What We Lose With the End of the Shuttle Program • Hacker News Board

Re: What We Lose With the End of the Shuttle Program

#71

Post by digikata » Fri, Jul 08, 2011, 2:53 PM UTC

nate_meurer wrote: post #38

digikata wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reward of human exploration is impossible to quantify. You may as well ask what is the risk reward for basic research, philosophy, religion, or art.

I agree, except for the fact that in the field of space exploration humans can now be largely substituted by machines, and will be more so as our machines advance. Philosophy and art do indeed require lots of human intervention. Thankfully, they are cheap, as is much of the basic science research that we should be prioritizing ahead of, say, super sexy space stations.

For my part, I feel that space robots supplement the exploration efforts, but are a poor substitute.

Re: What We Lose With the End of the Shuttle Program

#72

Post by zeemonkee » Fri, Jul 08, 2011, 11:52 PM UTC

hugh3 wrote: post #69

zeemonkee wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The shuttle reminds me of one of those awful software development projects which start with clear, simple goals, until all the "stakeholders" start wanting their pet feature and need to be appeased because they will bring more money to the table, and you end up with a bloated, over-engineered mess.

aka just about every government project ever. Or at least in the last forty years.

Good example of when governments got the job done (P51 Mustang):

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/North_America...

First prototype completed 100 days after the contract signed. In contrast it took decades to build the Eurofighter. Granted a more complex aircraft, but they didn't have CAD back then either.

Re: What We Lose With the End of the Shuttle Program

#73

Post by bdunbar » Mon, Jul 11, 2011, 2:16 PM UTC

zeemonkee wrote: post #72

hugh3 wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

aka just about every government project ever. Or at least in the last forty years.

Good example of when governments got the job done (P51 Mustang): https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/North_America... First prototype completed 100 days after the contract signed. In contrast it took decades to build the Eurofighter. Granted a more complex aircraft, but they didn't have CAD back then either.

Mustang vs Eurofighter isn't really a fair comparison in a number of ways.

The most important, I think, is that Mustang wasn't a government project, but one designed and built by a private company to meet an existing wartime need.

Eurofighter by contrast was a government job start to finish, built by three companies in three countries. Starting with a DNA like that delays and cost overruns are baked into the process.