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As last module docks, China completes its space station

nytimes.com

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Re: As last module docks, China completes its space station

#41

Post by [deleted] »

ARandomerDude wrote: post #25
wellthisisgreat wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nationalism, any forms of it are evil. There is no "benign nationalism" that is just people being proud for their country or whatever. It all leads to sorrow and, ultimately, destruction. Paraphrasing Voltaire, we should squash it. It is not beneficial and people can absolutely "reach for the stars" in all senses of it without nationalism. The only thing nationalism, in any form, moderate or extreme, is good for is f…

Hypothetical Nation A allows democratic freedom of expression and respects human rights. Hypothetical Nation B has a tyrannical government that censors and imprisons anyone who questions it and constantly violates the rights of its people. Nation A and Nation B go to war. Do you care who wins? If you don't care, there's something wrong with you. If you do care, people will accuse of being a nationalist. At the end of…

[deleted]

Re: As last module docks, China completes its space station

#42

Post by diskzero »

Victerius wrote: post #28
outworlder wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That requires a truly astounding amount of material. Unless the cost to place it in orbit gets within an order of magnitude of our current terrestrial freight, it's not happening. Best bet is to construct these things in orbit, with materials sourced in orbit. But now you have a chicken and egg problem - need to send an incredible amount of material (and people) in order to (potentially!) save in the future.

Quoted post unavailable.

Space stations and exploration can be a difficult proposition to justify to any economic system; democratic, socialist, communist, etc. For China to want to "beat" us, building bigger and better space stations would somehow have to align with the current and future five year plans.

I would rather have China and the US pouring tons of money into space stations and exploration, but it is hard to figure out the rationale for such a massive investment. China seems to make rational decisions, those of which I am not defending. I am trying to figure out how rational a $500 billion dollar investment in a space station would be to Chinese interests.

Re: As last module docks, China completes its space station

#43

Post by stickfigure »

Victerius wrote: post #8

I hope mankind can move beyond building space stations as a handful of modular small cylinders, and start building space stations the way they appear in science fiction: dozens of rooms, cubical exteriors, hallways, human height doors that open and close, stairs, elevators, hangars, a nuclear reactor instead of solar panels, and modules that rotate around an axis to create artificial gravity. And a more diversified c…

To stay within the protection of Earth's magnetosphere, habitable stations are put in low earth orbit. Low earth orbit entails atmospheric drag, and bigger stations have more drag as well as larger propellent requirements to boost.

Re: As last module docks, China completes its space station

#44

Post by buscoquadnary »

TremendousJudge wrote: post #32
Victerius wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

I think you're seriously overestimating Chinese economic capabilities. They are still constrained by the same economic realities as everybody else, and -- much as we wish it were possible -- they cannot afford to just do whatever .

"You can accomplish anything when you have vision, determination and an endless supply of expendable labor"

Re: As last module docks, China completes its space station

#45

Post by vasco »

Victerius wrote: post #8

I hope mankind can move beyond building space stations as a handful of modular small cylinders, and start building space stations the way they appear in science fiction: dozens of rooms, cubical exteriors, hallways, human height doors that open and close, stairs, elevators, hangars, a nuclear reactor instead of solar panels, and modules that rotate around an axis to create artificial gravity. And a more diversified c…

Even if the cost to launch would be way cheaper, that weigth allowance would be used for useful stuff like laundry machines, more "sterile" modules as you call them for more research, and potentially for industrial applications like factories to build low-gravity-only components and low gravity biomedical applications.

Your vision is useful for tourism and little else.

Re: As last module docks, China completes its space station

#46

Post by rvba »

fuoqi wrote: post #12
mensetmanusman wrote: post #6

Quoted post unavailable.

Are you implying that Chinese nationalism prevents the collaboration? Look into why China is not part of ISS, despite its desire to join. Spoiler: the US has blocked it. It's a small miracle that Russia is part of ISS, not in small part because the US wanted to get cheap access to the Soviet Mir-based technology and expertise.

Can you go to China and travel freely? Can you even own a business there as a foreigner? How many foreigners received a citizenship?

Re: As last module docks, China completes its space station

#48

Post by dQw4w9WgXcQ »

jedberg wrote: post #17
mensetmanusman wrote: post #6

Quoted post unavailable.

I agree with you but I suspect you're blaming the wrong nation. China built their own station because the USA won't allow them to join ISS.

The USA requiring China to invent something on their own rather than Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V the USA's work is helping them grow up. It's a long-term win-win. We don't "blame" parents for asking their children to grow up into independent adults, nor should countries enable codependent behavior.

Re: As last module docks, China completes its space station

#49

Post by TremendousJudge »

Victerius wrote: post #39
oneoff786 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re afraid china will beat the us to aesthetic space stations?

I want a country to make one. Any country. I would gladly pay for a ticket for a week long stay on an aesthetic space station. You have no idea how badly I want to live in the kind of futuristic future depicted in science fiction.

You'd like to live in a world similar to Blade Runner or Neuromancer? That doesn't seem pleasant at all to me.

Re: As last module docks, China completes its space station

#50

Post by dang »

mensetmanusman wrote: post #6

Quoted post unavailable.

I'm sure you didn't mean to, but your comment was nationalistic flamebait that predictably set off a nationalistic flamewar. Please don't do that. From https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html:

"Eschew flamebait. Avoid generic tangents."

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