5 ms·

I wish EU was next but we slept too much on this one

by h1fra 11mo ago

kypro 11mo ago
> this one Heh. I like your optimism.
speed_spread 11mo ago
Mbah, just copy China's rockets once they stop exploding. It would be embarrassing for them to complain about a little industrial espionnage.
- churchill 11mo ago
  >Mbah Did you mean to say nah? Mba actually means just that in at least one language I know.
  - speed_spread 11mo ago
    I meant what I wrote, which was a transition from the universal reflective 'mmm' to the French whatever 'bah'.
    - churchill 11mo ago
      [dead]
GMoromisato 11mo ago
This is truly sad. Despite having, collectively, a larger GDP than the US, Europe has not been at the forefront of too many technologies, compared to the US and China. [Pharmaceuticals might be the main exception.] Sadly, I think the disadvantages will compound. Europe doesn't have a Google-type company with expertise building data centers, and are now behind on AI scaling. Without cheap access to orbit, they have missed out on building Starlink-like LEO constellations. I wish I knew why this is and how to fix it.
- GuB-42 11mo ago
  One other exception is ASML. They make the best photolithography machines, for me, it is simply the most advanced piece of tech humanity has created, look it up, everything about EUV lithography is insane. In a sense all modern tech goes back to them, including AI. They make the machines that make the chips that make AI.
  - GMoromisato 11mo ago
    Excellent example.
- Meneth 11mo ago
  "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." - George Bernard Shaw I suspect that Europe is much more "reasonable", in this sense, than the US and China.
  - m_fayer 11mo ago
    It’s a neat quote but it’s not a clean fit. You’d expect the “unreasonable man” of Europe to be behind but stable and decent, whereas these days much of Europe can’t maintain living standards or political stability. There’s also an argument to be made that China is putting in a very solid performance in a very reasonable manner. See: methodical capture of global EV+energy markets, soft power expansion into the global south, cold-eyed deflation of financial bubbles, 5 year plans, and so on. At this rate, I’m not sure that the freedom and unreason loving “man” that is the US will be able to compete either.
    - ethbr1 11mo ago
      > whereas these days much of Europe can’t maintain living standards or political stability Those are the side effects of Europe trying to offset its fertility rate with immigration, yet failing to explicitly address the enculturation tension. It's remarkably how people so smart in one area (demographic issues and solutions) can flounder so badly in another (addressing cultural friction with immigrants). Especially considering history has "a few" examples of exactly this same thing, although possibly Americans have more experience in modernity.
bluGill 11mo ago
It isn't a race. EU can't do everything and so it is best to see what several others are doing and take that as a sign to do something different. If only one party (or only your enemies) then yes you should, but it seems there are plenty of players and the EU is smart to sit it out.
- newZWhoDis 11mo ago
  It quite literally is a race. A space race.
  - bluGill 11mo ago
    The space race ended 50 years ago, all that is left is those who didn't win to finally cross the finish line. Dropping out is your best bet. The only reward was bragging rights, so you need to find something else to brag about. If indeed you need to brag, there is nothing wrong with modesty. Even if you do need to brag, it isn't clear what you can work on today that will get bragging rights - you might finish at the same time as something else and that something else gets the rights.
  - beAbU 11mo ago
    It's not a race if the other party is not willing/able to participate.
GuB-42 11mo ago
I think the EU dropped the ball on reusability. But Ariane 5 was an excellent expendable heavy-lift launcher and Ariane 6 follows on the same track. Not great for mass commercial launches, but good enough for sovereignty and science missions. Why compete with SpaceX? They can already provide more than what the market demands, so much that they have to create their own demand in the form of Starlink. Europe could join the space race but it is an extremely expensive endeavor and the EU has other priorities. Now the question is which ones. As a French, I am all for nuclear technology, for which France was at the forefront and it seems to get back some traction after decades of neglect.
- Rover222 11mo ago
  Yeah it doesn't seem worth it to try and compete with SpaceX at this point, at least in countries allied with the US. Makes more sense to take the future NASA approach and focus on specialized payloads, not launchers.
- panick21_ 11mo ago
  Ariane 5 wasn't excellent. It was a bad rocket strategically. Ariane 5 grew far bigger then the original designers wanted, because they had dreams of launching the Hermes space plan. But once Hermes was dead they didn't reevaluate the project. so Ariane 5 was far to big, and while for very large GEO multi sat launches that was ok, they had a very low launch rate and couldn't compete for many missions. Arianespace always launch more Soyuz then Ariane 5s. To me, if your European launch provider launches more Russian then European craft, its not good. Ariane 5 was lucky that Progress and other Russian rockets were so mismanaged. They basically didn't have competition. And Ariane 6 is just a slightly punched up Ariane 5 and in relative to market terms, its even worse. Basically everything that has been learned in the market for the last 15 years is ignored on Ariane 6. > but good enough for sovereignty and science missions. Ariane 6 was designed EXPLICITLY WITH STRONG FOCUS ON competing with SpaceX. Its only now after the 5 billion EUR were spend that people way 'it was all about sovereignty'. If sovereignty was the only goal, other ways to go about it would have been better. No need to give European Tax $ to Amazon just so they launch on European rocket. They didn't want to give money to SpaceX, so instead they are giving it to Amazon. I agree with you, Europe should have just embraced SpaceX (or whoever does the launch cheapest) and invested into sats and innovation like space nuclear. That would have actually made sense. For the cost of Ariane 6 they could have built a reusable nuclear tug and a nuclear reactor for moon/mars.

