Generation Ships

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by Sindri

Well the farther they get away from Earth the harder it is to stay in communication. Also it's not like people won't be interesting in advancing things though they might focus on theoretics and engineering.

There's a problem. Doing science these days is very much dependent on the wider scientific community. News, scientific journals and the web are all important, and simply being able to discuss problems with a wide range of people is really important. Much of that tapers off as a generation ship gets further away and the data rate goes down. It may be necessary to re-invent some of the ways that earlier scientists worked, and there's no telling how those will cope with the problems of late TL8 or later.