Greater Israel—Getting Serious About Settlements and Colonization. (Part 2 of 3)
To recapitulate, we are aiming to create within Israel an advanced, scientific, research-oriented economy, an economy whose foundations and educational framework have already been put securely in place with the effort, labour and sacrifice of almost four generations of Israelis. By 2048, Israel’s 100th birthday, her economy will have one of the highest individual net incomes in the world. We intend to build, over the course of the coming generation or two, a multi-trillion dollar economy producing unique, intricate, and indispensable products and services. We further aim to develop, uniquely, a medically focused economy that will improve the lives of billions, alleviate human suffering and pain and create an unbreakable linkage between Israel and the healing arts. Israel will be as renowned for medicine as the ascetic Jewish sect known as the Therapeutae were two thousand years ago. This reclusive sect lived on the shores of Lake Mareotis outside of Alexandria and were, according to Philo of Alexandria, known worldwide for their healing arts as “the best” and given to “perfect goodness.”
‘Rabbinics’ and a new medical praxis will be fused and different schools of teaching and the medical arts will compete with each other. Every Yeshiva and advanced university and college will have its own medical school. Zionism 2.0 will establish and will thereby earn recognition and worldwide respect and honour by making breakthrough after breakthrough accompanied by great research triumphs. Israeli researchers, we believe, will find cures for many different kinds of cancer and various intractable and chronic illnesses, discover anti-aging therapies, and methods to regenerate and replace aging organs and tissues. Novel pharmacological molecules and new imaging technologies will be invented. The application of machine learning and Artificial Intelligence to monitor and track individual wellness and health will succour and shelter our families and loved ones. New types of robotic surgery and utterly reimagined hospitals will be built. This medical praxis will draw on the deeply rooted ‘ontological structures of compassion’ and humanity that have animated Hebraic civilization and Jewish religion at its core. The vast contribution of the Jewish people to medicine, accounting for perhaps a quarter of all Nobel Prizes in the field, is not accidental but rather arises directly from the underlying structures of compassion and humanity immanent within Hebrew culture. The Hebrew language will within a generation or two, by way of a specific program and plan, (previously touched upon in an earlier entry) become the lingua franca of medical research, education and practice. Teaching institutions and hospitals will be part of a world spanning global network. We believe that this linguistic transformation will be distinctive, consciousness altering and species creating. Language shapes, as Benjamin Whorf hypothesized, “human thought and cultural perception”.
We are planning other initiatives of unprecedented scale and scope as part of the program of Zionism 2.0. Some of these projects have been outlined in earlier entries-a full inventory of these projects will be posted on a web site soon to be announced, as outlined in our last entry: “Building a multi-trillion dollar economy”. This entry described an Israeli directed framework for the creation of millions of companies around the world, through building a new type of economic institution which would be centred in Israel, an institution we have named the “Von Neumann Universal Constructor and Tool Facility”. As an integral part of the Zionism 2.0 agenda we intend to announce the launch of a number of Israel-based projects of great grandeur and majesty. These projects are not utopian exercises in futile scenario making but actionable undertakings that will be energetically pursued.
One of the greatest challenges facing humankind is to expand our civilization into outer space and the nearby regions of the solar system. Many possible dangers and exigencies on Earth make this a necessity. Further, establishing colonies in space and exploring the planets and moons in our solar system will immeasurably expand human possibilities, opening vast frontiers of industry and commerce that will transform how we understand ourselves. A new epoch will be established, inspiring and giving humankind bold collective tasks that we can strive for. Humankind will be transformed and energies and capacities within us will be tapped that we did not know existed.
To this end, we intend to recenter in Israel an important ‘world-changing’ project currently in its conceptual stage. This grand undertaking is directed at building a long-considered ‘alternate’ means for transporting people, machines and raw materials from Earth to outer space beyond our atmosphere. What we are referring to is known as a Space Elevator, or sometimes called an orbital lift or a star ladder. We have named this project “Heavens Lift”. It is a concept that has been mooted for over a century, a conception that is usually attributed to the Russian physicist Konstatin Tsiolkovsky in his 1895 book, Earth and Sky.
The entire feasibility of space colonies and industrial facilities in outer space for the purpose of exploring the local solar system, and establishing a satellite community on Mars, all depends on developing an efficient and inexpensive means to raise raw materials, machinery and people from Earth in a reliable, safe and economic fashion. Currently, the costs are not feasible, with estimates of $12-20 thousand dollars per kg by way of conventional rockets. The current costs for the Space X’s Falcon Heavy launch vehicle is somewhere around $2,350 per kg for low Earth orbit and twice that for a geosynchronous orbit. Elon Musk has talked about bringing the cost per kg down to as little as $10/kg for the heavy Starship, a hybrid jet and rocket based space plane—this cost per kilogram seems extremely optimistic and unrealistic.
