4 ms·

The article gets the numbers right but the human part absolutely wrong. I'd love it if humans were the kind of creatures that could make big advances by taking

by gary_0 4y ago

The article gets the numbers right but the human part absolutely wrong. I'd love it if humans were the kind of creatures that could make big advances by taking them one small boring step at a time with no unachievably ambitious end goal driving them forward, but that's absolutely not how it works. The first advances in science were made by people trying to get rich turning worthless metals into gold. A lot of computer science grunt-work in decades past was done by or funded by people who thought they could build C-3PO. Reasonable people who avoid likely financial ruin, who don't dream of building impossible machines or visiting other planets, simply don't take the risks needed to make actual technological leaps. Reasonable scientific goals that can't make headlines don't get billions from Congress. We're not capable of building Mars colonies any time soon, that's true, but who knows what we'll invent as we blunder our way in that direction nonetheless?

Bloodshot997 4y ago
[flagged]
eks391 4y ago
Love your perspective. It reminds me of the technological advances from the space race to the moon as well. We aren't taking casual trips up there ever, but the tech that came from it was revolutionary
- 8n4vidtmkvmk 4y ago
  i feel like this is all propaganda to convince tax payers to fund this stuff. it's like we never invented anything worthwhile at all if it wasn't used for war or space. maybe we should just try? try spending some money on good for a change and we'll see if good comes out of it.
  - moloch-hai 4y ago
    Displacing all coal- and oil-generated power with renewables in a short enough time to fend off climate catastrophe would be a good choice.
  - aa-jv 4y ago
    If it is propaganda, it is to detract from the fact that we could actually be on Mars already, if we hadn't spent a Trillion dollars a year bombing the shit out of everyone for the last two - or so - decades .. People tend to forget that we are still murdering each other over this planet. Getting to Mars would either be a solution to that problem, or just an extension. I guess, therefore, it matters who gets there first. (See also: Psyche 16)
  - TchoBeer 4y ago
    Yeah, the obvious reason why funding spaceflight yields useful technology is that we also fund e.g. laser technology. We can fund science research without also spending billions of dollars going to the moon.
    - m4rtink 4y ago
      But will the money actually go there ? The track record is not very good so far in this regard.
paulryanrogers 4y ago
The Apollo mission that reached the moon was preceded by very rational steps to get there, and get back. Prematurely shooting for Mars could literally bankrupt resources on Earth and still have worse odds than a more methodical approach.
- skissane 4y ago
  I doubt anyone is actually going to “shoot prematurely for the Mars”. I expect what SpaceX is going to do, is once they get Starship up and running, and tick off some intermediate goals such as Artemis III and DearMoon, they’ll start launching demo Mars missions-no crew, but demonstrating some of the technologies a crewed mission will need-and NASA will probably pay for some of it. And that’s likely to take a lot longer than all their optimistic estimates suggest. But they’ll continue to dangle those timelines in front of everybody to create buzz which increases the odds of Congress/NASA paying for some of it. SpaceX might be a bit less risk-averse than NASA, but no way are they sending humans (even privately) to Mars unless they have reasonable odds of surviving, and there is a lot of further technology development and demonstration required to have reasonable confidence in that.
  - 8n4vidtmkvmk 4y ago
    i think musk has basically said he doesn't mind risking/losing some lives. and people have volunteered. whether or not the world allows him to actually do that is another story though
    - skissane 4y ago
      Musk is prone to speak in a somewhat hyperbolic fashion, and may well be more risk-averse when it actually comes time to actually decide whether to put human lives at risk, than he is when talking about that decision as an abstract future. It also isn't entirely up to him–it is also what the rest of the SpaceX executive team feels comfortable with (especially Gwynne Shotwell), and also the comfort level of the regulators and lawyers. Even NASA "doesn't mind risking/losing some lives", in that while they drive the "probability of loss of crew" as low as feasible, they never can get it to zero. Possibly, a private SpaceX mission might have a higher go/no-go threshold for that probability – but if it adds up to (say) 50%, I really doubt they'll go ahead with the mission, they'll likely instead delay so they can invest further engineering resources in reducing it to a more reasonable level.
8note 4y ago
this seems likely to be ignorant of all the small steps needed in everything everywhere, to romanticize people that marketed themselves well.
runarberg 4y ago
> The first advances in science were made by people trying to get rich turning worthless metals into gold. And the planetary motions were discovered by somebody trying to prove that the 5 planets all fit inside a babushka doll of the 5 platonic solids. This says nothing of what would happen if these scientists had different creeds or different goals. Most scientific discoveries are indeed very boring. Vera Rubin discovered dark matter while trying study the rotation curves of spiral galaxies, a very simple and very down to earth goal that lead to a remarkable discovery. At the same time Jane Goodall’s big creed was that maybe it is OK to empathize with the individual animals you are studying. Grand goals are neither necessary nor sufficient for making scientific advancements. And while some goals might be useful, others are just as likely to be a major distraction. There is reason to believe that a human mars landing falls in the latter category.
cphajduk 4y ago
Actually - It doesn't get the numbers right either. If you look at the first reference, "[1]", the author says: "I’ll justify this figure in detail later on. For now, consider that each SLS launch costs $4.2B, and that developing just the Orion space capsule has cost $20B. The ISS, which is functionally close to a Mars transfer vehicle, has so far cost $250 billion." With absolutely no regard for the massive cost per kg to orbit improvement being achieved by new space companies (SpaceX, RocketLab, etc.) The author has cherry-picked his facts to fit his opinion.
beepbooptheory 4y ago
As long as people need to worry about things like their own financial ruin, need to worry about their investors each quarter, people aren't going farther than the earths orbit, and if they do, it will surely be a one way ticket to death. Doing it right now its like asking someone to play an impossible chess game where your side only has pawns and you lose $100 billion everytime one is taken.

