Well, honestly during the trip I don't see myself being of much use. I like to gain an understanding of new information, being one of the people to say "it works this way", so if anything new comes up during the trip I would want to look into it and explain it. Ideally whatever I research would have practical applications later on, and instead stopping at just figuring new information out I would move on to putting it to real-world use. Maybe after landing the colony would run across a ton of new things, and I'd have a mindgasm thinking of ways to make use of it.Originally Posted by sigma
I'd have no problem using what I already know to create a stable living environment, or whatever else needs to be done. Say there isn't enough oxygen present in the atmosphere to support human life (or whatever else we brought with us). I'd be happy to use existing knowledge to solve the issue, it makes sense to use what we already know instead of looking for something new, since you kind of need oxygen NOW to survive. Huge plus if there is some new material is found later that you can either extract oxygen from or use as a mechanism of creating some.
This could probably explain why I picked engineering as a major. I could do math or science, but the whole time I'd be either writing proofs (AAAAAARGH! HATE!) or doing overly abstract research without ever making something at least semi-tangible out of what I learn. I'm good at these things, but making something out of it is sort of a validation of what I know. Its like "See, its not all just numerically sound bullshit. It WORKS!"
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