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Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

esa.int

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Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#391
post #388

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>You are parroting Trump's arguments about defence spending as if the US spending is only concerning NATO, the US spend a lot in defence because it's been your bread and butter to maintain a global reach as a superpower, the moment you lose this you'll see America's influence diminish, if that's what you wish please go ahead and pull out but so far it's been very beneficial to you in the USA to be the de facto global…

> Given the choices presented, I am in fact voting for Trump. Problem? I question your judgment but given other comments I read on HN coming from your username it's actually not that surprising you are taking such an immensely stupid decision. Good luck, you are just a sad unloved human being with strongly emotional opinions, nothing really I can discuss with to land on some common ground.

>I question your judgment but given other comments I read on HN coming from your username it's actually not that surprising you are taking such an immensely stupid decision.

Look: I can pick between a senile elder who can't speak straight under pressure, or someone who ostensibly acts for improving the country (MAGA) even though I don't agree with everything about him.

The Democrats can pick someone else for their candidate and if he's a good one I might vote for him. Doesn't look like that will be the case though.

This is also putting aside the long standing trend of the Left moving further and further left that I, as a center-conservative, am left with choosing the Right all the time every time as the closer of two options. Not entirely my problem the political landscape is this way.

>Good luck, you are just a sad unloved human being

I doubt you know enough about me to make such a bold statement.

>with strongly emotional opinions

Yup. I'm a tired, jaded geezer in his mid 30s now with no more damns left to give, I'm about fed up with dealing with the ramblings of both youngster know-nothings and know-it-all pundits/"experts"/intellectuals. Screw all of you, I'll just go and quietly(loudly?) enjoy life while y'all whine yourselves to death for no good reason.

Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#392
post #388

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Given the choices presented, I am in fact voting for Trump. Problem? I question your judgment but given other comments I read on HN coming from your username it's actually not that surprising you are taking such an immensely stupid decision. Good luck, you are just a sad unloved human being with strongly emotional opinions, nothing really I can discuss with to land on some common ground.

>I question your judgment but given other comments I read on HN coming from your username it's actually not that surprising you are taking such an immensely stupid decision. Look: I can pick between a senile elder who can't speak straight under pressure, or someone who ostensibly acts for improving the country (MAGA) even though I don't agree with everything about him. The Democrats can pick someone else for their ca…

> Look: I can pick between a senile elder who can't speak straight under pressure, or someone who ostensibly acts for improving the country (MAGA) even though I don't agree with everything about him.

> The Democrats can pick someone else for their candidate and if he's a good one I might vote for him. Doesn't look like that will be the case though.

How is trying to overthrow a democracy an improvement for your country? This alone should have completely barred Trump from public life, if not legally at least morally. Instead we from the outside see people like you, defending and voting for a person who is ostensibly and almost transparently against what are your supposed core values. You had 4 years of clear facts on how Trump does not care a single bit about your country if he is not gaining something out of it. You got 4 years of a botched response to a pandemic, packing your Supreme Court with the likes of Clarence Thomas, openly corrupt people (Jared Kusher) in higher echelons of government. To top it off you are voting for someone who stole secret documents on their way out of the highest position in your government.

It's frankly absurd that your judgment is so flawed. Not that Biden is good with his senile mind but at least he is not working against your democracy.

On top of that you have access to "Project 2025" clearly on the internet, you can read exactly what's the plan for a next Trump government and you are still siding on that.

> This is also putting aside the long standing trend of the Left moving further and further left that I, as a center-conservative, am left with choosing the Right all the time every time as the closer of two options. Not entirely my problem the political landscape is this way.

There's no "Left" in the USA, the Democrats are not leftists, they might try to appease more with some social policies but they are very clearly not "Left", if you are a center-conservative but will vote for Trump you are not center anything, you are supporting a brazen antagoniser of democracy, I don't believe that's a centrist position at all, you've been consumed into the Overton window and has a very clear misguided belief. You are falling to magical thinking that Trump will somehow not act worse than on his 1st presidency.

> I doubt you know enough about me to make such a bold statement.

I took note of a past comment from you this week about love being a mental illness, I didn't have to check your history for that because the sadness of that comment got stuck in my mind.

> Yup. I'm a tired, jaded geezer in his mid 30s now with no more damns left to give, I'm about fed up with dealing with the ramblings of both youngster know-nothings and know-it-all pundits/"experts"/intellectuals. Screw all of you, I'll just go and quietly(loudly?) enjoy life while y'all whine yourselves to death for no good reason.

