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Space-based astronomy is the future, and lowered launch costs should contribute towards that.

• ISL 6y ago
  Lowered launch costs can't compare with the expedience of ground-based experiments. Some things work really well in space, some do not. Low-cost launch will revolutionize some experiments, but not all. Building radio experiments like SKA, big telescopes like TMT, or starting up innovative low-budget instruments like Dragonfly is still impossible with low-cost launch. In the latter case, until a graduate student with a screwdriver can make daily adjustments to an on-orbit instrument, we will lose the earliest-stage R&D capability. Finally, it is essential for our future generations to see a dark and unfettered sky with the human eyeball. That perpetual perspective, for 7,500,000,000 people, is inaccessible with launch vehicles.