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> this is precisely the kind of thing that will help humanity outgrow the dark age of war, inequality and climate mismanagement. How do you figure? The previou

by lapcat 7mo ago

> this is precisely the kind of thing that will help humanity outgrow the dark age of war, inequality and climate mismanagement. How do you figure? The previous Moon missions certainly didn't accomplish that.

rhubarbtree 7mo ago
Sparked the environmental movement, to name but one major impact.
- TeMPOraL 7mo ago
  Also wrt. "climate mismanagement", pretty much all tools we get to measure climate exist because of space program, and many require it to function.
  - 113 7mo ago
    Okay well we have those already and it hasn't really changed anything.
    - TeMPOraL 7mo ago
      Disagree about the change. Even the fact that you know and care enough to argue this on-line is a change that can be attributed to space missions - and it's even more true about the overall global conversation about climate situation, and all activities taken to help with it. These things do take time though.
    - JumpCrisscross 7mo ago
      > we have those already and it hasn't really changed anything What’s the term for antibiotics having been so successful that we forget all their benefits? The Montreal Protocol worked [1]. It probably couldn’t have without our satellite data. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montreal_Protocol https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montreal_Protocol
- lapcat 7mo ago
  This is absurd. Have you heard of Rachel Carson's 1962 "Silent Spring"?
  - nandomrumber 7mo ago
    No, what’s that? QED
- dragonwriter 7mo ago
  > > The previous Moon missions certainly didn't accomplish that. > Sparked the environmental movement, to name but one major impact. It...really didn't. There was a new wave with a different political orientation (less conservative/elite) in the environmental movement roughly contemporary to the space program from—the 1950s through the 1970s—but it was driven by a variety of human driven (nuclear testing, oil spills, etc.) environmental disasters combined with more modern media coverage that occurred in that time than by the space program itself. I know there are people who try to ignore all that and pretend that the whole thing was just the Earthrise photo in 1968 but much of the development of the new character of the movement happened before Earthrise, and even what happened after generally clearly had other more important causes.
  - dylan604 7mo ago
    Regardless of what you think of those first shots from Apollo 8, you have to admit they put things into a different perspective for a lot of people. Seeing the whole of the Earth like that moved a lot of people into realizing this planet is worth saving. That one image was a significant moment causing such a spike in people paying attention that it can be forgiven for being confused as the thing. It's not like John Muir needed to see the Blue Marble image to start his movement. It's just so many more people did
    - dragonwriter 7mo ago
      > Regardless of what you think of those first shots from Apollo 8, you have to admit they put things into a different perspective for a lot of people. “Regardless of what you think about X, you must think Y about X” is a particularly tiresome rhetorical device, but its also being deployed as part of a motte-and-bailey argument here. > It's not like John Muir needed to see the Blue Marble image to start his movement. It's just so many more people did Blue Marble (1990) is a completely different image than Earthrise (1968), and Earthrise was only adopted as a symbol of the environmental movement because the movement was already ascendant when it came out, not because it was the trigger for it.
  - rhubarbtree 7mo ago
TeMPOraL 7mo ago
You don't solve these problems in a single step, but notice how space imagery and analogies pop up every time people try to talk about peace, global problems, mutual empathy, understanding, etc. The Pale Blue Dot, images of Earth from orbit or the Moon, etc. Those are anchors in public consciousness, competing in memetic space with usual divisive, dystopian, hope-draining pictures and soundbites - we need more of them to improve on the big problems, and we absolutely would not have them if not for people actually flying to space. Or, put differently, space exploration is one of the few things "feeding the right wolf" for humanity at large.
- lapcat 7mo ago
  > You don't solve these problems in a single step Obviously, but there's no evidence that the previous Moon missions were a step toward solving the problems. > notice how space imagery and analogies pop up every time people try to talk about peace, global problems, mutual empathy, understanding, etc. You think these problems will be solved with... photos? How many more photos do we need? Everyone has seen the photos already. I'm sure Putin and Trump have seen the photos of Earth.
  - TeMPOraL 7mo ago
    Nobody it'll say space exploration will alone solve those problems. But it helps, and can help more - much more, if we go all the way in and establish permanent economic activity and eventually settlements in the space near Earth and beyond.
    - lapcat 7mo ago
      > if we go all the way in and establish permanent economic activity and eventually settlements in the space near Earth and beyond. Could you please explain exactly how these would help to stop war and inequality? As far as I can tell, space exploration is going to exacerbate inequality, for example, by making Elon Musk even more obscenely wealthy than he already is.
      - 7mo ago
fasterik 7mo ago
The key phrase is "kind of thing". It certainly does matter what kinds of things we focus our attention on as a species. I think you would have to be quite cynical to think that progress in spaceflight over the past 60+ years hasn't had a positive impact.
- lapcat 7mo ago
  > I think you would have to be quite cynical to think that progress in spaceflight over the past 60+ years hasn't had a positive impact. Spaceflight aside, how exactly has humanity started to outgrow war, inequality, and climate mismanagement? Call me cynical, but I'm not seeing it.
oceanplexian 7mo ago
Global rates of poverty are 83% lower than they were in 1969 when we landed on the moon. So actually, millions of lives have massively benefited from science and technology. To be cynical in the face of all that is a personal take, not a reflection of the facts.
- lapcat 7mo ago
  > Global rates of poverty are 83% lower than they were in 1969 when we landed on the moon. Obvious post hoc fallacy
  - nandomrumber 7mo ago
    It’s only a fallacy if the purported facts are fallacious. And in the case of lifting most of humanity out of poverty, two things are responsible: capitalism and technology. You can argue that China is a communist state, but it’s the allocation of capital to things that matter that has enable China to thrive.
    - lapcat 7mo ago
      > It’s only a fallacy if the purported facts are fallacious. These don't appear to be the words of someone who understands what the post hoc fallacy is. In any case, the subject is not "capitalism and technology" generally but rather manned Moon missions specifically.
      - nandomrumber 7mo ago
        Just because one thing happened after another thing, doesn’t mean the first thing caused the second thing. Happy now? However, sometimes it is true that the first thing caused the second thing. Therefore, it’s only a fallacy when it’s fallacious. My argument is that going to space was an allocation of capital that mattered in driving technology forward and improved the lives of everyone.
    - turtlesdown11 7mo ago