Mid-30s is definitely not a "geezer", I'm well into my mid-30s and as jaded as I got by many aspect of life I'm glad to have accumulated enough wisdom to avoid the worst pitfalls of being an petulant cynical man-child, while also knowing that I'm not wise enough in many other aspects, it's probably part of it.

Your rejection of experts, or intellectualism is another very sad aspect, someone who was born and grew up in one of the wealthiest countries on Earth didn't seem to have got a good enough education to understand their own limits on knowledge, and be able to defer opinions to those who might have acquired it while having a good enough grasp to apply critical thinking. You are stuck in an infantile black-and-white worldview, and instead of trying to improve you've decided it's better to be tired and reject everything.

I understand the pull of ignorance, it does make one happier, it's the lazy way of living. It also makes one stupider.

> I'll just go and quietly(loudly?) enjoy life while y'all whine yourselves to death for no good reason.

You are part of a society, built upon people who cared about improving it over many generations, if taking part on that is no good reason for you, please just don't vote.

It's more odious to me someone choosing to be ignorant after being given all opportunities to not be than someone being ignorant by the lack of them. You are the former case which is absolutely sad.

Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#393
post #392

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I question your judgment but given other comments I read on HN coming from your username it's actually not that surprising you are taking such an immensely stupid decision. Look: I can pick between a senile elder who can't speak straight under pressure, or someone who ostensibly acts for improving the country (MAGA) even though I don't agree with everything about him. The Democrats can pick someone else for their ca…

> Look: I can pick between a senile elder who can't speak straight under pressure, or someone who ostensibly acts for improving the country (MAGA) even though I don't agree with everything about him. > The Democrats can pick someone else for their candidate and if he's a good one I might vote for him. Doesn't look like that will be the case though. How is trying to overthrow a democracy an improvement for your countr…

> On top of that you have access to "Project 2025" clearly on the internet, you can read exactly what's the plan for a next Trump government and you are still siding on that.

That's just a wishlist by a coalition of conservative thinktanks. Trump didn't personally write it, and when he claims he hasn't even read it, I believe him–why would he want to read 922 pages of thinktank verbiage? [0] Obama probably would (as a former constitutional law professor I'm sure he can demolish a thousand pages of blather for breakfast), I doubt Trump's attention span is long enough

If Trump wins in November, they'll spoon feed him this document in bite-sized chunks. And he might actually agree to implement some of it. But I'm sure other bits he'll either reject, or only agree to in some watered-down form. Because he doesn't personally agree with it. Or because he worries about negative political blowback (e.g. the 2026 mid-terms). Or because competing lobbyists/advisors/etc are urging him to do something else instead.

And I reckon if you went looking, you'd find instances of progressive groups publishing "wishlists" or "advice" for potential future Democratic administrations too. No doubt Biden/Obama/Clinton did some of their asks, and failed or refused to do others – just like what's going to happen here, assuming Trump wins (which right now looks more likely than not, but it isn't impossible the Democrats might recover, especially if they swap Biden for someone else)

[0] https://static.project2025.org/2025_MandateForLeadership_FUL...

Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#394
post #392

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I question your judgment but given other comments I read on HN coming from your username it's actually not that surprising you are taking such an immensely stupid decision. Look: I can pick between a senile elder who can't speak straight under pressure, or someone who ostensibly acts for improving the country (MAGA) even though I don't agree with everything about him. The Democrats can pick someone else for their ca…

> Look: I can pick between a senile elder who can't speak straight under pressure, or someone who ostensibly acts for improving the country (MAGA) even though I don't agree with everything about him. > The Democrats can pick someone else for their candidate and if he's a good one I might vote for him. Doesn't look like that will be the case though. How is trying to overthrow a democracy an improvement for your countr…

Oh boy, where shall I even begin. From the top, I guess.

>How is trying to overthrow a democracy an improvement for your country?

Largely a farce narrative, both from the outset and slowly but surely as the courts work their way through all the quagmire.

>Instead we from the outside see people like you, defending and voting for a person who is ostensibly and almost transparently against what are your supposed core values.

>You had 4 years of clear facts on how Trump does not care a single bit about your country if he is not gaining something out of it.

I saw 4 years of North Korea not launching a single missile and even some diplomacy with them, our country not starting any new wars (a god damn miracle), our southern border actually getting secured (relatively speaking), a surging economy pre-covid, FAA getting told to pound sand with their Boeing relationship, Boeing told to GTFO with Air Force One 2 unless they slashed the price (which they did), a lean State Department, and more.

