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I think colonizing Mars is pretty small sink compared to climate change and many others. With how SpaceX going, I think for the first stage it's comparable to s

I think colonizing Mars is pretty small sink compared to climate change and many others. With how SpaceX going, I think for the first stage it's comparable to something like one modern Olympic games event cost.

bumby 6y ago
>first stage it's comparable to something like one modern Olympic games event cost. To continue on with the steelmanning, the first stage is probably a drop in a bucket compared to the entire effort. How much freight do you think it would take to colonize a planet with a population large enough to be relatively self-sufficient? Just the payload cost would be huge and that's just to park it (not to assemble, maintain etc.) I think the steelman argument would be to focus on things immediately needed, like healthcare, before space adventurism. Edit: to put a finer point on it, the commercial space industry is essentially subsidized by the government precisely because it's not currently economical. In other words, if the government wasn't a customer there would be no commercial space industry. There's nothing inherently wrong with this because it's how high-risk industries often get started (e.g., the airlines), but the fact that it is subsidized by the government points to the fact that it is (currently) inherently uneconomical
- derekp7 6y ago
  So if SpaceX shuts down their entire operations (and lets include all rocket companies), then that would completely fix health care and the climate crises? I'm not following the logic of how that would work. It is basically a larger version of the argument "Well, if you are so poor, why did you drink that cup of coffee this morning?"
  - bumby 6y ago
    >that would completely fix health care and the climate crises? At no point did I say it's a magic bullet that would "completely fix" any of that. But spending hundreds of millions directly on healthcare would likely pay more healthcare dividends than, say, some unintended materials science application that started in rocket engine development. How exactly do you think funding gets doled out? They aren't just given a blank check...Agencies request a certain amount, then as the sausage gets made on Capitol Hill, some programs are shaved, others are padded. The people in those discussions are bringing their priorities to the table and, in some cases, will have to make concessions like not having their metaphorical coffee in order to save a higher priority project.
  - eptcyka 6y ago
    I agree, spending more money on healthcare in the states would be fruitless, as the US already pays more per capita for healthcare than any other nation.
    - bumby 6y ago
      I'm not sure if this is meant to be snarky/sarcastic but do you understand some of the dynamics that bear this out? For example, the U.S. pays more than 40% (down from 50%) of the worlds medical R&D. They essentially subsidize healthcare for much of the rest of the world (meaning the U.S. bears more of the cost so other countries can have cheaper care). There's plenty wrong with the U.S. healthcare system that needs fixing, but trite sentences don't begin to capture the real nature of the problem.

bumby 6y ago

>first stage it's comparable to something like one modern Olympic games event cost. To continue on with the steelmanning, the first stage is probably a drop in a bucket compared to the entire effort. How much freight do you think it would take to colonize a planet with a population large enough to be relatively self-sufficient? Just the payload cost would be huge and that's just to park it (not to assemble, maintain etc.) I think the steelman argument would be to focus on things immediately needed, like healthcare, before space adventurism. Edit: to put a finer point on it, the commercial space industry is essentially subsidized by the government precisely because it's not currently economical. In other words, if the government wasn't a customer there would be no commercial space industry. There's nothing inherently wrong with this because it's how high-risk industries often get started (e.g., the airlines), but the fact that it is subsidized by the government points to the fact that it is (currently) inherently uneconomical

derekp7 6y ago
So if SpaceX shuts down their entire operations (and lets include all rocket companies), then that would completely fix health care and the climate crises? I'm not following the logic of how that would work. It is basically a larger version of the argument "Well, if you are so poor, why did you drink that cup of coffee this morning?"
- bumby 6y ago
  >that would completely fix health care and the climate crises? At no point did I say it's a magic bullet that would "completely fix" any of that. But spending hundreds of millions directly on healthcare would likely pay more healthcare dividends than, say, some unintended materials science application that started in rocket engine development. How exactly do you think funding gets doled out? They aren't just given a blank check...Agencies request a certain amount, then as the sausage gets made on Capitol Hill, some programs are shaved, others are padded. The people in those discussions are bringing their priorities to the table and, in some cases, will have to make concessions like not having their metaphorical coffee in order to save a higher priority project.
- eptcyka 6y ago
  I agree, spending more money on healthcare in the states would be fruitless, as the US already pays more per capita for healthcare than any other nation.
  - bumby 6y ago
    I'm not sure if this is meant to be snarky/sarcastic but do you understand some of the dynamics that bear this out? For example, the U.S. pays more than 40% (down from 50%) of the worlds medical R&D. They essentially subsidize healthcare for much of the rest of the world (meaning the U.S. bears more of the cost so other countries can have cheaper care). There's plenty wrong with the U.S. healthcare system that needs fixing, but trite sentences don't begin to capture the real nature of the problem.