by lapcat 7mo ago

rhubarbtree 7mo ago

Sparked the environmental movement, to name but one major impact.

TeMPOraL 7mo ago
Also wrt. "climate mismanagement", pretty much all tools we get to measure climate exist because of space program, and many require it to function.
- 113 7mo ago
  Okay well we have those already and it hasn't really changed anything.
  - TeMPOraL 7mo ago
    Disagree about the change. Even the fact that you know and care enough to argue this on-line is a change that can be attributed to space missions - and it's even more true about the overall global conversation about climate situation, and all activities taken to help with it. These things do take time though.
  - JumpCrisscross 7mo ago
    > we have those already and it hasn't really changed anything What’s the term for antibiotics having been so successful that we forget all their benefits? The Montreal Protocol worked [1]. It probably couldn’t have without our satellite data. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montreal_Protocol https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montreal_Protocol
lapcat 7mo ago
This is absurd. Have you heard of Rachel Carson's 1962 "Silent Spring"?
- nandomrumber 7mo ago
  No, what’s that? QED
dragonwriter 7mo ago
> > The previous Moon missions certainly didn't accomplish that. > Sparked the environmental movement, to name but one major impact. It...really didn't. There was a new wave with a different political orientation (less conservative/elite) in the environmental movement roughly contemporary to the space program from—the 1950s through the 1970s—but it was driven by a variety of human driven (nuclear testing, oil spills, etc.) environmental disasters combined with more modern media coverage that occurred in that time than by the space program itself. I know there are people who try to ignore all that and pretend that the whole thing was just the Earthrise photo in 1968 but much of the development of the new character of the movement happened before Earthrise, and even what happened after generally clearly had other more important causes.
- dylan604 7mo ago
  Regardless of what you think of those first shots from Apollo 8, you have to admit they put things into a different perspective for a lot of people. Seeing the whole of the Earth like that moved a lot of people into realizing this planet is worth saving. That one image was a significant moment causing such a spike in people paying attention that it can be forgiven for being confused as the thing. It's not like John Muir needed to see the Blue Marble image to start his movement. It's just so many more people did
  - dragonwriter 7mo ago
    > Regardless of what you think of those first shots from Apollo 8, you have to admit they put things into a different perspective for a lot of people. “Regardless of what you think about X, you must think Y about X” is a particularly tiresome rhetorical device, but its also being deployed as part of a motte-and-bailey argument here. > It's not like John Muir needed to see the Blue Marble image to start his movement. It's just so many more people did Blue Marble (1990) is a completely different image than Earthrise (1968), and Earthrise was only adopted as a symbol of the environmental movement because the movement was already ascendant when it came out, not because it was the trigger for it.
- rhubarbtree 7mo ago

