In which I post about a TL9 solar system

[Say, it isn't that bad!]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Considering that TL8+ factories are capable of producing biological materials (if so designed), a TL9 factory could produce its hourly capacity in flesh through cultured meat (I would say one pound per $1 of capacity [GURPS$ rather than 2020$]). In the station that I suggested above, diverting 10,000 minifacs to meat production would produce 5 million lbs of meat per hour, far more than the facility could produce through raising animals (milk, ivory, leather, etc. production could substitute for meat production).

In the case of actual animals, they would provide the sort of "exclusive luxury items" that certain people buy because they are expensive, and perhaps a bit forbidden, rather than for any value of the item itself.

As to the production, 5 million lbs of meat per hour seems a bit high. Also, looking at it again, I'm not sure where you got the specific number of 20,000 fabricators, nor a price of $10B, which doesn't seem to occur on the chart for fabricators. If you got it from the cabin space of a SM+15 habitat, a factory that size would cost +$150B, not +$10B; while producing +$5M of produce per hour would make it a SM+12 fabricator, for $5B.

That being said, 20,000 people would probably eat 20,000 lbs of meat per day, plus 2-3 lbs of other foodstuffs. Call it 3.5 lbs per person, and that SM+12 factory can feed 1.4 million people, or 70 times the population of a SM+15 habitat.

Add in the necessity to make a net profit... still seems a little high?

Perhaps look at it the other way: $1 is the "finished goods" price, and its actually producing $0.4 of material goods. That gives 2 million lbs of meat; the fabricator can feed 571,000 people, or 28.5 times the population of a SM+15 habitat.

That seems more reasonable, I guess?

[Say, it isn't that bad!]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

I would be worried that one of the ways in which this was not as good as the TL10 Regneration (Radiation Only) was that the TL9 version did not clear the permanent dose the way the TL 10 version does.

If it didn't you'd still be gaining 5 rads/year without heavy shielding and Antirad drugs. Without clearing the permanent dose you're always gaing some rads and they'll add up to a lethal effect eventurally.

Hmm... might need a "Purges Permanent Radiation Dose" enhancement? What would you price that at?

[AlexanderHowl]

Originally Posted by Say, it isn't that bad!

In the case of actual animals, they would provide the sort of "exclusive luxury items" that certain people buy because they are expensive, and perhaps a bit forbidden, rather than for any value of the item itself.

As to the production, 5 million lbs of meat per hour seems a bit high. Also, looking at it again, I'm not sure where you got the specific number of 20,000 fabricators, nor a price of $10B, which doesn't seem to occur on the chart for fabricators. If you got it from the cabin space of a SM+15 habitat, a factory that size would cost +$150B, not +$10B; while producing +$5M of produce per hour would make it a SM+12 fabricator, for $5B.

That being said, 20,000 people would probably eat 20,000 lbs of meat per day, plus 2-3 lbs of other foodstuffs. Call it 3.5 lbs per person, and that SM+12 factory can feed 1.4 million people, or 70 times the population of a SM+15 habitat.

Add in the necessity to make a net profit... still seems a little high?

Perhaps look at it the other way: $1 is the "finished goods" price, and its actually producing $0.4 of material goods. That gives 2 million lbs of meat; the fabricator can feed 571,000 people, or 28.5 times the population of a SM+15 habitat.

That seems more reasonable, I guess?

Minifacs are cabin equivalent factories that cost $0.5M and produce $0.5K/hour before modifiers (they are effectively SM+4 factories that do not require energy points). They may be given any options for normal factories, so they can be biological, robotic, etc. 20,000 cabins can be made into 20,000 minifacs for the cost of $10B and a production of $10M/hour. $1 per lb of meat for a retail cost is reasonable for mass produced vatmeat, as it only requires a vegetable slurry for nutrition, though you could upscale it for higher quality meats (it is also important to remember that GURPS$ are not 2020$).

[Say, it isn't that bad!]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Minifacs are cabin equivalent factories that cost $0.5M and produce $0.5K/hour before modifiers (they are effectively SM+4 factories that do not require energy points). They may be given any options for normal factories, so they can be biological, robotic, etc. 20,000 cabins can be made into 20,000 minifacs for the cost of $10B and a production of $10M/hour. $1 per lb of meat for a retail cost is reasonable for mass produced vatmeat, as it only requires a vegetable slurry for nutrition, though you could upscale it for higher quality meats (it is also important to remember that GURPS$ are not 2020$).

...I read the entire "Specialized Rooms for Habitats" section. I made specific note of the Minifac.

My brain, why have you betrayed me?

Anyway, that explains it. I thought you were explaining it as growing 5 million lbs of meat per hour, which seemed... a bit off. So yeah, 5 million pounds of vegetable slurry turned into "vegemeat" sounds about right for 20,000 minifacs.

One "green space" is described as having enough food for the entire vessel. Since very few vessels will have more than 4 habitats, let's say enough for 4 habitats. At SM+18, that's 600K people, or 2.1M lbs of vegetable slurry. We can treat that as 600K occupancy, and 2.1M lbs-equivalent of vegetable-slurry-equivalent. It would take 2.38 SM+18 green spaces to produce 5 million lbs of vegetable slurry feedstock per day, or 57.12 green spaces to produce 5 million lbs per hour.

