6 ms·

It's not clear for me how important gateway is. Many critics say it's not needed for lunar or Mars missions. It means just using more fuel to get there. There

by nabla9 6y ago

It's not clear for me how important gateway is. Many critics say it's not needed for lunar or Mars missions. It means just using more fuel to get there. There may be some advantages, like re-use ascent modules and risk reduction for lunar missions.

manderley 6y ago
The next question is: Are manned lunar and mars missions useful in any way? No.
- larkeith 6y ago
  In the long term, they're pretty much the most important missions possible - even absent disasters, Earth only has so many resources, so designing and testing the technology for extraterrestrial habitation is rather essential. Admittedly, there are alternatives to manned colonialization (e.g. seeding), but it seems rather worth exploring multiple options, considering the stakes.
  - pfdietz 6y ago
    Just because something is valuable in the long term doesn't mean it's justifiable in the short term. Perhaps the route to colonizing Mars is to develop technologies that have nothing to do with going into space right now.
    - manderley 6y ago
      Long-term, there's no solution at all. In the short-term, it's a waste of resources that could be put to better use.
      - gpanders 6y ago
        From Wikipedia: > NASA's budget for fiscal year (FY) 2020 is $22.6 billion. It represents 0.48% of the $4.7 trillion the United States plans to spend in the fiscal year. NASA uses less than half of 1 percent of the federal budget. If you care so much about budget waste, there are a myriad of other places you could complain about (how about defense or healthcare spending?) The practical benefits of NASA's science and engineering efforts have been laid out many times in many different places. There are also less practical benefits; for example, how can you quantify the impact that the Blue Marble photo had on the environmental movement? That was only possible because we put someone on the Moon. Curmudgeons like you will always be around, and those of us who enjoy seeing humanity push itself and accomplish incredible things are happy to ignore you :)
    - blackrock 6y ago
      Perhaps we can focus on quantum teleportation instead? Solve that first, and then we can easily quantum teleport ourselves to anywhere in the solar system. Then reconstitute ourselves at the destination point. And hopefully your device didn’t make a quantum error during the rematerialization process. You’d have to send the complement quantum teleportation receiver device to Mars, and set it up there first. Then the device would have to rematerialize you back into fleshy form from pure quantum information residing in your quantum storage buffer. Oh and make sure that a fly doesn’t enter the quantum teleportation device with you, as you initially get quantum scanned and dematerialized from Earth. And you must enter the quantum teleportation device without any extra external clothing on. Since version 1 of the device has difficulty differentiating between organic and inorganic materials.
      - Seb-C 6y ago
        I think the other way around: we don't have the knowledge or technology to even make a reasonably feasible teleportation theory. Once we colonize the solar system, the next frontier to explore will be interstellar travel. I think research on faster than light travel will be what brings teleportation to us rather than the other way around.
        blackrock 6y ago
        So.. invent faster than light travel, go to a distant planet rotating around a distant star, to find a bunch of friendly advanced aliens, that will bequeath us some advanced teleportation technology?
        pfdietz 6y ago
        I see no reason to think FTL will ever be possible. That FTL is a trope in SF stories doesn't meant it's an aspect of the reality, it just means that it enables one to write more interesting stories.
        Seb-C 6y ago
        With our current knowledge and technology, you are right, but nobody knows what we might discover in the future. Even if FTL were indeed impossible, I think pursuing it would bring interesting discoveries and technologies.
  - manderley 6y ago
    Long-term, humanity will die. That's the reality of the situation, we'll never travel beyond our small solar system, even. We can't technology our way out of fundamental physics problems.
    - s1artibartfast 6y ago
      Yes, the universe will ultimately end, but there is no reason to believe that travel beyond our solar system is impossible. We have the technology to do it now, but it would be a suicide mission.
    - Teever 6y ago
      Well with that mentality why don't we just give up all human endeavours and let entropy wash over us?
    - sleepy_keita 6y ago
      It is technically possible to travel beyond our solar system with current technology. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Orion_(nuclear_propulsion) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Orion_(nuclear_propuls...
- aardvarkr 6y ago
  Useful for human life on earth? Yes, through scientific advancements similar to what happened with the Apollo missions. Useful for human life on any other celestial body? Absolutely critical
manicdee 6y ago
Gateway makes heaps of sense in a reusable spacecraft future. You have vehicles specialised for certain tasks such as ferrying crew from Earth to Lunar orbit and back, and specialised vehicles for landing crew and cargo on the surface. Starship is trying to be launch vehicle, cruise stage, landing/ascent vehicle and reentry vehicle all in one and has to make huge sacrifices in terms of payload capacity and delta-v to achieve that. Starship can land on the Moon and return, but it needs a fleet of tankers to refuel it for each trip. A specialised crew transfer vessel (no heat shield, no aero surfaces, no landing legs) would be able to head directly from LEO to LLO and transfer crew without having to be refuelled in a highly elliptical orbit around Earth first. Using Starship to get from Earth to the Moon is like using a Ram 3500 to pick up groceries from the corner store.
- skissane 6y ago
  > Starship can land on the Moon and return, but it needs a fleet of tankers to refuel it for each trip. A specialised crew transfer vessel (no heat shield, no aero surfaces, no landing legs) would be able to head directly from LEO to LLO and transfer crew without having to be refuelled in a highly elliptical orbit around Earth first SpaceX is already talking about a few different variants of Starship (Crew, Cargo, Tanker, Lunar Landing). There's no reason why they couldn't come up with a special "Lunar Transfer Starship" variant to meet the use case you describe
  - manicdee 6y ago
    I'm sure they will, especially if they ever get to research nuclear thermal propulsion. For the meantime that Lunar transfer ship is Orion with a small boost stage.

