The tree · Regime · Happens to the world · Plays out over the whole window
An off-Earth site accepts people as permanent residents
What separates living off Earth (the A3 tier) from working there on rotation (A2). Early settlements may be work camps by policy for decades, with every person on a return schedule, even after the biology allows staying. The node resolves when some site publishes a resident status that lets a person stay indefinitely by choice, and someone has actually lived there under it for years. Choosing to stay is my decision, not the world's, and belongs with the choice points once the access branch firms up.
The test: what counts as it having happened
Under a published resident status at an off-Earth site that permits voluntary indefinite residence, at least one person has lived there continuously for three years holding that status, without a mandatory rotation date and not because departure was delayed or impossible, confirmed by the operator or governing body.
Settled by: The site's published residence terms and the operator's or governing body's record
The odds, by how long I live
| baselineto 2071 ± 8 | moderateto 2080 | strongto 2095 | radicalto 2136 | openno deadline |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 60% | 70% | 82% | 92% | 95% |
Each column is a different guess at how long I live, from current trends (baseline) to open-ended. The number is the chance this happens before that deadline, assuming everything it depends on happens first. As of September 19th, 2026.
Why these numbers: Once the biology allows it, the rule is a liability and policy question, and one permissive site anywhere resolves it; work-camp terms at every operator at once are less likely to persist for decades than the first estimate assumed.
What this one is worth
Nothing. The headline number does not rest on this step at any remove, so however it turns out, the chance that I live and work off Earth does not change. That is not a judgement that it does not matter. It is what the tree says: this step feeds a tier above the one the headline asks about, or sits beside the equation rather than in it.
What the ledger says about this step
- An off-Earth site accepting permanent residents was raised: one permissive site anywhere resolves it 2026-09-20 Changed my mind
The last 3 checks
Once a week the tree is read against the news, node by node, against the test above. Open a line to see what that week held. Every check ever made on this node is on the Radar page.
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2026-11-01 Nothing new
No published resident status at any off-Earth site was found, only proposals, academic governance work and reports of lunar settlement intentions.
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2026-10-04 Nothing new
No off-Earth site has published a permanent resident status; results were only academic discussion and ISS crew news.
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2026-09-19 Nothing new
No off-Earth site has any resident yet; the coverage found, NASA's 2030s moon base plan, SpaceX's stated ten-year lunar-city ambition, and Mars sustained-presence projections for the 2030s, is forward-looking intent, not an actual residency event.
Revisions
| Date | Field | From | To | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-09-19 | resolution | 'with no scheduled return to Earth', which proves a negative and could describe stranded crew | a published resident status that permits voluntary indefinite residence, held by at least one person living there continuously for three years | Step 27 outside-model review, items 24 and 86 (docs/reviews/2026-09-19-rulings.md): a positive status test in place of a negative, with 'voluntary' ruling out the stranded case; the name loses 'with no return scheduled' to match. Decided September 19th, 2026. |
| 2026-09-19 | probability | 0.50 / 0.60 / 0.75 / 0.90 / 0.93 | 0.60 / 0.70 / 0.82 / 0.92 / 0.95 | Step 27 outside-model review, item 87 (docs/reviews/2026-09-19-rulings.md): the first rationale was a claim about every operator at once, and one permissive site resolves the node; moved partway. Gates A3 only. Decided September 19th, 2026. |
Notes
Added September 8th, 2026 (agreed by me) so that A3 has a node distinguishing it from A2. Placed under regime because permanent residence is a rule somebody sets, not a technology.
Think this estimate is wrong?
Here's how to tell me, and
what happens next.
The record itself is data/R-regime.toml in the public repository.