Blue Origin thread.

[RCgothic]

Also, yes, Musk and Bezos can both be collosal members. They are both ruthless, have little to no patience, and work hours that (at least in Musk's case) lead to occasional public breakdowns. I particularly dislike the way Musk slandered and libelled a mine rescuer for no better reason than the guy didn't Musk's crazy cave submarine idea.

That was low. There's no excuse for that sort of behaviour.

But liking and respecting are two different things. These are the two richest guys in the world and they've built that success themselves and they've had to work for it.

There is an Aphorism: How do you become a millionaire? Start as a billionaire and found a space company. 

Neither of these guys are in the space game for profit. They're using their resources to improve access to space to build a better future.

Musk wants to take us to other planets because he believes if we don't then ultimately something is going to wipe us or and we will have no future.

Bezos wants to take all industry offworld to space so that we can stop trashing our own planet and it can become a paradise. Musk wants to get us off gasoline for the same reason - it's why he founded Tesla.

Liking these guys is not mandatory. They can be pretty unlikeable.

But respect? How can anyone not?

Edited May 7, 2021 by RCgothic

[tater]

5 minutes ago, SpaceFace545 said:

Literally no mars colony can be self sufficient. it's not a backup. 

Atleast a space station would be closer to home. and much closer at that

The first is definitionally untrue. If a Mars colony could be established that was self-sufficient, and had the required genetic diversity, it's a backup.

I don't go in for Mars colonies, myself, but I can still acknowledge that given the right colony, it's true.

Stations have some small backup value, but the same rules apply (100% self-sufficient, and enough genetic diversity)—if they are in cislunar space, they suffer from being near where some cosmic catastrophe might happen (planet killer).

My personal take is that both are OK goals, build both and see what works—and in the meantime, the stuff required to build either protects us from the disaster even happening.

[Hannu2]

9 minutes ago, RealKerbal3x said:

What about protecting human life from some future catastrophe? If we have humans living elsewhere in the solar system, a nuclear war or asteroid impact won't wipe us out entirely.

Bezos' plan for giant space stations would likely produce similar benefits - a backup for Earth's biosphere.

It can be ideological objective in very far future. But it is hard to imagine as motivation for begin interplanetary living. It takes probably hundreds of years before colony could be enough self sufficient to work as backup and could not help in any case now living people. Probably curiosity is more important motivation at beginning phase.

It is also very difficult to believe so extreme conditions that it would be easier to survive in space than anywhere on Earth.

[tater]

16 minutes ago, tater said:

Simple question, in an ideal human future, are we limited to living on Earth exclusively forever?

 

[SpaceFace545]

11 minutes ago, Beccab said:

I mean, why? Mars has water albeit not liquid (and theoretically it could be created on site as well), and Perseverance already demonstrated oxygen production on site. I could understand if you said "in the next decade" or something like that, but it's definitely possible

Good for them I guess. I’ve done that at high school, turning simple molecules into more simple molecules doesn’t prove that people can viably love there. Think about the psychological impacts of living in a metal cave your whole life. And the fact that cosmic radiation will likely give you cancer earlier then people on earth or that any children born and raised on Mars probably wouldn’t ever be able to live back on earth. It also takes much more than protein pills to raise a healthy human thus anyone’s growth would be severely stunted. A Mars colony would also likely fall prey to the circumstances that many of the first pilgrim colonies came to face; food shortages, disease, inbreeding, and resorting to an authoritarian regime so the people in power can stay afloat.

[RCgothic]

Those are all valid things to be considered, but none of them make a Mars or orbital colony impossible.

Unlike the first pilgrims we do actually now know now what constitutes basic nutrition and sufficient generic diversity.

 

[mikegarrison]

51 minutes ago, RCgothic said:

Unlike the first pilgrims we do actually now know now what constitutes basic nutrition and sufficient generic diversity.

... mostly. We still argue like heck over "good" versus "bad" fats, etc.

1 hour ago, Hannu2 said:

It is also very difficult to believe so extreme conditions that it would be easier to survive in space than anywhere on Earth.

Yes, there is nowhere in this solar system that is as conducive to human life as the place where humans evolved to fit the environment.

I don't believe it is impossible for us to find other places to live. I also don't think it is impossible for us to F up the Earth to the point we would have to. But the combination of both of those things happening together is much more likely in fiction than in reality.

