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> We now have the capability to put up another ISS today, resupply it, and staff it, at a fraction of the cost, all with launch equipment made by a single compa

> We now have the capability to put up another ISS today, resupply it, and staff it, at a fraction of the cost, all with launch equipment made by a single company that started a decade ago. This is the part that's exciting for me. Whether it comes in the form of more space stations like the ISS or a much bigger and reinvigorated ISS, either way is a vital step in the right direction toward making humanity less beholden to a single planet. Lots of challenges still to come, but this is a reminder that those challenges can someday be overcome.

flingo 6y ago
AFAIK, the ISS needs to be de-orbited over an ocean, burned up, and replaced. (like the plan was from the beginning) There are a number of scary mould patches up there, and potentially other pathogens, with no real way to properly clean the whole thing.
toyg 6y ago
I love space exploration like the next guy, but I have a massive fear that a proliferation of space-stations will lead to unpleasant situations. With all its tensions, the ISS has been an amazing tool for soft diplomacy; if we start having country-specific stations we’ll soon end up with nasty arguments. Already we have competing satellites rumoured to have classified capabilities, I hate to think what they could do with manned stations. I guess it’s inevitable.
- bane 6y ago
  Your fears our valid, and something we have to learn to work through as a species.
- the_duke 6y ago
  China plans to launch the first part of their own space station next year. [1] They actually wanted to join the ISS effort, but were given a firm no and had no other option than to do pursue their own. [2] I don't think we will see any other country-specific stations for a long time, but modular commercial stations that can be shared for research and potential business endeavors (hotels, specialized manufacturing, ...). If efforts like SpaceX Starship actually succeed in very significantly lowering launch costs, that is. Right now it is simply not affordable either for nations or businesses. A single Starship would actually be a great temporary space station on it's own, comparable to the ISS in usable area. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_large_modular_space_station https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_large_modular_space_st... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_of_the_International_Space_Station#China https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_of_the_International_...
  - bane 6y ago
    Don't forget the Tiangong program [1], which resulted in this spectacular docking and entry [2] 1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiangong_program https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiangong_program 2 - https://youtu.be/rPqJyS26e60 https://youtu.be/rPqJyS26e60
  - fpoling 6y ago
    I read Russia considered to disconnect their module from ISS when the agreement about ISS expires.
- yellowapple 6y ago
  My hope would be that all (or at least most) such new space stations would be "international" space stations. Stations should be differentiated by purpose rather than nationality, I think. Space doesn't have borders. But yeah, this is definitely a reason why I hope we can keep the ISS going and just keep building on it. Additional space stations should be for good reason (for example: orbiting the moon, or - my crazy dream scenario - one orbiting in the past-GEO graveyard orbit to collect and refurbish dead satellites). That means we should allow China to participate in the ISS, too. There are some national security concerns, apparently, but we overcame those with the USSR/Russia, and China should be no different.
  - pfdietz 6y ago
    I wonder if the 3rd Amendment would prevent nationalization of US space stations.
    - yellowapple 6y ago
      I guess it depends on who owns it, and whether or not it counts as a private home (and to be clear, nationalization in and of itself wouldn't run afoul of it, since the amendment is limited in scope to quartering of troops in a private residence without the actual residents' consent). It'd get even fuzzier if different people "own" different modules (so the military could perhaps occupy some shared corridors, but if people have attached their own modules as homes, then those would be off-limits for quartering). Realistically, maritime law might be a better reference, given that space stations and other spaceships are informally (if not formally) referred to as "ships".
redis_mlc 6y ago
Almost no science is done on the ISS. Most of the time, energy and money spent on the ISS is to just keep the people alive. But HN is consistent in admiring rocket launches without considering how pointless they are. Bread and circuses. Nothing's changed since the gladiator days, have they?
- yellowapple 6y ago
  > Almost no science is done on the ISS. The very presence of people on the ISS is "science". The whole point of the ISS is to investigate the effects of long-term space habitation on humans. Plus, the ISS itself is an experiment, demonstrating the feasibility of in-orbit assembly of complex human-habitable structures from individually-launched-and-deployed modules (on a scale far greater than its predecessor Mir). There are even recent examples of this, like Bigelow Aerospace's module demonstrating the feasibility of inflatable space structures. On top of that, all sorts of other experiments take place on the ISS all the time. There is, mind you, a giant Wikipedia article listing the myriad of experiments done throughout the history of the ISS: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_research_on_the_International_Space_Station https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_research_on_the_Int... And SpaceX just brought back a bunch of samples from such experiments as recently as April: https://www.slashgear.com/spacexs-dragon-cargo-ship-returns-from-iss-with-science-experiments-07615904/ https://www.slashgear.com/spacexs-dragon-cargo-ship-returns-... Not sure where you get the impression that the ISS ain't doing much science, but it's pretty trivial to find a plethora of information indicating the exact opposite.
  - macintux 6y ago
    Could be worse, there was a flat earther commenting here about the fake SpaceX launch last week.
  - redis_mlc 6y ago
    No, the Hubble and WMAP are some of the most-cited experiments, and ISS the least. The ISS orbits at only 250 miles, barely into LEO. The wikipedia article has a long list of experiments, but the question is, "Do they actually contribute anything?" Can you name one scientific result from an ISS experiment? I can't. > the effects of long-term space habitation on humans. Humans aren't colonizing anything in space. You've read too many scifi books.

