I assume they meant that if you were to double the diameter of the balloon, it w... | Hacker News

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Tossrock on Feb 2, 2015 | parent | context | favorite | on: Why We Should Build Cloud Cities on Venus

I assume they meant that if you were to double the diameter of the balloon, it would be a superlinear increase in lifting capacity (since volume is cubic in radius). However, it wouldn't actually be exponential, and two balloons added together definitely does not equal more than the sum of their individual lift capacity.

jackcarter on Feb 3, 2015 | [–]

To be precise, it's 8x the lifting capacity (=2^3), which would be 5.6 million tons, or "nearly 6 million".

kissickas on Feb 3, 2015 | [–]

OK, so just the journalist misunderstood then? Because doubling the diameter is in no way compatible with "add a second balloon."

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