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The whole moon thing is a pointless and ludicrously expensive dead end. But if one wants to do it, one should choose between the working approaches.
by luke5441 8mo ago
The whole moon thing is a pointless and ludicrously expensive dead end. But if one wants to do it, one should choose between the working approaches.
- lukeschlather 8mo agoOrion is actually pointless, I don't understand why the mission goals are valuable. Partial success would be meaningless. Success is meaningless. Starship in contrast has a variety of meaningful objectives. Even if Starship only achieves proving that cryogenic fuel transfer in LEO is possible that's a valuable mission goal in and of itself. If you really think "the whole moon thing is pointless" NASA is pointless.
- pfdietz 8mo agoNASA does not seem to be constituted to be able to engage in a coherent manned space program of actual value. It's a long standing systemic issue. They are great at pretending to deliver value, but there's no "there" there.
- foobarbecue 8mo ago> If you really think "the whole moon thing is pointless" NASA is pointless. There's more to NASA than Artemis! NASA's robotic spaceflight programs generate extremely high science return at relatively low cost. Missions like Psyche, Europa Clipper, and Dragonfly are humanity's real explorers. And their aeronautics work is valuable as well. Low-boom, etc.