[tater]

Bezos (this is the BO thread after all) wants Earth to be more park like, with nasty industry moved away to space. As a result, "millions of people living and working in space."

L5 guy that he is, this is presumably orbital. Obviously non-trivial to build, but at least you can make it 1g (since we have zero data on what 0.38g does to humans long term).

If he wants to move that process along he needs to be a little less gradatim, and a little more ferociter.

[SpaceFace545]

42 minutes ago, tater said:

Bezos (this is the BO thread after all) wants Earth to be more park like, with nasty industry moved away to space. As a result, "millions of people living and working in space."

L5 guy that he is, this is presumably orbital. Obviously non-trivial to build, but at least you can make it 1g (since we have zero data on what 0.38g does to humans long term).

If he wants to move that process along he needs to be a little less gradatim, and a little more ferociter.

I agree with Bezos. Move the factories up and let the earth be a garden again. 

[SOXBLOX]

Mmm, I don't see it. I just have a hard time believing space logistics will outdo planetside supply chains.

[CatastrophicFailure]

27 minutes ago, SOXBLOX said:

Mmm, I don't see it. I just have a hard time believing space logistics will outdo planetside supply chains.

A couple hundred years ago no one would have thought we’d be sending raw materials to China and receiving the finished products, all for dirt cheap, either. Bezos’ vision makes more sense when you consider such raw materials would ideally be coming from asteroids, too. All the messy stuff stays up there, mostly run by machines, and we get finished products down here. 

[SpaceFace545]

37 minutes ago, SOXBLOX said:

Mmm, I don't see it. I just have a hard time believing space logistics will outdo planetside supply chains.

Space logistics will never outdo supply chains on earth nor will factories ever migrate to space but I can see a future where technical manufacturing like pharmaceuticals could be moved up but stuff that relies on raw humans for labour such as textiles will always stay on the ground.

[SOXBLOX]

2 hours ago, CatastrophicFailure said:

A couple hundred years ago no one would have thought we’d be sending raw materials to China and receiving the finished products, all for dirt cheap, either. Bezos’ vision makes more sense when you consider such raw materials would ideally be coming from asteroids, too. All the messy stuff stays up there, mostly run by machines, and we get finished products down here. 

We still have tons of land area, and even more resources. Until we run out of those, Terra is cheaper. Maybe we need higher concentrations of some specific things (rare earths), but for the most part, there's no economic reason to go to space. Or to build colonies and vacuum-adapted factories at great expense for little reward.

On the other hand, if BO did pull this off, then Amazon would be the first space megacorp. Weyland-Yutani, here we come! 

[Hannu2]

1 hour ago, SpaceFace545 said:

Space logistics will never outdo supply chains on earth nor will factories ever migrate to space but I can see a future where technical manufacturing like pharmaceuticals could be moved up but stuff that relies on raw humans for labour such as textiles will always stay on the ground.

You are in prestigious gang with this statement. You must have heard for example:

“heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible” from lord Kelvin in 1895

or

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." from Thomas Watson, president of IBM, 1943

But if you are famous in your real life after couple of hundreds of years people will laugh to your statement.

You are correct that those thing are not directly foreseeable at current tech level. And if you think our lifetime you are clearly right. But in longer periods there is no real obstacles. It is extremely expensive project to move mining and manufacturing industry to space but it can lead to almost infinite growth. There are many orders of magnitude more raw materials in space and no need to care pollution or other environmental aspects. Space will not be safe and comfort workplace for humans but there are always people who are willing to take risks if you pay well and there is probably not much need for human work. On the other hand, huge rotating space stations with gravity enough to keep people health may give orders on magnitude more living room for mankind.

It would be interesting to se what happens to Earth at long run, when significant part of humans live in space or on other celestial bodies. Will it be exclusive natural paradise for rich people and average people live in space stations around the solar system? Or will rich people live in luxury space stations, average people in huge middle class stations and poor people on old fashioned Earth with all nasty natural problems? Will the Earth be some kind of natural preservation zone where lives some extreme conservative people in relatively primitive conditions?

5 minutes ago, SOXBLOX said:

We still have tons of land area, and even more resources. Until we run out of those, Terra is cheaper. Maybe we need higher concentrations of some specific things (rare earths), but for the most part, there's no economic reason to go to space. Or to build colonies and vacuum-adapted factories at great expense for little reward.

