Live data from Hacker News

Artemis II Launch Day Updates

nasa.gov

451–460 of 1001 posts

Re: Artemis II Launch Day Updates

#451
post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My personal take for a long time has been that the primary driver of most war today is boredom. War today is undertaken for entertainment. It's a special kind of entertainment that taps into deep brain stem circuits and provides a false but deeply resonating sense of purpose and meaning. When you hear that "people don't have a sense of meaning," it means their brain stem is not feeling the tribal loyalty emotions con…

Wildly disagree with that. I think the overwhelming majority of people want simple, peaceful existence, and that the 'lack of meaning' can be solved through deeper shared community goals and aspirations. More prominent figures like Trump, Putin or al-Assad don't wage war out of boredom, but out of ego, or visions of a glorious future that only they can impart (which I guess is still ego). I also think that the variou…

> but out of ego, or visions of a glorious future that only they can impart..

Obviously. Why would any one do anything at all if not for this very reason, let alone world leaders...

For world leaders, that is their whole point of their authority.

Re: Artemis II Launch Day Updates

#452
post #177
post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They can move around after they switch from launch to spaceflight config. Apparently they also have some exercise gear for the journey.

It is just the capsule though? There's no stage under them/another cylinder? Module Trying to imagine how big the thing is like 10x10 feet room

ABC News says 330 habitable cubic feet or about the interior space of two minivans.

Re: Artemis II Launch Day Updates

#453

[flagged]

Well. You are getting down voted but here I am in later stages in life watching this Moon launch, and unlike other times in past, I didn’t feel any inspiration. Honestly, it’s a waste of money. That’s my final answer, there’s kids that need food. I am no longer inspired by this stuff. I’ve seen enough advanced technology for many lifetimes, we need something else as a species (more of that humanity thing).

We're literally only doing it to beat the Chinese back. As a Gundam fan, I can't help but feel (likely misplaced and misguided) enthusiasm for the development of space, but objectively, this is a stunt, through-and-through. Trump-y on the Moon.

Re: Artemis II Launch Day Updates

#454

The politicization of everything and constant doomerish on here sure has echoes of early 2000s Slashdot. That's not a compliment. Reading the comments here is actually depressing. Human progress is never all at once, we can't even celebrate this triumph? Life is almost never "one or the other," the program could be scrapped to a junk yard and that wouldn't solve global hunger or global conflicts. Setting human eyes f…

I pray to never reach a point of cynicism where my response to watching humans leave the planet on a rocket is immediately "meh, whatever, here's my political complaint of the week"

Global hunger's a great example. When we last left the moon (1972) 35% of the global population was undernourished. Today it's ~8%. Optimism is a choice, and generally a more rational one. That doesn't mean we don't have real issues.

Re: Artemis II Launch Day Updates

#456
post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does any of that matter for this mission, which will not be landing on the moon?

To test the stuff that will allow to land humans on the moon

More like to test the stuff that will take them to the ship(s) that will allow humans to land on the Moon.

Re: Artemis II Launch Day Updates

#458

I do hope the doomers who think that the entire US government has been completely gutted will take note of this. The government workforce is in a bad spot for sure, SLS is far from a perfect program, but this still demonstrates that we are doing some real work still.

Have you talked to any actual NASA employees (not just contractors) that work in science?

For what it’s worth, I watched today’s Artemis II launch with them. While proud of the mission, they’re likely in your “Doomer” category after a year being devastated and demoralized by having their science budgets slashed, grants/projects cancelled, having been forced to fire good contractors of 10+ years and then watching some of the most knowledgeable/skilled folks take early retirement. Don’t let the awe or Artemis fool you — NASA, especially when it comes to science, has been gutted and functionally degraded. For what it’s worth, they’re not focused on earth/climate science.

Re: Artemis II Launch Day Updates

#459
post #446
post #424

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Escape velocity is 25,020 mph (6.95 mps), so not completely surprising. Note that escape velocity applies to a situation without continued propulsion and also without air resistance, but still you can imagine that the order of magnitude is similar.

Not surprising if you know that. Pretty surprising to me who didn’t.

Maybe you’ll like this too: The Earth’s speed around the sun is around 67,000 mph. So it moves significantly faster than the rocket, though not orders of magnitude. The solar system itself moves at 43,000 mph relative to its local neighborhood.

But speed is always just relative to some frame of reference. Acceleration, on the other hand, is absolute, and so might be the more interesting thing to look at here.

Re: Artemis II Launch Day Updates

#460

I’m so glad they lifted off safely. I hope they re-enter safely too.

Heat shield is the concerning part, yeah. I'm thrilled the launch went well but that's the thing to watch for, AFAIK

Mission commander made the call himself I believe if it should go ahead, after talking to the engineers.
Post reply on HN