Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Lunacy of Artemis

idlewords.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

361–370 of 539 posts

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#361

Post by deadbabe »

z0r wrote: post #278
jwells89 wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Long-term habitation of surfaces of bodies other than that of Earth is a stepping stone to being able to live in space long term in very large, permanently spaceborne crafts. It’s easier to develop these things on the moon, mars, etc because of immediate access to materials that’d need to be launched into orbit otherwise. In the long term, it may make sense to build shipyards on the moon, on Mars, or somewhere in the…

Imagine being born in a habitat on another planet that is further away from Earth in travel time than one's lifespan, and being robbed of your birthright to experience the natural wonders and beauty of the cradle of humanity.

You don’t have to imagine too hard. Imagine being born right here on Earth in some shitty country never being allowed to really venture beyond the same 14 mile radius you were born in because you just have to slave away at a job all day and night just to survive. For some, it is life.

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#362

Post by grecy »

lupusreal wrote: post #342
grecy wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine being born on an earth where millions of species have gone extinct, where there are hardly any old growth forests left, no bison roaming the central/western US plains and where thousands of water bodies around the world are so toxic they'll kill you if you fall in.

I feel strongly that I was robbed of my birthright to be a mammoth hunter in a caveman tribe. Man didn't evolve for this industrial society we've created, our machinations have already denied to us our natural condition.

Move North. I spent years up there hunting bison & moose, catching salmon so big my arms hurt, cutting my own firewood to heat my home, helping friends build their log cabins with our bare hands (never got around to building my own...).

You can live that life if you want, plenty of people up there live off grid and only come into town once a month or so.

-48 is a hell of a thing. The most beautiful place I've ever been.

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#363

Post by api »

throwawayffffas wrote: post #213

> Conversely, if SpaceX and Blue Origin can’t make cryogenic refueling work, then NASA has no plan B for landing on the moon. If SpaceX and Blue Origin can't. Then Nasa will find someone who can. Cryogenic refueling is the projects real engineering target. Landing on the moon in the twenty twenties just isn't that impressive anymore. The Artemis program is nominally about going to the moon, but it really isn't. It's…

Hmm... so it's really a half-mission to Mars with the Moon as stand-in?

That makes a lot more sense. It's still sub-optimal but not as bad as it looks at first glance.

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#364

Post by slowmovintarget »

leoedin wrote: post #241
kqr wrote: post #180

I didn't live through the early space programmes, but having read about them recently, I'm surprised by how incremental they (and the Soviet Sputnik and Vostok counterparts) were. - The early Mercury flights developed the idea of putting a human in a capsule on top of an ICBM to see what happens at altitude and during re-entry. - Later Mercury flights experimented with de-orbiting techniques. (The early flights didn'…

Iterative development is the only way you can do R&D. That truth was clearly known by NASA leadership in the 60s in a way that clearly isn’t today. I think it’s probably a symptom of wider culture. In the 60s every major industry was in the middle of a massive improvement cycle, a lot of the engineers would have learned their skills during the R&D boom of the Second World War, and everything was still manufactured lo…

Iterative (repeating) and incremental (additive). We sometimes forget that last part in software development, too.

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#365

Post by dotnet00 »

alexey-salmin wrote: post #360
dotnet00 wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

'Starships keep exploding' is kind of like saying 'tests keep failing' in test-driven development. Yeah, the tests for the stuff you're actively writing or haven't written yet are going to fail until you finish working on them and to someone who doesn't have a debugger it's just going to look like a crash... People have forgotten how much destructive testing NASA used to do back in the Apollo era (eg with the Ranger…

> Starships keep exploding' is kind of like saying 'tests keep failing' in test-driven development. Saturn V had zero failed launches

'test-driven development'

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#366

Post by jhbadger »

lupusreal wrote: post #350
ryandrake wrote: post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're getting piled on, but you're absolutely right. We don't even have the capability to permanently inhabit Antarctica, which has 1. an atmosphere of breathable air at the right pressure, 2. survivable temperature range, 3. abundant water, 4. a magnetic field and radiation shielding, 5. safe transit to and from. How does anyone think we can inhabit Mars, which doesn't have any of these? Build a city of 100K on the…

We definitely have the capability to permanently inhabit Antarctica, except there's nobody who's both willing and permitted to do it. This is also the main problem with Moon/Mars colonies; it could be done but who will pay for it? It's not an economically sound proposal.

The Argentinians claim they have a right to (part of) Antarctica and have made some attempts to create settlements there, not very successfully.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argentine_Antarctica

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#367

Post by spiritbear14 »

moffkalast wrote: post #262
throwawayffffas wrote: post #213

> Conversely, if SpaceX and Blue Origin can’t make cryogenic refueling work, then NASA has no plan B for landing on the moon. If SpaceX and Blue Origin can't. Then Nasa will find someone who can. Cryogenic refueling is the projects real engineering target. Landing on the moon in the twenty twenties just isn't that impressive anymore. The Artemis program is nominally about going to the moon, but it really isn't. It's…

> Then Nasa will find someone who can. Who's even left? Northrop? Lockmart? Adds an extra 10 years to the timeline at the most optimistic.

I think they should give it to Boeing

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#368

Post by moffkalast »

spiritbear14 wrote: post #367
moffkalast wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Then Nasa will find someone who can. Who's even left? Northrop? Lockmart? Adds an extra 10 years to the timeline at the most optimistic.

I think they should give it to Boeing

Ha I was just thinking how after the recent QA whistleblower fiasco and MCAS, one can't really look at Starliner's ongoing list of problems without a sensible chuckle. It truly is the 737 Max of space capsules.

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#369

Post by jhbadger »

usrbinbash wrote: post #351
lupusreal wrote: post #342

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel strongly that I was robbed of my birthright to be a mammoth hunter in a caveman tribe. Man didn't evolve for this industrial society we've created, our machinations have already denied to us our natural condition.

If I could, I would go and be a watchmaker in the 18th century.

There are times and places (including the 18th century) that seem like they could be interesting to live in, but then I consider the lack of indoor plumbing. It's not just the convenience -- the lack of hygienic facilities was a major reason why cholera and other water-transmitted diseases was such a problem even in the West until the late 19th century.

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#370

Post by botro »

usrbinbash wrote: post #263
throwawayffffas wrote: post #213

> Conversely, if SpaceX and Blue Origin can’t make cryogenic refueling work, then NASA has no plan B for landing on the moon. If SpaceX and Blue Origin can't. Then Nasa will find someone who can. Cryogenic refueling is the projects real engineering target. Landing on the moon in the twenty twenties just isn't that impressive anymore. The Artemis program is nominally about going to the moon, but it really isn't. It's…

> It's about building and living in habitats beyond low orbit And what for if I may ask? And please don't say "technological development" or "colonizing space". ad Development): Most of the tech that needs to be developed for this, is what is commonly called space plumbing: Figuring out ways to make human bodily functions not immediately fail in space. Next to none of these technologies benefit humanity at large in a…

I think if we follow your logic exactly, and make mathematically optimal decisions in every instance, leaving no space for the human spirit - we're robots anyway and may as well go to space!
Post reply on HN