This is only apparent but not real fact. We can not use all land and resources because environment problems will be much more expensive than profits. We have already probably exceeded long term sustainable level of land using for our industrial and agriculture needs. Environmental problems and expensive countermeasures are already severe restriction for economic growth on Earth and will increase every decade in future.

[Beccab]

Serious question, would the crewed New Shepard flight this July give BO any first in the space industry? Not internal ones like the obvious first NS flight with people, i mean more like inspiration 4's first full civilian crew

[SOXBLOX]

8 hours ago, Hannu2 said:

We can not use all land and resources because environment problems will be much more expensive than profits

Aaaand so the environmental problems in the Gobi Desert, where there's breathable atmosphere and no dangerous radiation, are harder to deal with than the problems in space? Hah!

8 hours ago, Hannu2 said:

You are in prestigious gang with this statement. You must have heard for example:

Ehm, no. I think it's feasible. I just don't think that there's enough money in it for folks. Sure, if you got all the different pieces of space industry to line up perfectly and simultaneously, it would work. But who knows. Maybe we'll see this happen someday.

[cubinator]

8 hours ago, Beccab said:

Serious question, would the crewed New Shepard flight this July give BO any first in the space industry? Not internal ones like the obvious first NS flight with people, i mean more like inspiration 4's first full civilian crew

I think BO would be the first suborbital spaceflight with a tourist. 

[SpaceFace545]

1 minute ago, cubinator said:

I think BO would be the first suborbital spaceflight with a tourist. 

but not the first or even the second spaceflight with tourists. And inspiration 4 won't be the first orbital spaceflight with tourists either.

[Beccab]

5 minutes ago, SpaceFace545 said:

And inspiration 4 won't be the first orbital spaceflight with tourists either.

I'm aware, I said it will have the first full civilian crew. Also, do you mean that it will be technically the first *suborbital* flight with tourists but that there were already orbital flights with tourists? I'm not sure I understood correctly

Edited May 7, 2021 by Beccab

[cubinator]

3 minutes ago, Beccab said:

I'm aware, I said it will have the first full civilian crew. Also, do you mean that it will be technically the first *suborbital* flight with tourists but that there were already orbital flights with tourists? I'm not sure I understood correctly

Yes, there have been a few tourist astronauts in years past, mainly on Soyuz. There was even a schoolteacher on one Shuttle flight, but her rocket did not make it to space...

[Beccab]

Just now, cubinator said:

Yes, there have been a few tourist astronauts in years past, mainly on Soyuz. There was even a schoolteacher on one Shuttle flight, but her rocket did not make it to space...

Ah, got it now. Thank you

Since they were all suborbital before making it to orbit don't they count too as "first suborbital flight with tourists"?

[cubinator]

Just now, Beccab said:

Ah, got it now. Thank you

Since they were all suborbital before making it to orbit don't they count too as "first suborbital flight with tourists"?

Hmm. I suppose by KSP contract conventions, they would. So perhaps Blue gets the badge for 'first suborbital flight with a tourist that did NOT also go to orbit'. Which would not catch much attention from the Kerbin world record keeping organization.

[SpaceFace545]

2 minutes ago, Beccab said:

Ah, got it now. Thank you

Since they were all suborbital before making it to orbit don't they count too as "first suborbital flight with tourists"?

Yep, some tourists have even been to the iss. Space tourism isn’t a new thing it’s just billionaires inflated it’s imagery with social media in the past few years

[Beccab]

3 minutes ago, cubinator said:

'first suborbital flight with a tourist that did NOT also go to orbit'

That's very Blue Origin style

Edited May 7, 2021 by Beccab

[mikegarrison]

10 hours ago, Hannu2 said:

You are in prestigious gang with this statement. You must have heard for example:

“heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible” from lord Kelvin in 1895

or

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." from Thomas Watson, president of IBM, 1943

But if you are famous in your real life after couple of hundreds of years people will laugh to your statement.

Why don't people ever quote all the famous people who claimed perpetual motion was impossible?

Sometimes when people make these statements, they turn out to be true (as far as we know yet).

30 minutes ago, Beccab said:

That's very Blue Origin style

To be fair, it's also SpaceX style: "The first orbital class booster (not that it went to orbit) to propulsively land and be reused."

It's also "any-company-with-a-marketing-department" style.

Edited May 7, 2021 by mikegarrison