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Another entry in the "generations ships are not the all-purpose answer early SF seemed to think they were" genre.
In this case, a flotilla of ships is sent for the sole purpose of investigating something anomalous around a distant star. Maybe it's a Dyson sphere in the process of being build? Anyway, the ships and crew are supposed to go out, investigate what's out there, and come back with the info. The elapsed time on earth will be a couple thousand years.
One interesting twist is that instead of relying on random human reproduction, the ship will be populated by clones. As one generation of clones approaches "retirement" (i.e., disposal) age, the generation of that clone line is activated and raised. The mission planners felt like they'd selected optimal gene lines, and just decided to keep them available.
The story is told episodically, at intervals of a couple hundred years, more or less. They find the star, learn what they can, and turn around to come back home, to a drastically changed earth. (Duh.) Along the way, there are the problems of big societies, just writ a little smaller due to the smaller number of clones.
It's an interesting perspective. It does seem strange to me to go that far, then turn around and come home to who-knows-what. Especially when the home planet stop responding/communicating after a few hundred years.
Not bad, some interesting ideas.
In this case, a flotilla of ships is sent for the sole purpose of investigating something anomalous around a distant star. Maybe it's a Dyson sphere in the process of being build? Anyway, the ships and crew are supposed to go out, investigate what's out there, and come back with the info. The elapsed time on earth will be a couple thousand years.
One interesting twist is that instead of relying on random human reproduction, the ship will be populated by clones. As one generation of clones approaches "retirement" (i.e., disposal) age, the generation of that clone line is activated and raised. The mission planners felt like they'd selected optimal gene lines, and just decided to keep them available.
The story is told episodically, at intervals of a couple hundred years, more or less. They find the star, learn what they can, and turn around to come back home, to a drastically changed earth. (Duh.) Along the way, there are the problems of big societies, just writ a little smaller due to the smaller number of clones.
It's an interesting perspective. It does seem strange to me to go that far, then turn around and come home to who-knows-what. Especially when the home planet stop responding/communicating after a few hundred years.
Not bad, some interesting ideas.