So, thinking about meat to vegetable price ratios, it seems about 7 : 1. So, $5M of minifac production could turn 700,000 lbs of artificially-cultured meat tissue into various meat products per day; or enough to feed 200,000 people, or 10 times a SM+15 habitat (as opposed to 70 times). That makes "cultured meat" a definite luxury product; even without markup, that's $7 1980 USD/GURPSBucks per lb.

We then divide our "green space" production by 7 for cultured meat; 300K lbs of cultured meat slurry. 2.33 SM+18 green spaces to produce 300K lbs per day; 56 to produce 300K lbs per hour. Since Spaceships deals with approximations rather than specifics, we can call those numbers "the same".

A luxury steak (made from an actual animal) can be estimated (via google search and a bit of mental math) at $140; at a ratio of 140 : 1 with vegetable slurry and 20 : 1 with cultured meat. From vegemeat to animal meat, we divide our minifac production by 140; 35K lbs of raw animal meat. 2.33 SM+18 green spaces to produce 35K lbs per day; 56 to produce 35K lbs per hour.

Buying unprocessed vegetable slurry... it's essentially just raw materials for vegemeat (and other products), so $0.4 per lb. Not the most palatable food, but cheap and plentiful. Your daily nutritional input for $1.4.

So, daily "cost of food": $1.4 subsistence, $3.5 regular, $24.5 comfortable, $490 wealthy (no variation or occasional luxury included). Does that seem reasonable? Subsistence is, as mentioned, vegetable slurry; regular is both vegemeat, as well as minifac-formed "broccoli", "carrots", "cucumbers", and dried vegetable slurry as "spices", and other such things; comfortable contains actual cultured meat, real whole vegetables, and real spices; wealthy is animal meat (or, alternately, and most often, carefully-grown and -managed cultured meat), and rare (hard to grow) vegetables and spices.

[Anthony]

All of the manufacturing options in Spaceships and Ultratech have numbers that completely break the economy, at least until raw materials prices rise by enough to make up the difference. This does not mean you shouldn't ever use them, just realize that using them gives a doubling time of around six months and thus gives you an economic singularity in under a decade.

[Say, it isn't that bad!]

Originally Posted by Anthony

All of the manufacturing options in Spaceships and Ultratech have numbers that completely break the economy, at least until raw materials prices rise by enough to make up the difference. This does not mean you shouldn't ever use them, just realize that using them gives a doubling time of around six months and thus gives you an economic singularity in under a decade.

I prefer to fix rules first, then numbers. Bad numbers are easier to fix that bad rules. If the rules are good, but the numbers are too high, I can just divide the numbers.

It's kinda hard to do the same to rules. ;)

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Say, it isn't that bad!

I prefer to fix rules first, then numbers. Bad numbers are easier to fix that bad rules. If the rules are good, but the numbers are too high, I can just divide the numbers.

It's kinda hard to do the same to rules. ;)

Eh, there's no strong distinction to be made there. The general issue is that a generic product that can be produced by a $5M factory in an hour (including the time required to reprogram the factory) is going to rapidly see its price decline to somewhere in the $50-$100 range, whatever it originally cost, for simple reasons of competition.

[AlexanderHowl]

Or the standard of living will go up. As for the raw materials for the meat, the meat requires a vegetarian growth medium that is 5 times its mass, but that is dirt cheap with you consider the price of vegetables. Corn costs $3 a bushel (around $0.06 per lb), meaning that it could cost $0.3 to grow a pound of meat (thus the $1 per lb). You could make fois gras for $1 a pound using cultured meat technology (it is actually easier than regular meat because liver is a very tolerant tissue).

Each habitat at SM+18 has 600,000 cabins, so 4 habitats would have 2.4 million cabins (supporting 1.2 million people if only half of them are living spaces). I generally use one Open Space per habitat (while one Open Space could hypothetically support an entire spacecraft, it comes down to quality of life issues). As for the productivity of the factories, that is just part of entering into a post-scarcity society, as prices will go down as labor becomes more productive and raw materials become cheaper.

There is an interesting question about prices though. GURPS prices are a suggestion, and the real world shows that just slapping a name brand on a shirt can increase the cost by 10x (or more) without increasing the quality. A shoe factory could make shoes for $4 a pair that will be sold for $200 a pair because of demand for the brand.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Or the standard of living will go up.

Why yes, having a $5,000 item drop to $50 will increase standard of living. The point is that you will wind up with exponential growth until you hit a new constraint, at which point prices will match up with that new constraint and overall production costs (total of materials cost, operating cost, depreciation, interest on capital) will closely resemble the wholesale price of the object, and if you have efficient universal manufacturing systems, the retail price will match the wholesale price.

[AlexanderHowl]

I think that is the assumption built into the system (at least at TL9+). At TL9, civilizations that expand into their solar system are capable of benefiting from such luxury that the society becomes post-scarcity after a few decades. Within our solar system, an asteroid like 16 Psyche contains more mineral wealth than the human species will use in a million year (assuming reasonable recycling), so there is a question of what is really valuable in such a setting.