The Banks Orbital: God’s Bracelet

The Banks Orbital is a ring-shaped Space Habitat over a million miles across with hundreds of times more living area than the entire Earth.

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Credits:
The Banks Orbital: God's Bracelet
Episode 445; February 29, 2024
Produced & Narrated by: Isaac Arthur
Written by: Isaac Arthur & Mark Warburton
Graphics:
Justin Dixon
Mafic Studios
Orion's Arm
Steve Bowers
Udo Schroeter

Music Courtesy of:
Stellardrone, "Red Giant", "Ultra Deep Field"
Taras Harkavyi, "Alpha and ..."
Miguel Johnson, "So Many Stars"
Lombus, "Cosmic Soup", "Hydrogen Sonata"

[harbl]

"Ringworld? Bit grandiose innit? Let's go with something that's a nice modest million miles across."

[jhwheuer]

Now we need to just figure out where the four elephants and the big turtle goes.

[JasoTheRedF]

I'm just gonna say it Mister Arthur, while your Fermi's Paradox and other style of episodes are good, the megastructure ones are the peak of this channel, in my humble opinion.

[garface]

Isaac would you consider doing an episode on the banks universe? Their ftl, human A.I. relationship, body modification, space habs etc? I'd love to hear your analysis of the concepts Banks brings to the table.

[kaylzshter]

I love the Culture series so much. Banks' passing still hurts all these years later

[sothasil]

"When you first saw Halo, were you blinded by its majesty?"

[aurigo_tech]

You used to show numbers also in text when talking about them. I must say I prefer that as in purely listening to them you quickly forget and I often find myself having to rewind a few seconds. Please bring that back in.

[ysfsim]

"... Cortana, what is that?"
" That is another Halo"
( cough, choking sounds)
".. So thats what my father found. Isnt it some kind of weapon?"
" Yes, and when fired it will cause destruction on a galactic scale."

[wstavis]

When Isaac started talking about disassembling Jupiter, all I could think was, "Well, he sounds like a Vogon now."

[donwald]

I already ran out of Living Room, it's packed full of moving boxes!

[Monsmak]

28:00
Bro, can't believe that the truck driver, just kept driving through such a rare and special event.

Like just pull off to the side of the road and enjoy totality for the few minutes it lasts.

[custardgannet]

If i could live in any fictional universe it would be Banks Culture verse for sure.

[iainballas]

One of the things I like most about Iain M Banks is that he spells his first name correctly.


This brought to you by the group of people who grew up being called "Lane".

[BrokenCurtain]

The funny thing about those orbitals is that in-world, they're considered backwater communities since the Culture is centered around their ships (which are also colossal).

[viddarkking]

Honestly now that humanoid robots are truly leaving the lab.
I do hope we go full Factorio the moment space mining becomes a thing.
A star trek future is possible as long as our industrial and agricultural capacity far exceeds our needs.
And we'd be able to finally focus on the megastructures like Banks Orbital to go further Factorio.
They'd be out Pyramids of Giza or Eiffel Tower.

[Masaq_TM]

Best Sci Fi author ever. RIP Iain. My gamer tag is taken from Look to Windward. ☝️

‘Don’t f*ck with the Culture.’

Love the channel. Kindest regards to you and yours.

[patrickunderwood]

Iain M. Banks, my favorite SF author and fellow Scotch enthusiast. RIP.

[marxug]

I favor sloping mountain ranges for the rims rather than walls – imagine the epic hike clear into space! Also, I’d love to hear you discuss the energy-intensive problem of just getting **on** and **off** these structures, given the 300, 000 mile-per-hour tangential velocity.

[chrisgriffith]

One of the biggest problems with making giant constructions like a "ring world" is that what ever you make the ring from will eventually fatigue, or outright fail, graphene is not immune to the effects of radiation, heat and stress. Even if the material has the strength when its built, it will need massive maintenance. For something that big, you cannot simply replace the supports in the long term, you'll end up making the ring over and over and over. Even if you could, where is all that material coming from?

[carlosandleon]

Everybody gangsta until people go antispin and start to float.