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NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission

cnn.com

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Re: NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission

#771

Post by mmooss »

electriclove wrote: post #350
mmooss wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Difficult to say It's not difficult to say. They are behind schedule and everyone, not just Duffy, is talking about it and have been for awhile. I don't care - beyond how getting to the moon will help future space exploration - and risk is high when developing new tech, but I also don't care about SpaceX. It's very possible Starship won't work out; that's risk and I'm sure SpaceX and NASA people understand that. Wh…

It would be great for there to be more competition. But the reality is that SpaceX is in a different league - why focus on knocking them when there isn’t another alternative ??

> the reality is that SpaceX is in a different league

They aren't delivering, so maybe not. People on HN state the SpaceX talking points like they are reality. It's an Internet mob; there is no room for any serious examination of the issue.

Re: NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission

#772

Post by boxed »

llbeansandrice wrote: post #680
qwerpy wrote: post #419

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, the company gets things done but the CEO is unpopular with certain crowds. Seems better than Boeing, which is bad at getting things done. At least their CEO is inoffensive, and that’s what is important?

“Unpopular” is a weird way to frame “is a Nazi”.

I mean.. Werner von Braun wasn't just "sort of a Nazi if you squint real hard", but an ACTUAL Nazi. At some point you need to focus on getting the job done, and not on purity tests and struggle sessions. THAT is why the US once got to the moon, while China starved 40 million of its own people, and the Soviet Union collapsed.

Re: NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission

#773

Post by Gud »

nxor wrote: post #570
WalterBright wrote: post #510

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Charles Lindbergh knew his chances of dying crossing the Atlantic were pretty high. After all, previous attempts resulted in many deaths. Armstrong's personal estimate of his odds getting back alive were about 50%. Apollo 13 came within a hair of killing its crew. I fly across the North Atlantic at 30,000 feet, death in seconds if the hull is breached, in a comfortable chair, watching a movie and sipping a drink. Isn…

Planes are incredible. And people die every day flying them. The public seems to have found that out this year

They do? How many deadly aviation accidents are there in a year? Seems to me it happens a lot less than every day

Re: NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission

#774

Post by effdee »

allenrb wrote: post #373

There is just so much wrong with this from start to finish. Here are a few things, by no means inclusive: 1. We’ve already beaten China to the moon by 56 years, 3 months, and some change. And counting. 2. Nothing based around SLS is remotely serious. The cost and timeline of doing anything with it are unreasonable. It is an absolute dead-end. The SpaceX Super Heavy has been more capable arguably as early as the secon…

Regarding 1, that's like saying the Mongols beat the US at owning China (and most of Asia for that matter) by 700 years. And counting.

Re: NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission

#775

Post by genewitch »

WalterBright wrote: post #515
05 wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To play devil's advocate, the only purpose astronauts serve is PR. Anything that can be done is space could be done cheaper and better with automation/rovers. So it seems that having those astronauts risk their lives for a short term political win is just table stakes, because the alternative for them is to stay on Earth and maybe pay $100K for just an hour in orbit with any of the commercial space tourism companies.

Automation still cannot pick a strawberry.

no strawberries in space

Re: NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission

#776

Post by exe34 »

rayiner wrote: post #587
Waterluvian wrote: post #442

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Re: 1. I think the America of Theseus mindset is a bit troubling. A lot of people like to identify with achievements that they played no role in. Based on zero expertise whatsoever, I have a sense that this is a bit self defeating. To be born a winner, to be taught you’re a winner… how can that be healthy? Today’s America scores zero points for its accomplishments of the past. But I think one way it can be a good thi…

My first job out of law school was at a 176 year old law firm. New lawyers were socialized to identify with the past achievements of the firm, like helping J.P. Morgan build the railroads. There was a good reason for that: it socializes people to adhere to a culture and practices that have proven to be effective. You’re right that, if overdone, it can lead to complacency. But if you treat every generation as a blank…

> you abandon the valuable capital of experience.

it has nothing to do with how you treat each generation. it's whether or not you have a continuous shared work experience from the elders to the youngsters over and over.

if your company abandoned big projects for small local stuff and then a few generations later suddenly decided to go big again, you'd suck at it.

if you're good at it, it's because the people right before you were doing it already and passed on their experience.

(this doesn't mean something can't be done the first time - it just means if you don't have institutional knowledge, you have to suck at it first and then get better).

