A great essay by Charles Stross on the almost ungraspable scale of space and the size of the (unfriendly, uncaring, unaware) universe. Conclusion: we will not get out of the solar system in our current form or in any imaginable future. Bryson says that somewhere in his science book but Stross says it harder and does the numbers too. It reminds me of Ryman's mundane sf movement. Stross concludes with a nice dampener on humanity's self-assured moves towards crossing the void and a reminder of our overlooked limitations:

Colonize the Gobi desert, colonise the North Atlantic in winter — then get back to me about the rest of the solar system!

I just got back from Dubai, where the desert wants the land back but the people want golf courses and green spaces. It seems like a battlefield in the war on entropy but compared to colonizing Mars it is a minor skirmish.