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NASA's "bold bet" is also an insurance policy on the fact that SpaceX might have just built this Moon landing Starship version on its own and get back to the mo
by njarboe 6y ago
NASA's "bold bet" is also an insurance policy on the fact that SpaceX might have just built this Moon landing Starship version on its own and get back to the moon first. Especially if it got a large private backer, like Yusaku Maezawa is backing the dearMoon project. NASA's relevancy would definitely take a hit if that happened, so funding it themselves is a good idea. I don't see the other two bids getting private funding to go forward without NASA support.
- eloff 6y agoImagine in an alternate universe where they decided to back an SLS type program over SpaceX, perhaps due to corruption of some sort. In that case, there's probably better than 10-1 odds that SpaceX would have beat them there for a fraction of the price. They would have looked stupid and been the laughing stock of the country. Future budgets would have been seriously cut. They made the smart decision here to back SpaceX. Love or hate Elon Musk, his companies get results in an incredible fashion. So far everyone betting against them has got horribly burned. They are excellent examples of American ingenuity and enterprise.
- merpnderp 6y agoThey already look stupid for being part of SLS and having prominent admins say things like landing a rocket isn't that hard and NASA could have done it in the 80's if they'd wanted to, or the Space Shuttle which was a massive downgrade from the Saturn series.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- inglor_cz 6y agoWell, this guy finally considers himself too old to run for re-election again: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Shelby https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Shelby SLS had a big fan in him, and he used to punch above his weight in space matters.
- yummypaint 6y agoGoing to the moon is not a good value proposition as far as science per dollar. SpaceX and other players only care about supporting science to the extent it makes them money. In my opinion NASA never had the budget for a moon mission anyway. Scrapping space telescopes and other far more useful instruments to pull a publicity stunt would be irresponsible. NASA is still the only party willing to support the less glamorous but more important work. This division of labor is good. Companies can do things that make good marketing material and NASA can continue managing the science that motivates the entire excercise in the first place.
- bpodgursky 6y agoThe goal of NASA, or spaceflight at all, has never been to maximize science per dollar. That is a new invented benchmark. The goal was, and IMO still is, to put ourselves in space.
- Diederich 6y agoScience/$ is something of a "new invented benchmark", but I think it's useful to a point. I fully agree that "put ourselves in space" was the prime driver for NASA up through Apollo, and has certainly played a role since, but NASA as a driver of scientific discovery has become, I think, the main NASA thing.
- mlindner 6y ago"Science" isn't even a fungible unit, so you can't even say "science/$". Even a specific type of science, say "Earth Science", isn't even a fungible unit. So it doesn't make much sense to talk about "Science/$".
- yummypaint 6y agoThis can be true when trying to compare science A against science B. However, there is no controversy when comparing a program designed to deliver an instrument package with one designed to build a brand. Also, there are frameworks for evaluating science output per dollar. This is what funding agencies do when creating and managing grants. There is alot of subjectivity involved which is why DOE program managers, for example, are pulled from practicing experts in the relevant field and tend not to serve very long in those positions before circulating back.