Re: NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission

#777

Post by safety1st »

Waterluvian wrote: post #442
allenrb wrote: post #373

There is just so much wrong with this from start to finish. Here are a few things, by no means inclusive: 1. We’ve already beaten China to the moon by 56 years, 3 months, and some change. And counting. 2. Nothing based around SLS is remotely serious. The cost and timeline of doing anything with it are unreasonable. It is an absolute dead-end. The SpaceX Super Heavy has been more capable arguably as early as the secon…

Re: 1. I think the America of Theseus mindset is a bit troubling. A lot of people like to identify with achievements that they played no role in. Based on zero expertise whatsoever, I have a sense that this is a bit self defeating. To be born a winner, to be taught you’re a winner… how can that be healthy? Today’s America scores zero points for its accomplishments of the past. But I think one way it can be a good thi…

This gets back to why there is a "we need to start making things in America again" sentiment. We made a national policy decision and underwent an economic transformation based on financialization and globalization. Kept the design and services aspects of our greatest companies in the US but the nuts and bolts of manufacturing and assembly went overseas, relying on patents and IP law to control production from afar.

This approach was always going to have holes in it and sure enough we're now facing a difficult and uncertain endeavor, for example, to ever be able to make the best chips in the world on American soil again. (Or as in the headlines today, to source and process rare earths for all manner of production.) It turns out that, surprise surprise, there was tons of process knowledge and tons of capacity for innovation in the people who were closest to the actual work of production, now those people are no longer American and couldn't care less what America can and cannot do. So we're in a bind. Americans keep claiming they can build all the things but they haven't actually done so in many years.

There's no way to solve the problem other than to try, and that entails clawing back as much of the people, processes and materiel as you can by whatever means you can until you start cobbling together some genuine innovation. My gut tells me enough of the political class supports the idea that the financiers will just have to get used to capitalizing a lot of production on domestic soil again, politicians will of course be happy to print billions more dollars of free money and hand it to them for this.

Re: NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission

#778

Post by creshal »

standardUser wrote: post #395
creshal wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ISS served all political purposes it could, and microgavity research can be served by private entities these days. (Especially considering that a Starship has half the internal pressurized volume of the entire ISS, at approximately one thousandth the cost.) A permanent Moon base would allow research opportunities that private LEO stations can't: ISRU, low gravity research, the far side of the Moon offers unique o…

The ISS has (and has always had) a multi-year backlog of experiments, with no shortage of orgs willing to pay the 6 or 7 figure fee.

Cool, then they can pool together and build a commercial station. There's now multiple companies capable of building them.

Re: NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission

#779

Post by vincenthwt »

halapro wrote: post #763
vincenthwt wrote: post #759

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hopefully, your view is in the minority. If this mindset becomes prevalent in the US, nothing new will ever be invented, and no new regions of space will be explored. Modern moon exploration isn’t about repeating Apollo but progressing toward resource extraction and establishing humanity’s long-term presence in space. These missions are designed to achieve goals that were previously impossible and lay the foundation…

> humanity’s future beyond Earth. Yes but why? It's cool that we can learn about what's around us, but in practice we're light years away from being interplanetary, we just can't afford it and our energy sources are laughable. Realistically speaking, how far are we really from "moon travel" that is both remotely affordable and worth the trip?

"Yes, but why?" If humans had never ventured beyond perceived limits, like crossing oceans or building planes, where would we be today?

"We’re light-years away from being interplanetary; it’s too costly and our energy is laughable." If people doubted the Wright brothers or mocked the idea of landing on the Moon, should we have stopped trying?

"How far are we from affordable Moon travel that’s worth it?" Humanity thrives when it takes risks and embraces exploration. Space is where the next wave of innovation and opportunity lies, and waiting for "perfect timing" ensures we stay stagnant while others move ahead. Why choose doubt over progress?

Re: NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission

#780

Post by gorbachev »

enraged_camel wrote: post #644
zm262 wrote: post #641

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It matters more to US politically than scientifically. It's totally about the US mojo in the eyes of politicians and thus funding.

This dismissal is quite shallow. Yes, it matters politically - but that has enormous downstream repercussions. China beating us to the Moon helps reinforce the narrative that the American century of global dominance is over, and China is the new superpower that is unseating it. The implications of that would go well beyond politics.

You don't win that fight by sending a few folks to the moon.

You win it using the playbook the CCP has been systematically and very successfully implementing for a few decades. They are very good at long-term planning. The US plans in 4-year (or 8-year) cycles, and often times reverse course completely at the end of those.

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