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The only thing that kind of annoys me in the back of my mind, is that these guys are aiming to save humanity, but the average Facebook engineer figuring out how

The only thing that kind of annoys me in the back of my mind, is that these guys are aiming to save humanity, but the average Facebook engineer figuring out how exploit users better is probably being paid 2-3x as much as the average SpaceX aerospace engineer. But that's what the free market is rewarding right now.

SOLAR_FIELDS 8y ago
While I agree that less effort should be spent on what Facebook wants to achieve, there are way more engineers that would rather work on space stuff than positions so of course they are going to pay less. So the market is functioning as it should.
- icebraining 8y ago
  "Should" is a subjective moral/ethical evaluation. The market is just functioning as predicted (which is still nice).
ekianjo 8y ago
do you have any source for spacex engineers salaries vs Facebook ones?
nightski 8y ago
Save humanity? From what global warming? Global warming is nothing compared to Mars. If we can terraform mars into a beautiful landscape then climate change isn't really an issue on earth... Going to Mars for scientific research would be an incredible step forward for man kind. But the feasibility of space still holds a lot in question. It is exciting, but let's not call it "saving humanity".
- Zanni 8y ago
  Save humanity from an extinction level event. Think asteroid impact or global nuclear war rather than climate change. Musk has been pretty explicit about his intention to make humanity a multi-planetary species. [0] [0] https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/full/10.1089/space.2017.29009.emu https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/full/10.1089/space.2017.29009...
  - icebraining 8y ago
    What nightski is saying is that achieving a truly independent colony on Mars, which can survive the destruction of Earth, is much harder than just putting people there.
- foota 8y ago
  Mars might an interesting playground for testing climate engineering, since it'd be hard to mess it up more than it is now. That said though, it's hard to imagine fixing things like the lack of atmosphere without a lot of investment.

SOLAR_FIELDS 8y ago

While I agree that less effort should be spent on what Facebook wants to achieve, there are way more engineers that would rather work on space stuff than positions so of course they are going to pay less. So the market is functioning as it should.

icebraining 8y ago
"Should" is a subjective moral/ethical evaluation. The market is just functioning as predicted (which is still nice).

ekianjo 8y ago

do you have any source for spacex engineers salaries vs Facebook ones?

nightski 8y ago

Save humanity? From what global warming? Global warming is nothing compared to Mars. If we can terraform mars into a beautiful landscape then climate change isn't really an issue on earth... Going to Mars for scientific research would be an incredible step forward for man kind. But the feasibility of space still holds a lot in question. It is exciting, but let's not call it "saving humanity".

Zanni 8y ago
Save humanity from an extinction level event. Think asteroid impact or global nuclear war rather than climate change. Musk has been pretty explicit about his intention to make humanity a multi-planetary species. [0] [0] https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/full/10.1089/space.2017.29009.emu https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/full/10.1089/space.2017.29009...
- icebraining 8y ago
  What nightski is saying is that achieving a truly independent colony on Mars, which can survive the destruction of Earth, is much harder than just putting people there.
foota 8y ago
Mars might an interesting playground for testing climate engineering, since it'd be hard to mess it up more than it is now. That said though, it's hard to imagine fixing things like the lack of atmosphere without a lot of investment.