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A $1000 dinner is nothing in comparison to the cost of going to the moon. I’m definitely glad we did it. However, the Apollo program was expensive. It was 2.5

A $1000 dinner is nothing in comparison to the cost of going to the moon. I’m definitely glad we did it. However, the Apollo program was expensive. It was 2.5% of GDP for 10 years. https://www.herkulesprojekt.de/en/is-there-a-master-plan/the-moon-landing.html#:~:text=The%20Apollo%20project%20cost%2025,over%20a%2010%2Dyear%20period https://www.herkulesprojekt.de/en/is-there-a-master-plan/the.... Imagine today if we said we were going to try and cure cancer(s) in 10 years by spending 2.5% of GDP over the next decade. Think people would support that? Doubt it.

codyb 3y ago
That would be pretty sweet. Big fan of Biden's moonshot cancer initiative. I'd love to see another "space race" type event pursued by America in the name of advancing our scientific understanding. Trying to cure cancer seems like it would be an awesome place to start. 2.5% of GDP would be... 500bn a year? Coordinating that would be wild. What about a race to negative emissions for 2.5% GDP? With the promise of well paying jobs, cleaner air (long term saves money due to reduced asthma, etc), reduced foreign energy dependence, and increasing the number of products we can sell abroad (long term positive), reducing climate impact (long term saves money in reduced disaster relief).
- deleted 3y ago
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LeifCarrotson 3y ago
If people believed you might actually do it, enough of us have been affected by cancer that I'm sure they'd support it. Fuck cancer.
- melling 3y ago
  What if we failed and we could only cure half the people who would have otherwise died? Of course that’s half of people going forward…forever
lordnacho 3y ago
The cure for cancer project was a waste of money! Sure it's nice they did it but that money would have been better as tax cuts where it would have spurred innovation in other fields. People die of something else anyway. Yeah we built fancy new labs and educated a new generation of scientists, but what does it matter that we made an algorithm that can cure each individual person's cancer? Those people would have studied something else, and you can just git clone the cancer algorithm nowadays. The whole cure for cancer project was nothing but a tumourdoggle for big research. Hospitals and universities across the country feasting on public money. Labcoat manufacturers and those guys who make beakers, suddenly getting wealthy off what is essentially a photo-op where where we stick it to the Chinese.
aidenn0 3y ago
Something about that math doesn't work out; all of NASA was about 3% of the federal budget from '62-72. I don't see how that could be 2.5% of the GDP. [edit] Upon closer reading I think it means that over a 10 year period they spent 2.5% of the annual GDP, which would work out to a 0.25% GDP spend each year.
- melling 3y ago
  Good question. Perhaps they mean as percentage of federal spending? https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2010/feb/01/nasa-budgets-us-spending-space-travel https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2010/feb/01/nasa-b...

codyb 3y ago

That would be pretty sweet. Big fan of Biden's moonshot cancer initiative. I'd love to see another "space race" type event pursued by America in the name of advancing our scientific understanding. Trying to cure cancer seems like it would be an awesome place to start. 2.5% of GDP would be... 500bn a year? Coordinating that would be wild. What about a race to negative emissions for 2.5% GDP? With the promise of well paying jobs, cleaner air (long term saves money due to reduced asthma, etc), reduced foreign energy dependence, and increasing the number of products we can sell abroad (long term positive), reducing climate impact (long term saves money in reduced disaster relief).

deleted 3y ago
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LeifCarrotson 3y ago

If people believed you might actually do it, enough of us have been affected by cancer that I'm sure they'd support it. Fuck cancer.

melling 3y ago
What if we failed and we could only cure half the people who would have otherwise died? Of course that’s half of people going forward…forever

lordnacho 3y ago

The cure for cancer project was a waste of money! Sure it's nice they did it but that money would have been better as tax cuts where it would have spurred innovation in other fields. People die of something else anyway. Yeah we built fancy new labs and educated a new generation of scientists, but what does it matter that we made an algorithm that can cure each individual person's cancer? Those people would have studied something else, and you can just git clone the cancer algorithm nowadays. The whole cure for cancer project was nothing but a tumourdoggle for big research. Hospitals and universities across the country feasting on public money. Labcoat manufacturers and those guys who make beakers, suddenly getting wealthy off what is essentially a photo-op where where we stick it to the Chinese.

aidenn0 3y ago

Something about that math doesn't work out; all of NASA was about 3% of the federal budget from '62-72. I don't see how that could be 2.5% of the GDP. [edit] Upon closer reading I think it means that over a 10 year period they spent 2.5% of the annual GDP, which would work out to a 0.25% GDP spend each year.

melling 3y ago
Good question. Perhaps they mean as percentage of federal spending? https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2010/feb/01/nasa-budgets-us-spending-space-travel https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2010/feb/01/nasa-b...