by nabla9 6y ago

manderley 6y ago

The next question is: Are manned lunar and mars missions useful in any way? No.

larkeith 6y ago
In the long term, they're pretty much the most important missions possible - even absent disasters, Earth only has so many resources, so designing and testing the technology for extraterrestrial habitation is rather essential. Admittedly, there are alternatives to manned colonialization (e.g. seeding), but it seems rather worth exploring multiple options, considering the stakes.
- pfdietz 6y ago
  Just because something is valuable in the long term doesn't mean it's justifiable in the short term. Perhaps the route to colonizing Mars is to develop technologies that have nothing to do with going into space right now.
  - manderley 6y ago
    Long-term, there's no solution at all. In the short-term, it's a waste of resources that could be put to better use.
    - gpanders 6y ago
      From Wikipedia: > NASA's budget for fiscal year (FY) 2020 is $22.6 billion. It represents 0.48% of the $4.7 trillion the United States plans to spend in the fiscal year. NASA uses less than half of 1 percent of the federal budget. If you care so much about budget waste, there are a myriad of other places you could complain about (how about defense or healthcare spending?) The practical benefits of NASA's science and engineering efforts have been laid out many times in many different places. There are also less practical benefits; for example, how can you quantify the impact that the Blue Marble photo had on the environmental movement? That was only possible because we put someone on the Moon. Curmudgeons like you will always be around, and those of us who enjoy seeing humanity push itself and accomplish incredible things are happy to ignore you :)
  - blackrock 6y ago
    Perhaps we can focus on quantum teleportation instead? Solve that first, and then we can easily quantum teleport ourselves to anywhere in the solar system. Then reconstitute ourselves at the destination point. And hopefully your device didn’t make a quantum error during the rematerialization process. You’d have to send the complement quantum teleportation receiver device to Mars, and set it up there first. Then the device would have to rematerialize you back into fleshy form from pure quantum information residing in your quantum storage buffer. Oh and make sure that a fly doesn’t enter the quantum teleportation device with you, as you initially get quantum scanned and dematerialized from Earth. And you must enter the quantum teleportation device without any extra external clothing on. Since version 1 of the device has difficulty differentiating between organic and inorganic materials.
    - Seb-C 6y ago
      I think the other way around: we don't have the knowledge or technology to even make a reasonably feasible teleportation theory. Once we colonize the solar system, the next frontier to explore will be interstellar travel. I think research on faster than light travel will be what brings teleportation to us rather than the other way around.
      - blackrock 6y ago
        So.. invent faster than light travel, go to a distant planet rotating around a distant star, to find a bunch of friendly advanced aliens, that will bequeath us some advanced teleportation technology?
      - pfdietz 6y ago
        I see no reason to think FTL will ever be possible. That FTL is a trope in SF stories doesn't meant it's an aspect of the reality, it just means that it enables one to write more interesting stories.
        Seb-C 6y ago
        With our current knowledge and technology, you are right, but nobody knows what we might discover in the future. Even if FTL were indeed impossible, I think pursuing it would bring interesting discoveries and technologies.
- manderley 6y ago
  Long-term, humanity will die. That's the reality of the situation, we'll never travel beyond our small solar system, even. We can't technology our way out of fundamental physics problems.
  - s1artibartfast 6y ago
    Yes, the universe will ultimately end, but there is no reason to believe that travel beyond our solar system is impossible. We have the technology to do it now, but it would be a suicide mission.
  - Teever 6y ago
    Well with that mentality why don't we just give up all human endeavours and let entropy wash over us?
  - sleepy_keita 6y ago
    It is technically possible to travel beyond our solar system with current technology. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Orion_(nuclear_propulsion) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Orion_(nuclear_propuls...
aardvarkr 6y ago
Useful for human life on earth? Yes, through scientific advancements similar to what happened with the Apollo missions. Useful for human life on any other celestial body? Absolutely critical

manicdee 6y ago

Gateway makes heaps of sense in a reusable spacecraft future. You have vehicles specialised for certain tasks such as ferrying crew from Earth to Lunar orbit and back, and specialised vehicles for landing crew and cargo on the surface. Starship is trying to be launch vehicle, cruise stage, landing/ascent vehicle and reentry vehicle all in one and has to make huge sacrifices in terms of payload capacity and delta-v to achieve that. Starship can land on the Moon and return, but it needs a fleet of tankers to refuel it for each trip. A specialised crew transfer vessel (no heat shield, no aero surfaces, no landing legs) would be able to head directly from LEO to LLO and transfer crew without having to be refuelled in a highly elliptical orbit around Earth first. Using Starship to get from Earth to the Moon is like using a Ram 3500 to pick up groceries from the corner store.

skissane 6y ago
> Starship can land on the Moon and return, but it needs a fleet of tankers to refuel it for each trip. A specialised crew transfer vessel (no heat shield, no aero surfaces, no landing legs) would be able to head directly from LEO to LLO and transfer crew without having to be refuelled in a highly elliptical orbit around Earth first SpaceX is already talking about a few different variants of Starship (Crew, Cargo, Tanker, Lunar Landing). There's no reason why they couldn't come up with a special "Lunar Transfer Starship" variant to meet the use case you describe
- manicdee 6y ago
  I'm sure they will, especially if they ever get to research nuclear thermal propulsion. For the meantime that Lunar transfer ship is Orion with a small boost stage.