TeMPOraL 7mo ago

You don't solve these problems in a single step, but notice how space imagery and analogies pop up every time people try to talk about peace, global problems, mutual empathy, understanding, etc. The Pale Blue Dot, images of Earth from orbit or the Moon, etc. Those are anchors in public consciousness, competing in memetic space with usual divisive, dystopian, hope-draining pictures and soundbites - we need more of them to improve on the big problems, and we absolutely would not have them if not for people actually flying to space. Or, put differently, space exploration is one of the few things "feeding the right wolf" for humanity at large.

lapcat 7mo ago
> You don't solve these problems in a single step Obviously, but there's no evidence that the previous Moon missions were a step toward solving the problems. > notice how space imagery and analogies pop up every time people try to talk about peace, global problems, mutual empathy, understanding, etc. You think these problems will be solved with... photos? How many more photos do we need? Everyone has seen the photos already. I'm sure Putin and Trump have seen the photos of Earth.
- TeMPOraL 7mo ago
  Nobody it'll say space exploration will alone solve those problems. But it helps, and can help more - much more, if we go all the way in and establish permanent economic activity and eventually settlements in the space near Earth and beyond.
  - lapcat 7mo ago
    > if we go all the way in and establish permanent economic activity and eventually settlements in the space near Earth and beyond. Could you please explain exactly how these would help to stop war and inequality? As far as I can tell, space exploration is going to exacerbate inequality, for example, by making Elon Musk even more obscenely wealthy than he already is.
    - 7mo ago

fasterik 7mo ago

The key phrase is "kind of thing". It certainly does matter what kinds of things we focus our attention on as a species. I think you would have to be quite cynical to think that progress in spaceflight over the past 60+ years hasn't had a positive impact.

lapcat 7mo ago
> I think you would have to be quite cynical to think that progress in spaceflight over the past 60+ years hasn't had a positive impact. Spaceflight aside, how exactly has humanity started to outgrow war, inequality, and climate mismanagement? Call me cynical, but I'm not seeing it.

oceanplexian 7mo ago

Global rates of poverty are 83% lower than they were in 1969 when we landed on the moon. So actually, millions of lives have massively benefited from science and technology. To be cynical in the face of all that is a personal take, not a reflection of the facts.

lapcat 7mo ago
> Global rates of poverty are 83% lower than they were in 1969 when we landed on the moon. Obvious post hoc fallacy
- nandomrumber 7mo ago
  It’s only a fallacy if the purported facts are fallacious. And in the case of lifting most of humanity out of poverty, two things are responsible: capitalism and technology. You can argue that China is a communist state, but it’s the allocation of capital to things that matter that has enable China to thrive.
  - lapcat 7mo ago
    > It’s only a fallacy if the purported facts are fallacious. These don't appear to be the words of someone who understands what the post hoc fallacy is. In any case, the subject is not "capitalism and technology" generally but rather manned Moon missions specifically.
    - nandomrumber 7mo ago
      Just because one thing happened after another thing, doesn’t mean the first thing caused the second thing. Happy now? However, sometimes it is true that the first thing caused the second thing. Therefore, it’s only a fallacy when it’s fallacious. My argument is that going to space was an allocation of capital that mattered in driving technology forward and improved the lives of everyone.
  - turtlesdown11 7mo ago