denizsi said:
That is the purpose imposed on colony, for maintaining and transfering knowledge and skills of a specific branch you never got to choose. Is there space fo change without jeopardising the colony economy?
No. It can't be.
As for that purpose being higher than yours or mine; that's highly subjective.
Maybe. So, what's your purpose in life? Other than trying to make a buck (or a lira), getting married, having sex and kids, building up a lovely nest, and dying in a very confused "what the fuck was all this hassle about?" state of mind.
You may not have a personal fulfillment within your career...
I do. I have a personal fulfillment when I deposit my paycheque.
I can't say that I hate my job; I don't. I just don't see it as something that has a lot of Purpose (yes, with a capital P). I'm not sure if saving lives in a hospital or developing technologies of the future (like xbox 3!) come with extra Purpose, but I'm not really good at either of these things, so...
... but you can take risks by changing that without affecting anyone else outside your family (such as AoD being your wishful foray into game industry).
That's what I'm working on at the moment, but I'm not sure that making games could be described as "life with Purpose".
100 farmers out of 1000 deciding to "quit" and do something else is a big change for colony economy.
That's what heavy policing is for.
Implants? Brain control? Pre-birth genetic modification to determine and control who will do what best (and perhaps even enjoy it)? Totalitarian (and perhps fascist) technocracy? Deception of living environment (think Logan's Run, or The Island)? Forced fertilization (though this has to be in because you mentioned professions survived by offspring, so there has to be a way to make sure there will be an offspring in the first place, without risking it by couples who decide that they don't want to have a child) or even a whole sect of women used only for births like hatching-machines so a constant and controlled reproduction is maintained?
Too much. I see it more as an idealistic venture going wrong. Again, think Russian communism. A bunch of idealistic people decided to establish a new society where people are free, equal, and happy. Naturally they thought the future generations will share their enthusiasm and views, but they didn't. 70 years later the massive colossus collapsed and died. Why? The people factor (despite all the totalitarism and government control).
Exactly. The project is to transpot a huge amount human race and knowledge in a space ship to a far away spot which will take several generations until the ride is over. So, whoever or whatever society has come up with this project with a designated destination (and not just a "let's hope we will find a habitable planet") in the first place, must have some damn good reason for doing this and with so many things having been set in motion, anyone who would lend the fate of these 100.000 people on those people themselves has to be a moron because there are innumerable amount of things that could go wrong.
Sure. The war in Iraq? Bush had a plan to go in and ... that was pretty much it. Or the retarded Prohibition in US:
“National prohibition of alcohol -- the ‘noble experiment’ -- was undertaken to reduce crime and corruption, solve social problems, reduce the tax burden created by prisons and poorhouses, and improve health and hygiene in Americaâ€
Needless to say, the exact opposite was achieved. In other words:
...anyone who would lend the fate of these 100.000 people on those people themselves has to be a moron because there are innumerable amount of things that could go wrong
Welcome to Earth!
Many people will simply break down like you said. That's one of the most obvious, foreseeable problems.
Yet people running/participating in such projects tend to be very idealistic. As for foreseeable problems... take Interplay for example (I was going to throw some work examples of some really dumb shit at you, but let's talk about a subject that's familiar to all). Does any of what happened to the company make sense? Cancelling two almost ready cash cows: BG3 and FO3, killing BIS, the only profitable department, deciding not to renew the BG license, focusing on shitty consoles games (shitty means not heavy titles like Morrowind and KOTOR, but really crappy games like FOBOS, part1), etc. You may say "uh, dude, making games and sending colony ships to Alpha fucking Centauri are totally different things". Sure, but the common factor in both cases is human nature, which never seems to change. If people are involved, fuck ups are guaranteed, but rarely foreseen, because statistically people in charge are morons.
Sending all these people to space for generations, knowing it will cause problems and still giving control to people does not compute.
Does what's happening in Iraq compute to you? There you go.