, 2017 30m 8s

How will we handle it when someone breaks the rules of our new societies in space? Who decides whether they’re guilty? Do we need to build space prisons? Or are there alternative forms of justice we should consider that would better suit our ne

Ep 04: Where’s My Money?

Dec 6th, 2017 20m 32s

Once we’ve reached out space settlements, what do we do next? What kind of jobs will be available, and what kind of economy will we have? What kinds of rights do we have as workers in space, and what will we do if our employer tries to exploit

Ep 03: Who Owns Mars?

Nov 29th, 2017 22m 20s

Once we’ve taken that giant leap for mankind and have set foot on a new world, we have to ask: Who actually owns the land we’re standing on? If you’re planning on making your fortune in space by mining or farming or building new habitats, how d

Ep 02: Who Gets to Go?

Nov 22nd, 2017 25m 46s

Before we can head out into space, we have to ask: Who gets to go? What will the population of space settlers look like? Who will be allowed to go, and who will be left behind? Historian Donna Gabaccia rejoins us to talk about what kind of peop

Ep 01: Why Are We Going?

Nov 15th, 2017 27m 44s

Welcome to the first episode of Making New Worlds: Why Are We Going? Examining our motivations for settling space. We talk to historian Donna Gabaccia about the historical reasons for human migration on the Earth. Sociologist Zuleyka Zevallos w

Trailer

Nov 8th, 2017 3m 34s

Welcome to Making New Worlds, a podcast about the ethical issues of human settlements in space. Here’s a quick trailer to give you a taste of the kinds of questions the podcast will explore. Please share far and wide, and stay tuned! Episodes w

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