Do I want more? Hell yeah. Wasn't perfect, but what administration ever was?

>You got 4 years of a botched response to a pandemic,

Pretty much every country botched it to varying degrees.

I personally think America was relatively better off because our courts had the guts to rule that long-term abuse of executive emergency powers and other transgressions on Constitutional rights and liberties are not warranted by a pandemic.

>packing your Supreme Court with the likes of Clarence Thomas,

...Do you even know when Justice Thomas was appointed and who nominated him? Appointed in 1991, nominated by George Bush Sr..

That aside, I appreciate having Supreme Court justices who judge based upon the word of the law rather than emotional diatribe like seen from Justice Sotomayor.

>openly corrupt people (Jared Kusher) in higher echelons of government.

Name me one President who didn't have corruption in his cabinet.

>To top it off you are voting for someone who stole secret documents on their way out of the highest position in your government.

So did Biden.

>On top of that you have access to "Project 2025" clearly on the internet, you can read exactly what's the plan for a next Trump government and you are still siding on that.

Heard about it, couldn't care less since it's all just political marketing like similar stuff I've seen in previous elections numerous times.

>There's no "Left" in the USA, the Democrats are not leftists, they might try to appease more with some social policies but they are very clearly not "Left",

Your European political compass is worthless in America, I would suggest re-calibrating that if you want to discuss American politics usefully. Just like my American political compass would be useless when discussing European politics and need re-calibrating.

>if you are a center-conservative but will vote for Trump you are not center anything,

Like I said, I have a choice between the Left (who might also be senile if things don't change) or the Right; and with the Left moving further left every year I am, for better or worse, left to relate more closely to the Right so they get my vote.

>you are supporting a brazen antagoniser of democracy, I don't believe that's a centrist position at all, you've been consumed into the Overton window and has a very clear misguided belief.

The Overton Window left me on account of moving lefter and lefter, as I keep repeating at least twice now.

>I took note of a past comment from you this week about love being a mental illness, I didn't have to check your history for that because the sadness of that comment got stuck in my mind.

So you honestly think you can make a statement about someone off of just one comment? Stunning.

I call romantic love a mental illness because it compels you to do things that defy logic and common sense, especially when seen in hindsight. That's the brain not working right, that's an illness of the mind, a mental illness.

If you think that's sad, more power to you. I'm a happy man.

>Mid-30s is definitely not a "geezer",

YMMV, but I'm feeling the rapid onset of physical aging already to say nothing of mental exhaustion. I'm nowhere as energetic as I was in my 20s.

>Your rejection of experts, or intellectualism is another very sad aspect,

If there's anything the past 8 years have taught me, it's that most "experts" spew bullshit and most examples of intellectualism aren't all that intelligent. I'm very aware of the limits of my own knowledge and understanding, and it is precisely because of that I reject peddlers of false knowledge and information who will only waste my precious time.

In case I'm not clear: There are experts and intellectuals worth listening to, I am saying most claimed examples actually are not.

>You are part of a society, built upon people who cared about improving it over many generations, if taking part on that is no good reason for you, please just don't vote.

I take part in society plentifully, though probably not in ways you want me to. That's fine, you mind your business and I will mine.

If you guys keep on resenting America (the context for this whole sub-thread), sooner or later we really will get tired of the whining and just go have beer somewhere else.

It wouldn't be the first time America wanted nothing to do with Europe either, so be aware it's more likely than you think even without all the prodding. We will always bend over backwards to help out the United Kingdom (our mom!), but the rest of Europe? Stop pressing your luck.

Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#395

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's what I mean by backward-looking. Putin is so obsessed with his perceived stature and "correcting" past humiliations that he's willing to create a completely fictional crisis and drive his country into a never-ending meatgrinder war just to prove some abstract geopolitical point.

Perhaps you don't know that the US in turn had to remove its nukes from Turkey and Italy.

This just goes to show how incomparable the situation is with the Cuban missile crisis. The US has nothing to remove, because their nuclear weapons stand where they stood 40 years ago.

Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#396
post #392

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Look: I can pick between a senile elder who can't speak straight under pressure, or someone who ostensibly acts for improving the country (MAGA) even though I don't agree with everything about him. > The Democrats can pick someone else for their candidate and if he's a good one I might vote for him. Doesn't look like that will be the case though. How is trying to overthrow a democracy an improvement for your countr…

> On top of that you have access to "Project 2025" clearly on the internet, you can read exactly what's the plan for a next Trump government and you are still siding on that. That's just a wishlist by a coalition of conservative thinktanks. Trump didn't personally write it, and when he claims he hasn't even read it, I believe him–why would he want to read 922 pages of thinktank verbiage? [0] Obama probably would (as…

> If Trump wins in November, they'll spoon feed him this document in bite-sized chunks. And he might actually agree to implement some of it. But I'm sure other bits he'll either reject, or only agree to in some watered-down form.

And isn't this already scary enough to reject a Trump presidency? That's what I mean about the Overton window shifting, when some parts of that tome are acceptable as public policy given the foundation of the whole document... It shouldn't be acceptable that any of it would be considered as policy, even less by a stupid ignorant like Trump who won't even read it, much less have any semblance of knowledge for the consequences of applying those policies.

The guy openly states his ignorance and stupidity, and his voters accept that ignorance as a good trait, it's absolutely unfathomable.

Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#397
post #392

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Look: I can pick between a senile elder who can't speak straight under pressure, or someone who ostensibly acts for improving the country (MAGA) even though I don't agree with everything about him. > The Democrats can pick someone else for their candidate and if he's a good one I might vote for him. Doesn't look like that will be the case though. How is trying to overthrow a democracy an improvement for your countr…

Oh boy, where shall I even begin. From the top, I guess. >How is trying to overthrow a democracy an improvement for your country? Largely a farce narrative, both from the outset and slowly but surely as the courts work their way through all the quagmire. >Instead we from the outside see people like you, defending and voting for a person who is ostensibly and almost transparently against what are your supposed core va…

> >How is trying to overthrow a democracy an improvement for your country?

> Largely a farce narrative, both from the outset and slowly but surely as the courts work their way through all the quagmire.

I simply cannot continue a conversation when you can't adhere to a basic reality where a sitting president attempted to overthrow your democracy, playing it down as a "farce narrative" while a mob inflamed by the person you want to vote in invaded the Capitol. It's too absurd you are trying to push this under the rug.

> Your European political compass is worthless in America, I would suggest re-calibrating that if you want to discuss American politics usefully. Just like my American political compass would be useless when discussing European politics and need re-calibrating.

I'm originally Brazilian...

> ...Do you even know when Justice Thomas was appointed and who nominated him? Appointed in 1991, nominated by George Bush Sr..

> That aside, I appreciate having Supreme Court justices who judge based upon the word of the law rather than emotional diatribe like seen from Justice Sotomayor.

You prefer a corrupt judge in the Supreme Court? Taking lavish bribes from friends? That's absolutely absurd, I really can't comprehend this level of acceptance, just tells me clearly how degenerate has politics become in the USA if people participating in this forum who are very well versed in getting information from any source they might want to accept this.

> Name me one President who didn't have corruption in his cabinet.

> So did Biden.

Your whole argument over egregious acts committed under the Trump administration, like a blatant bribe of US$ 2bi for Kushner is based on "who cares? Everyone else also does it" without even considering there are varying levels of corruption, again you are in an infantile black-and-white worldview and I don't think we can meet anywhere when your reality simply doesn't match mine.

I will repeat: you are being an infantile reactionary, the Overton window has not shifted to the Left, when white supremacist discourse is not publicly shocking anymore that is not a leftist shift, you simply do not want or cannot comprehend that. When calling people "vermins", even if illegally immigrating to a country, is normalised you are not on a Left-shift of the Overton window.

> It wouldn't be the first time America wanted nothing to do with Europe either, so be aware it's more likely than you think even without all the prodding. We will always bend over backwards to help out the United Kingdom (our mom!), but the rest of Europe? Stop pressing your luck.

Once again, an infantile opinion "love me, or else..." without acknowledging the complexities of relationships between nations where friction is expected, disagreement is expected, and the mutual benefits of said relationships should prevail over infantile "I feel hurt" responses.

Your stupidly ignorant and reactionary point of view will cause harm, you are choosing to be ignorant about it. Not too unexpected from an American which centers the whole world in their own ego and feelings but still disappointing.

Good luck with the mess you are about to create, unfortunately your ignorance by choice will hurt others but it's not like you seem to care about others anyway.

Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#398
post #383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A rocket that's thrown away was cheaper per flight than the shuttles, which were only partly discarded. It all depends on how much does it cost to build vs refurbish. Falcon 9 was designed to be easily refurbished and Ariane 6 was designed to be cheap to build. It's not just that the Shuttle was expensive to refurbish. It was also very expensive to build. Whereas Falcon 9 is much less expensive to build new than Ar…

>Whereas Falcon 9 is much less expensive to build new than Ariane 6. For context, my understanding is that SpaceX builds one new Falcon 9 upper stage (not reused) every day . I doubt there is another entity on earth building a new rocket every month. SpaceX has a large fleet of Falcon 9 reusable boosters, but still needs to build one every now and then.

> For context, my understanding is that SpaceX builds one new Falcon 9 upper stage (not reused) every day.

Probably not quite that often. They're aiming to launch ~150 this year (although with the recent RUD, that'll be pretty tough). But yeah - 1 every other day is still very impressive.

Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#399
post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> On top of that you have access to "Project 2025" clearly on the internet, you can read exactly what's the plan for a next Trump government and you are still siding on that. That's just a wishlist by a coalition of conservative thinktanks. Trump didn't personally write it, and when he claims he hasn't even read it, I believe him–why would he want to read 922 pages of thinktank verbiage? [0] Obama probably would (as…

> If Trump wins in November, they'll spoon feed him this document in bite-sized chunks. And he might actually agree to implement some of it. But I'm sure other bits he'll either reject, or only agree to in some watered-down form. And isn't this already scary enough to reject a Trump presidency? That's what I mean about the Overton window shifting, when some parts of that tome are acceptable as public policy given the…

> And isn't this already scary enough to reject a Trump presidency?

I'm an outside observer sitting on the other side of the planet looking in. So I'm not personally accepting or rejecting anything.

But I note Trump said a lot of rather frightening stuff in his 2016 campaign–a fair chunk of which he rather quickly walked back on once he walked into the White House. And I'm pretty sure the same thing is going to happen this time around. He sold voters this massive wall on the southern border, he only ever built bits of it – and the random border fencing improvements he did do aren't fundamentally different from what his predecessor or successor have done. He promised a "Muslim ban" – which if he'd actually done it would have been a rather horrific policy – but it morphed into restrictions on citizens from certain countries, and major Muslim states such as Saudi Arabia were off the list, while North Korea (where people debate to what extent Islam even exists, outside of embassy staff and expats) was on it. He was never going to ban his Saudi pals, and I've even heard they knew that all along.

In fact, he's already walking back on some stuff and he hasn't even won yet – e.g. earlier this year he talked very loudly about ending aid to Ukraine, and then suddenly he switched gears and stayed quiet while Congressional Republicans passed a Ukraine aid bill. [0]

Nobody knows what Trump is going to do – including Trump himself – but he's unlikely to actually meet the demands of the most rabid members of the GOP base. He just wants them to think he will. And when he eventually betrays them, they just have to shut up and take it - they might whine a bit, but will anyone be listening? What other choice do they have? [1]

And I expect some Americans who are going to vote for Trump, are viewing it as a gamble – he sounded scary in 2016, yet (at least for them personally) he wasn't actually that bad, so vote for him with the hope the same thing happens this time around. And you'll be warning "this time around is different". And maybe you are right and they'll lose big. Then again, maybe they are right, and they won't. Nobody really knows what the future holds.

[0] https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/was-the-ukraine-aid-...

[1] https://www.politico.com/news/2024/07/08/trump-platform-gop-...

Re: Europe's new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, made its inaugural flight

#400
post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If Trump wins in November, they'll spoon feed him this document in bite-sized chunks. And he might actually agree to implement some of it. But I'm sure other bits he'll either reject, or only agree to in some watered-down form. And isn't this already scary enough to reject a Trump presidency? That's what I mean about the Overton window shifting, when some parts of that tome are acceptable as public policy given the…

> And isn't this already scary enough to reject a Trump presidency? I'm an outside observer sitting on the other side of the planet looking in. So I'm not personally accepting or rejecting anything. But I note Trump said a lot of rather frightening stuff in his 2016 campaign–a fair chunk of which he rather quickly walked back on once he walked into the White House. And I'm pretty sure the same thing is going to happe…

But isn't that just as disqualifying?

If you vote for a normal politician, they have a platform, and that platform is a declaration of intent. (At least to some degree - I know, politicians lie for votes.)

With Trump, he lies so much and so casually and so blatantly, you have no idea what his policies will be. None. There is zero correlation with what he says.

That's not something I'm willing to sign up for. I want at least some idea of what his policies will actually be.

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