You are exactly the kind of parent I had the most trouble with during my years coaching, convinced they know it all and who kept their kids from putting in the time and commitment necessary to do high level gymnastics.  Fortunately, there were enough around without that kind of god complex who gave their kids the latitude to choose how much time they wanted to put in and supported them in their choices.  The control freak parents would always pitch out the argument "She's only 10!  She's not old enough to decide to spend 30 hours a week in the gym!"   Blah blah blah, I heard that shit a million times.

Far as your paranoia regarding a Goobernmint conspiracy, I didn't posit this as a Goobermint project, it was how I would spend my money if I had as much as Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos instead of building rockets and going to try setting up a colony on Mars..  Of course the whole thing could be corrupted and sabotaged, but I hardly think you will be left alone to brain raccoons in WV either.  At least the bubble towns are out in international waters and would be pretty hard to get to.

Sorry I didn't grow up with your character building history of going to bed hungry on the nights you couldn't find a raccoon to brain and boil up into granma's secret recipe raccoon stew.  I still don't see this as a prerequisite for living in a floating egg the size of a couple of nuclear powered aircraft carriers and submarines though.

The fact you wouldn't try such an adventure isn't of much matter, since you wouldn't pass the psych eval anyhow.  You don't have the mindset for it.

It's not a whole lot different than the polynesians on Rapa'Nui (Easter Island) who died off leaving only a few monolithic statues behind.  These were the folks who waited too long until all the trees they built their sailing canoes from were gone and they couldn't get off the island when the resources ran out and they starved.    The ones who did survive were the ones who took the last few trees early on and took off into the unknown and a few of the lucky ones found the Big Island of Hawai'i.

On their cat rigged sailing canoes they took along pigs and chickens to breed if they found land and as much food and fresh water as they could fit for the journey.  They didn't know where they were going, only where they had been and how many days it had taken to get there.  Every trip had a point of no return, which once past they could not go back. I'm sure many of them never made landfall and died at sea, but at least one made it to Hawai'i, a whole lot better island than Rapa'nui.

I look at the floating town idea as a modernized version of those seagoing catamarans.  They have to last long enough that the people who stayed behind on land mostly kill each other off and the land and wildlife gradually recovers.  Maybe a century or two.  Since there are no Hawaiis left to sail to now, your point of no return is measured by time, not distance, so you have to last a long time.  A little sailboat just won't cut it, nor will a small group of people.  So you gotta build big.  Like a space station or one of those intergalactic spaceships, just built here on earth.  At least we have an atmosphere and liquid water on this rock.

Anyhow, I wish you good luck in your raccoon hunting.  All that practice with your Louisville Slugger will finally pay off! 

RE