u/IsaacArthur

How big could human civilization become? From trillion-person worlds to Dyson swarms, galaxy-spanning cultures, and digital minds, we explore just how far humanity could scale.

Why build floating cities above Jupiter and Saturn? Not for fusion fuel, but for something far more valuable: the staggering amounts of hydrogen, nitrogen, and raw material needed to build a spacefaring civilization.

If we could build a space elevator tomorrow, where should it go? Earth may be the obvious answer, but the Moon, Mars, and other worlds may be far easier. We compare the best candidates.

Ion drives are slow, quiet, and astonishingly efficient. From asteroid freighters and Mars cargo ships to the infrastructure behind future starships, these patient engines may help build civilization across the Solar System.

For 72 seconds, the universe seemed to answer SETI. The Wow! Signal was strong, narrowband, and strangely convincing... but it never came back. So what actually happened in 1977?

From company towns in orbit to corporate empires among the stars, could megacorporations build the space frontier... or end up owning the air, the docks, and the only ride home?

What happens when a colony ship’s children inherit a mission they never chose? We explore the values, conflicts, and founding myths that shape civilizations born between Earth and the stars.

Build a world small enough to circle in a day—or vast enough to house a galaxy. This grand tour explores the strangest space habitats possible under known physics.

We've been running SFIA episode polls on YouTube for years, but that means we're mostly hearing from one part of the community. Starting with this poll, I'm going to begin posting them here on Reddit, Discord, and elsewhere too, with new artwork for every option.

Vote for whichever topic you'd most like to see become a full SFIA episode. I'm also curious whether different parts of the SFIA community end up choosing differently.

Curious what each episode would actually cover?

The Hubble Tension: Is Our Universe Expanding Wrong?

Different methods of measuring the Universe's expansion rate produce conflicting answers. Is there an unnoticed error, or could the disagreement reveal physics beyond our current models?

Is Spacetime Made of Something?

Space and time may not be the deepest layer of reality. Could spacetime emerge from quantum information, entanglement, or some more fundamental structure?

What Is the Shape of the Universe?

Is the cosmos infinite, curved, flat, or connected back upon itself? Could traveling far enough in one direction eventually return you to where you began?

Why Does Matter Exist?

The early Universe should have produced matter and antimatter in nearly equal amounts. Why did enough matter survive to form galaxies, stars, planets, and us?

This is the first time we're trying the new poll format here, so feedback on the artwork, readability, and presentation is very welcome too.

View Poll