What we are proposing is an alternate approach that has attracted the fascination of those interested in speculative technology for more than half-a-century since Arthur C. Clark’s 1979 best seller “Fountains of Paradise” was published. “Fountains of Paradise” revolves around the construction of an orbital tower that reaches from the Earth’s equator to a space station parked 36,000 km above earth in a geo-stationary orbit at a Lagrangian point between the Earth and Moon where gravitational and centripetal forces balance out. Subsequent to the publication of Arthur C. Clark’s best-selling novel, dozens of Space Elevator designs and concepts have been proposed, and various challenges have been announced and technical X prizes (such as the Ansari X Prize) have been put on offer. Additionally, a number of global consortiums have been formed that are working on many aspects of the complex technical issues. The problems are far from trivial and many engineers have raised legitimate questions with regard to a space elevator’s feasibility in the near term or even in the distant future.
Much of the inspiration for Arthur C. Clark’s vision of space exploration and colonization and the key ideas for the space elevator in “Fountains of Paradise”, were inspired by the towering intellectual figure John Bernal, often referred to as “the sage of Cambridge.” Bernal is generally regarded as the father of molecular biology. He founded the first centre for the study of organic molecules by way of X-ray crystallography at the Birkbeck Institute of Molecular Biology in Cambridge. Bernal mentored and guided key figures in 20th century biology, including at least four proteges who won the Nobel Prize. These Nobelists include Max Perutz, who deciphered the structure of hemoglobin, Aaron Klug who deciphered the structure and function of of nucleic acids, Dorothy Hodgkin who after thirty-five years discovered the molecular and atomic structure of the Insulin molecule and James Crick, the co-discoverer of the DNA molecule—one of the most important and seminal discoveries in all of human scientific history. The unsung Jewish hero Rosalind Franklin, whose X-ray studies of DNA provided the key for the helical solution of the DNA molecule, was also Bernal’s student and protege. Various academic machinations and her premature death prevented Franklin from receiving the Nobel Prize which she was due.
Bernal’s 1929 book, “The World, the Flesh and the Devil”, was described by Arthur C. Clark, “as the most brilliant attempt at scientific prediction ever made.” Bernal described many futuristic technologies such as the Bernal Sphere and other aspects of the human extension into outer space including various types of orbital lifts. Many aspects of Bernal’s ideas, most of which have remained unpublished yet are widely-disseminated, were incorporated into Clark’s books, including “2001: A Space Odyssey” and other fictional works. The Bernal Sphere was said to be the principal source for Princeton physicist, Gerald K. O’Neill, whose 1976 book “The High Frontier-Human Colonies in Space” has had a tremendous influence. In his book, O’Neill sketches out the engineering and construction of immense space ships supporting large colonies of Earthlings. These enormous structures, anchored on Lagrangian points, measure 8km in width and 30km in length. Their construction requires mobilizing hundreds of millions of tons of raw materials drawn from mining operations on the Moon and asteroids. O’Neill has provided much of the vision for the post Apollo generation of space enthusiasts and entrepreneurs.
Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin program draws heavily on O’Neill’s concepts and plans. Bezos has suggested that vast O’Neill space structures could ultimately house hundreds of billions of people, obviating the need, in the short-term at least, to colonize or terraform other planets in the solar system. Bezos’ New Glen rocket, capable of carrying 45 thousand kg of cargo into a low earth orbit (13Kg to a geosynchronous orbit) is set to be launched into outer space, marking the beginning of new competitive era in the privately financed space industry.
As an aside and perhaps germane to other themes of this blog, it is of note that John Bernal is almost always referred to as the great, or alternatively as one of the greatest Irish scientists, a son of farmers from County Tipperary, we are told. It is of particular interest perhaps to the readership here, that Nobel laureate Dorothy Hodgkin, Bernal’s protege, lover and life-long intimate, goes to great length in her heartfelt Royal Society obituary to sketch out the entire five-hundred year history of Bernal’s illustrious Sephardic Jewish family—something that is almost never mentioned. A history that goes back at least to “one Bernal”, she states in 1502, “an apothecary, who travelled with Columbus on his third voyage”, and a distant ancestor, Abraham Nunez Bernal, who was burned alive at the stake in Cordoba. His brother and family fled in horror of the Spanish Inquisition to Holland and then to England. Bernal’s family acquired great estates in the West Indies, and distinguished themselves in many intellectual and commercial pursuits before settling down in county Limerick in Ireland. There are hundreds and probably thousands of others extraordinary people like Bernal, whose Jewish history and ancestry has been entirely obscured and effaced. They too, are part of the diaspora civilization that Ferdinand Braudel alludes to. They too must be remembered and brought within the ken of the true history and contributions of the Jewish people.
* Dedicated to the memory of 20 year-old frontline commander Yannai Kaminka, who lost his life on October 7th, 2023, while battling Hamas at the Zikim Base. His actions resulted in the saving of the lives of many individuals in his unit. May he never be forgotten and may his memory be a blessing.
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