4 ms·

> The only justification for human spaceflight at all is that humans can fix things that a robot can't yet. This was pre-Challenger, back then we also flew wit

• Robotbeat 3y ago
  They ultimately are, if we manage to get launch costs down. Starship is a second crack at trying to do what Shuttle failed to do with affordable space access (for both humans and payloads).
  • gumby 3y ago
    An ironic comment for someone called "Robotbeat" :-) Robots have been traveling to Mars for over 60 years. Humans? Maybe another 60. And most of the mass sent won't even be the humans, but all the support crap they need. And Pluto, or the heliopause? What human is going to hang out for half a century to go there?
    • Robotbeat 3y ago
      I mean, NASA’s Artemis program is basically demonstrating all the major logistical hardware needed for a Mars mission. If it goes well, we could be looking at a lunar landing in 3 to 5 years with a vehicle about 50 times larger than the Apollo LM (and for a cost of less than a NASA Mars robotic mission—like sample return—for the lander) and possibly a Mars landing 5 years after that. Optimistic, but not absurd odds. It’s not a foregone conclusion that we won’t be on Mars in the next 60 years.
• cybrox 3y ago
  I mean, they were. Back then, humans often outperformed machines in very rapidly evolving situations like these because there's only so much problem solving tech you can pack into 80kg. I would actually argue that the only reason this is becoming less of a factor because just launching the experiment again is an increasingly cheap and viable option.