I wish EU was next but we slept too much on this one

by h1fra 11mo ago

I wish EU was next but we slept too much on this one

kypro 11mo ago

> this one Heh. I like your optimism.

speed_spread 11mo ago

Mbah, just copy China's rockets once they stop exploding. It would be embarrassing for them to complain about a little industrial espionnage.

churchill 11mo ago
>Mbah Did you mean to say nah? Mba actually means just that in at least one language I know.
- speed_spread 11mo ago
  I meant what I wrote, which was a transition from the universal reflective 'mmm' to the French whatever 'bah'.
  - churchill 11mo ago
    [dead]

GMoromisato 11mo ago

This is truly sad. Despite having, collectively, a larger GDP than the US, Europe has not been at the forefront of too many technologies, compared to the US and China. [Pharmaceuticals might be the main exception.] Sadly, I think the disadvantages will compound. Europe doesn't have a Google-type company with expertise building data centers, and are now behind on AI scaling. Without cheap access to orbit, they have missed out on building Starlink-like LEO constellations. I wish I knew why this is and how to fix it.

GuB-42 11mo ago
One other exception is ASML. They make the best photolithography machines, for me, it is simply the most advanced piece of tech humanity has created, look it up, everything about EUV lithography is insane. In a sense all modern tech goes back to them, including AI. They make the machines that make the chips that make AI.
- GMoromisato 11mo ago
  Excellent example.
Meneth 11mo ago
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." - George Bernard Shaw I suspect that Europe is much more "reasonable", in this sense, than the US and China.
- m_fayer 11mo ago
  It’s a neat quote but it’s not a clean fit. You’d expect the “unreasonable man” of Europe to be behind but stable and decent, whereas these days much of Europe can’t maintain living standards or political stability. There’s also an argument to be made that China is putting in a very solid performance in a very reasonable manner. See: methodical capture of global EV+energy markets, soft power expansion into the global south, cold-eyed deflation of financial bubbles, 5 year plans, and so on. At this rate, I’m not sure that the freedom and unreason loving “man” that is the US will be able to compete either.
  - ethbr1 11mo ago
    > whereas these days much of Europe can’t maintain living standards or political stability Those are the side effects of Europe trying to offset its fertility rate with immigration, yet failing to explicitly address the enculturation tension. It's remarkably how people so smart in one area (demographic issues and solutions) can flounder so badly in another (addressing cultural friction with immigrants). Especially considering history has "a few" examples of exactly this same thing, although possibly Americans have more experience in modernity.

bluGill 11mo ago

It isn't a race. EU can't do everything and so it is best to see what several others are doing and take that as a sign to do something different. If only one party (or only your enemies) then yes you should, but it seems there are plenty of players and the EU is smart to sit it out.

newZWhoDis 11mo ago
It quite literally is a race. A space race.
- bluGill 11mo ago
  The space race ended 50 years ago, all that is left is those who didn't win to finally cross the finish line. Dropping out is your best bet. The only reward was bragging rights, so you need to find something else to brag about. If indeed you need to brag, there is nothing wrong with modesty. Even if you do need to brag, it isn't clear what you can work on today that will get bragging rights - you might finish at the same time as something else and that something else gets the rights.
- beAbU 11mo ago
  It's not a race if the other party is not willing/able to participate.

GuB-42 11mo ago

I think the EU dropped the ball on reusability. But Ariane 5 was an excellent expendable heavy-lift launcher and Ariane 6 follows on the same track. Not great for mass commercial launches, but good enough for sovereignty and science missions. Why compete with SpaceX? They can already provide more than what the market demands, so much that they have to create their own demand in the form of Starlink. Europe could join the space race but it is an extremely expensive endeavor and the EU has other priorities. Now the question is which ones. As a French, I am all for nuclear technology, for which France was at the forefront and it seems to get back some traction after decades of neglect.

Rover222 11mo ago
Yeah it doesn't seem worth it to try and compete with SpaceX at this point, at least in countries allied with the US. Makes more sense to take the future NASA approach and focus on specialized payloads, not launchers.
panick21_ 11mo ago
Ariane 5 wasn't excellent. It was a bad rocket strategically. Ariane 5 grew far bigger then the original designers wanted, because they had dreams of launching the Hermes space plan. But once Hermes was dead they didn't reevaluate the project. so Ariane 5 was far to big, and while for very large GEO multi sat launches that was ok, they had a very low launch rate and couldn't compete for many missions. Arianespace always launch more Soyuz then Ariane 5s. To me, if your European launch provider launches more Russian then European craft, its not good. Ariane 5 was lucky that Progress and other Russian rockets were so mismanaged. They basically didn't have competition. And Ariane 6 is just a slightly punched up Ariane 5 and in relative to market terms, its even worse. Basically everything that has been learned in the market for the last 15 years is ignored on Ariane 6. > but good enough for sovereignty and science missions. Ariane 6 was designed EXPLICITLY WITH STRONG FOCUS ON competing with SpaceX. Its only now after the 5 billion EUR were spend that people way 'it was all about sovereignty'. If sovereignty was the only goal, other ways to go about it would have been better. No need to give European Tax $ to Amazon just so they launch on European rocket. They didn't want to give money to SpaceX, so instead they are giving it to Amazon. I agree with you, Europe should have just embraced SpaceX (or whoever does the launch cheapest) and invested into sats and innovation like space nuclear. That would have actually made sense. For the cost of Ariane 6 they could have built a reusable nuclear tug and a nuclear reactor for moon/mars.