by gary_0 4y ago

Bloodshot997 4y ago

[flagged]

eks391 4y ago

Love your perspective. It reminds me of the technological advances from the space race to the moon as well. We aren't taking casual trips up there ever, but the tech that came from it was revolutionary

8n4vidtmkvmk 4y ago
i feel like this is all propaganda to convince tax payers to fund this stuff. it's like we never invented anything worthwhile at all if it wasn't used for war or space. maybe we should just try? try spending some money on good for a change and we'll see if good comes out of it.
- moloch-hai 4y ago
  Displacing all coal- and oil-generated power with renewables in a short enough time to fend off climate catastrophe would be a good choice.
- aa-jv 4y ago
  If it is propaganda, it is to detract from the fact that we could actually be on Mars already, if we hadn't spent a Trillion dollars a year bombing the shit out of everyone for the last two - or so - decades .. People tend to forget that we are still murdering each other over this planet. Getting to Mars would either be a solution to that problem, or just an extension. I guess, therefore, it matters who gets there first. (See also: Psyche 16)
- TchoBeer 4y ago
  Yeah, the obvious reason why funding spaceflight yields useful technology is that we also fund e.g. laser technology. We can fund science research without also spending billions of dollars going to the moon.
  - m4rtink 4y ago
    But will the money actually go there ? The track record is not very good so far in this regard.

paulryanrogers 4y ago

The Apollo mission that reached the moon was preceded by very rational steps to get there, and get back. Prematurely shooting for Mars could literally bankrupt resources on Earth and still have worse odds than a more methodical approach.

skissane 4y ago
I doubt anyone is actually going to “shoot prematurely for the Mars”. I expect what SpaceX is going to do, is once they get Starship up and running, and tick off some intermediate goals such as Artemis III and DearMoon, they’ll start launching demo Mars missions-no crew, but demonstrating some of the technologies a crewed mission will need-and NASA will probably pay for some of it. And that’s likely to take a lot longer than all their optimistic estimates suggest. But they’ll continue to dangle those timelines in front of everybody to create buzz which increases the odds of Congress/NASA paying for some of it. SpaceX might be a bit less risk-averse than NASA, but no way are they sending humans (even privately) to Mars unless they have reasonable odds of surviving, and there is a lot of further technology development and demonstration required to have reasonable confidence in that.
- 8n4vidtmkvmk 4y ago
  i think musk has basically said he doesn't mind risking/losing some lives. and people have volunteered. whether or not the world allows him to actually do that is another story though
  - skissane 4y ago
    Musk is prone to speak in a somewhat hyperbolic fashion, and may well be more risk-averse when it actually comes time to actually decide whether to put human lives at risk, than he is when talking about that decision as an abstract future. It also isn't entirely up to him–it is also what the rest of the SpaceX executive team feels comfortable with (especially Gwynne Shotwell), and also the comfort level of the regulators and lawyers. Even NASA "doesn't mind risking/losing some lives", in that while they drive the "probability of loss of crew" as low as feasible, they never can get it to zero. Possibly, a private SpaceX mission might have a higher go/no-go threshold for that probability – but if it adds up to (say) 50%, I really doubt they'll go ahead with the mission, they'll likely instead delay so they can invest further engineering resources in reducing it to a more reasonable level.

8note 4y ago

this seems likely to be ignorant of all the small steps needed in everything everywhere, to romanticize people that marketed themselves well.

runarberg 4y ago

> The first advances in science were made by people trying to get rich turning worthless metals into gold. And the planetary motions were discovered by somebody trying to prove that the 5 planets all fit inside a babushka doll of the 5 platonic solids. This says nothing of what would happen if these scientists had different creeds or different goals. Most scientific discoveries are indeed very boring. Vera Rubin discovered dark matter while trying study the rotation curves of spiral galaxies, a very simple and very down to earth goal that lead to a remarkable discovery. At the same time Jane Goodall’s big creed was that maybe it is OK to empathize with the individual animals you are studying. Grand goals are neither necessary nor sufficient for making scientific advancements. And while some goals might be useful, others are just as likely to be a major distraction. There is reason to believe that a human mars landing falls in the latter category.

cphajduk 4y ago

Actually - It doesn't get the numbers right either. If you look at the first reference, "[1]", the author says: "I’ll justify this figure in detail later on. For now, consider that each SLS launch costs $4.2B, and that developing just the Orion space capsule has cost $20B. The ISS, which is functionally close to a Mars transfer vehicle, has so far cost $250 billion." With absolutely no regard for the massive cost per kg to orbit improvement being achieved by new space companies (SpaceX, RocketLab, etc.) The author has cherry-picked his facts to fit his opinion.

beepbooptheory 4y ago

As long as people need to worry about things like their own financial ruin, need to worry about their investors each quarter, people aren't going farther than the earths orbit, and if they do, it will surely be a one way ticket to death. Doing it right now its like asking someone to play an impossible chess game where your side only has pawns and you lose $100 billion everytime one is taken.