6 ms·
Why do you think he was right?
by syndicatedjelly 3y ago
Why do you think he was right?
- cubefox 3y agoThe moon program was extremely expensive and the return (scientific or otherwise) was rather small in comparison.
- pharmakom 3y agoMan on the moon is such a fantastic (in the original sense) thing - I think it’s an end in itself!
- op00to 3y agoIt's only impressive if you're not from Remulak. Astronauts! To the Moon! Nya Nya Nya Nya Nya!
- nightski 3y agoHow exactly are you measuring "return" in this case? Because I feel that would be nearly impossible.
- fsckboy 3y ago>How exactly are you measuring "return" in this case? it would have been cheaper to send the astronauts to the moon without returning them to earth more seriously, the work that went into developing microelectronics returned a lot to the economy. the human genome project has only just started returning its benefits the R&D for manned moon missions didn't have much in the way of spinoffs.
- matthewmcg 3y agoRight! Even taking "return" very literally, the lunar rock samples brought back are incredibly valuable to science. And the spinoff/technological stimulus value of the program is even harder to quantify--consider that during one year, Project Apollo purchased >60% of U.S. semiconductor production. This was a critical early market for Fairchild Semiconductor, e.g. [1] [1]:https://books.google.com/books?id=gXYItzQARVoC&pg=PA127&lpg=PA127&dq=apollo+1963+60+percent+chips&source=bl&ots=25jEOr8-_7&sig=ACfU3U197AG7SyxXGyT99LuDEERyvrxG1Q&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwidnsv0oZ7jAhW8B50JHdmJAvYQ6AEwAXoECAkQAQ#v=onepage&q=apollo%201963%2060%20percent%20chips&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=gXYItzQARVoC&pg=PA127&lpg=...
- angiosperm 3y agoSpinoffs from Apollo, anyway, clearly returned more than the cost. The moon rocks, not so much. We have meteorites that came from moon. And from Mars! I could happily leave aside sending anything more to Mars.
- bregma 3y agoWell, you know, things like microelectronics, medical imaging, telecommunications, weather forecasting, stuff like that. Nothing important. Certainly we would have been better off if that money was spent here on Earth rather than sending it all into space.
- cubefox 3y agoI am skeptical that those things were invented by the Apollo program, and if they were, it would have been easier to do so without also developing moon landers.
- addicted 3y agoI think there’s a few hundred programs that cost more and had fewer returns (and many with negative returns) before we get to man on the moon being a problem.
- lumost 3y agoAs a fan of big science projects, I find this line of thinking unconvincing. The manhattan project cost roughly 56 billion in todays dollars vs. 149 billion for the Apollo program. The manhattan project effectively ended global great power conflict, likely saving hundreds of millions of lives from the inevitable catastrophe of a Warsaw pact vs. NATO conflict in Europe and Asia. The F-35 program cost 1.5 trillion dollars, but this program was also effectively an omni-spending program for the military - sustaining fighter development and arguably deferring several major global conflicts. We should judge projects by their individual merits rather than the justification that we're wasting less money than the alternative.
- AlecSchueler 3y agoThey might also agree that those projects weren't worth it.
- FredPret 3y agoWhat's the point of having a ton of money (USA) if you're not landing on the moon and sending probes to interstellar space?
- kube-system 3y agoThe intangible returns from the moon program are immense.
- troupe 3y agoAny time we can get countries competing with each other on technology that doesn't directly involve blowing each other up, it is a good thing for the human race.
- greiskul 3y agoWhat is the return for all the kids that saw it and because of that decided to become scientists or engineers, and all the technology that they developed? I have no idea how to quantify that, but I can guarantee you that there was an effect. And just because you don't know how to quantify something doesn't mean you get to ignore it. Unknown doesn't mean 0.
- Merad 3y agoThe Apollo program is estimated to have generated a ROI of $7-8 for every dollar spent by NASA. Today NASA has a budget of around $20 billion but they generate $70 billion in economic output. 0: https://nss.org/settlement/nasa/spaceresvol4/newspace3.html https://nss.org/settlement/nasa/spaceresvol4/newspace3.html 1: https://thehill.com/opinion/technology/3721375-how-much-does-nasa-return-to-the-american-economy/ https://thehill.com/opinion/technology/3721375-how-much-does...
- cubefox 3y agoI do not understand how this ROI was calculated. What, exactly, is the economic use case for NASA technology?
- Merad 3y agoI suspect that you're drastically underestimating the breadth of the technology that NASA deals with. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA_spinoff_technologies https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA_spinoff_technologies
- w0de0 3y agoIt redirected a potentially apocalyptic cold war into the peaceful development of fundamental science and new technologies - and into a project which unified all peoples in newfound understanding of ourselves as a single species, miraculously clinging to single pale blue dot. Of all outcomes one might imagine, this seems among the better. An alternative reality in which all this wealth is invested solely in the welfare of humans is unrealistic; one in which it is squandered on terrible weapons and endless war is all too plausible.
- unsupp0rted 3y agoImagine a moonshot program for cancer(s) at the time. Or a moonshot program for computer chips. It's not so much the money spent as the "we get to recruit all the smartest researchers and new grads for 2 generations to focus on a sole achievement" aspect. Getting to the moon was inspirational, but functionally curing even one type of common cancer or ushering in the information revolution a decade or two ahead of schedule would be an order of magnitude more valuable.
- syndicatedjelly 3y ago> Getting to the moon was inspirational, but functionally curing even one type of common cancer or ushering in the information revolution a decade or two ahead of schedule would be an order of magnitude more valuable. This is like, your opinion. Who knows what would have happened, or more importantly what might not have happened if the US didn't focus on getting to the moon. The context of the times is important - at the time it was important to beat the Soviets to space. Curing cancer, while admirable, wouldn't have given the US any sort of advantage over the Soviets. Maybe ushering the information age in sooner would have been meaningful. But what captures the attention of the 50s/60s American public more - a couple of bits of electricity pushed around abstractly, or the raw power of a rocket heading to the Moon? Which is more effective in showing the Soviets that the US has true hard power - controlling tiny amounts of electricity or demonstrating that they can send a rocket, potentially loaded with missiles, into space?
- bregma 3y ago> Or a moonshot program for computer chips. I can do that. I can imagine the Apollo program just like it happened, with one spinoff being computer chips and microelectronics. If it wasn't for Apollo we'd probably still be using rotary-dial phones owned by the local PTT.
- unsupp0rted 3y agoImagine the spinoffs from the Apollo program if the Apollo program's mission was creating computer chips and microelectronics.
- 3y ago