Hello, SFIA audio listeners. In this month's Nebula exclusive, big alien theory,

we're asked at the reason alien civilizations might be rare is because most aliens are huge.

To hear it and every episode early and ad-free, plus hours of bonus content,

check out go.nebola.tv slash Isaac Arthur and use my code, Isaac Arthur.

We so often hear of my nastero asteroids, but the moon outmasses every known asteroid

combined dozens of times over again, and is closer to Earth too.

So what would life be like mining on the moon?

Yeah. like Mining on the Moon. Luis and Clark are twins that have the dubious honor of being amongst the first 10 kids ever born on the moon,

and the first twins, and while they've been off the moon into space, they've never been

to Earth and find the idea of trying to live in its gravity a bit intimidating. But a trip

there is on their bucket list for whenever they make the big find, the one that in theory

lets them retire, but in practice would probably just be used to buy new gear because they love their

work.

They spent a lot of time driving around in the Louisiana, which more resembles a freight

truck or a recreational vehicle than a dune buggy, but they got one of those too, which they

carry along.

Both are battery powered and they have a lot of solar panels they can unroll at their base camp

as awnings and walls to protect them from the dust and sunlight during the long lunar days.

They also have two 5 kilowatt radio-isot thermogeot thermo generators, each massing 50 kilograms

or 110 pounds of it were on Earth, as much as Luis would weigh.

These are backpack carryable units that they also use during the two weeks of darkness.

Their individual expeditions usually last two to three months, sometimes more, sometimes

...