flingo 6y ago

AFAIK, the ISS needs to be de-orbited over an ocean, burned up, and replaced. (like the plan was from the beginning) There are a number of scary mould patches up there, and potentially other pathogens, with no real way to properly clean the whole thing.

toyg 6y ago

I love space exploration like the next guy, but I have a massive fear that a proliferation of space-stations will lead to unpleasant situations. With all its tensions, the ISS has been an amazing tool for soft diplomacy; if we start having country-specific stations we’ll soon end up with nasty arguments. Already we have competing satellites rumoured to have classified capabilities, I hate to think what they could do with manned stations. I guess it’s inevitable.

bane 6y ago
Your fears our valid, and something we have to learn to work through as a species.
the_duke 6y ago
China plans to launch the first part of their own space station next year. [1] They actually wanted to join the ISS effort, but were given a firm no and had no other option than to do pursue their own. [2] I don't think we will see any other country-specific stations for a long time, but modular commercial stations that can be shared for research and potential business endeavors (hotels, specialized manufacturing, ...). If efforts like SpaceX Starship actually succeed in very significantly lowering launch costs, that is. Right now it is simply not affordable either for nations or businesses. A single Starship would actually be a great temporary space station on it's own, comparable to the ISS in usable area. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_large_modular_space_station https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_large_modular_space_st... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_of_the_International_Space_Station#China https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_of_the_International_...
- bane 6y ago
  Don't forget the Tiangong program [1], which resulted in this spectacular docking and entry [2] 1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiangong_program https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiangong_program 2 - https://youtu.be/rPqJyS26e60 https://youtu.be/rPqJyS26e60
- fpoling 6y ago
  I read Russia considered to disconnect their module from ISS when the agreement about ISS expires.
yellowapple 6y ago
My hope would be that all (or at least most) such new space stations would be "international" space stations. Stations should be differentiated by purpose rather than nationality, I think. Space doesn't have borders. But yeah, this is definitely a reason why I hope we can keep the ISS going and just keep building on it. Additional space stations should be for good reason (for example: orbiting the moon, or - my crazy dream scenario - one orbiting in the past-GEO graveyard orbit to collect and refurbish dead satellites). That means we should allow China to participate in the ISS, too. There are some national security concerns, apparently, but we overcame those with the USSR/Russia, and China should be no different.
- pfdietz 6y ago
  I wonder if the 3rd Amendment would prevent nationalization of US space stations.
  - yellowapple 6y ago
    I guess it depends on who owns it, and whether or not it counts as a private home (and to be clear, nationalization in and of itself wouldn't run afoul of it, since the amendment is limited in scope to quartering of troops in a private residence without the actual residents' consent). It'd get even fuzzier if different people "own" different modules (so the military could perhaps occupy some shared corridors, but if people have attached their own modules as homes, then those would be off-limits for quartering). Realistically, maritime law might be a better reference, given that space stations and other spaceships are informally (if not formally) referred to as "ships".

redis_mlc 6y ago

Almost no science is done on the ISS. Most of the time, energy and money spent on the ISS is to just keep the people alive. But HN is consistent in admiring rocket launches without considering how pointless they are. Bread and circuses. Nothing's changed since the gladiator days, have they?

yellowapple 6y ago
> Almost no science is done on the ISS. The very presence of people on the ISS is "science". The whole point of the ISS is to investigate the effects of long-term space habitation on humans. Plus, the ISS itself is an experiment, demonstrating the feasibility of in-orbit assembly of complex human-habitable structures from individually-launched-and-deployed modules (on a scale far greater than its predecessor Mir). There are even recent examples of this, like Bigelow Aerospace's module demonstrating the feasibility of inflatable space structures. On top of that, all sorts of other experiments take place on the ISS all the time. There is, mind you, a giant Wikipedia article listing the myriad of experiments done throughout the history of the ISS: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_research_on_the_International_Space_Station https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_research_on_the_Int... And SpaceX just brought back a bunch of samples from such experiments as recently as April: https://www.slashgear.com/spacexs-dragon-cargo-ship-returns-from-iss-with-science-experiments-07615904/ https://www.slashgear.com/spacexs-dragon-cargo-ship-returns-... Not sure where you get the impression that the ISS ain't doing much science, but it's pretty trivial to find a plethora of information indicating the exact opposite.
- macintux 6y ago
  Could be worse, there was a flat earther commenting here about the fake SpaceX launch last week.
- redis_mlc 6y ago
  No, the Hubble and WMAP are some of the most-cited experiments, and ISS the least. The ISS orbits at only 250 miles, barely into LEO. The wikipedia article has a long list of experiments, but the question is, "Do they actually contribute anything?" Can you name one scientific result from an ISS experiment? I can't. > the effects of long-term space habitation on humans. Humans aren't colonizing anything in space. You've read too many scifi books.