NASA's Manned Rocket Contract: $4.2 Billion To Boeing, $2.6 Billion To SpaceX 188
schwit1 writes NASA has chosen two companies to ferry astronauts to and from the International Space Station, and those companies are Boeing and SpaceX. This decision confirms that SpaceX is ready to go and gives the company the opportunity to finish the job, while also giving Boeing the chance to show that it can still compete. After NASA has certified that each company has successfully built its spacecraft, SpaceX and Boeing will each fly two to six missions. The certification process will be step-by-step, similar to the methods used in the cargo contracts, and will involve five milestones. The contracts will be paid incrementally as they meet these milestones. One milestone will be a manned flight to the ISS, with one NASA astronaut on board. Boeing will receive $4.2 billion, while SpaceX will get $2.6 billion. These awards were based on what the companies proposed and requested.
Six Missoins Each (Score:5, Informative)
It was clarified later that both companies would fly six missions each (not counting the test mission).
I don't know if the director misspoke or was misunderstood, but she said later in the conference call they have the same requirements for the number of missions.
Re:Six Missoins Each (Score:5, Insightful)
They both got essentially the same contract, the dollar value represents what the companies bid for it, rather than establishing a first/second place.
Basically, the both won an equal contract. On the one hand, it sucks for SpaceX that they get less money to do the same thing, but on the other hand, it will put quite a feather in their cap to be able to demonstrate concretely that they can live up to their claims of doing it for less, which will give them a huge edge in the next round of contracts. Next time they can say "Look, we did everything just as well as Boeing, but we cost you a ton less. This time you should give us most of the flights."
Re:Six Missoins Each (Score:4, Interesting)
On the one hand, it sucks for SpaceX that they get less money to do the same thing
It wouldn't suck if they made more profit on less revenue.
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It wouldn't suck if they made more profit on less revenue.
Sure it could.
For example, Boeing could take the $4B and spend $5B on R&D having negative profit; while SpaceX could take the $2B and make $1B profit.
But then Boeing's technology will have improved by $5B in R while SpaceX's will have only benefited 1/5th as much
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It wouldn't suck if they made more profit on less revenue.
Sure it could.
For example, Boeing could take the $4B and spend $5B on R&D having negative profit; while SpaceX could take the $2B and make $1B profit.
But then Boeing's technology will have improved by $5B in R while SpaceX's will have only benefited 1/5th as much
Boeing could take the $4B and spend $5B on R&D, then be awarded another $2B to cover unforeseen expenses ... (FTFY)
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You are missing the point that the amount of money invested into R&D actually means something. As it stands I have the impression that each dollar spent by SpaceX in R&D has about the 10x impact then Boeing's R&D. SpaceX is extremely lean and have quite something to show for it. The problem with Boeing's R&D is that most of it is classified in some military contracts and as such hard to evaluate from the outside.
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If Boeing gets the same "Bang for the Buck" that SpaceX gets that's a very valid point, but my suspicion is SpaceX is going to get more bang for the buck than Boeing can. SpaceX has one mission, but Boeing has it's finger's into a lot of pies and that has to color their respective corporate cultures.
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SpaceX has been building, flying and recovering Dragon modules for a couple of years now. Boeing has not. That extra couple of billion dollars that Boeing got wa
Re:Six Missoins Each (Score:5, Interesting)
Speaking as a fellow non-American, I'm thrilled. The better SpaceX does, the lower their costs will be, and the more likely that the CSA (Canadian Space Agency) will be able to afford their services.
The CSA's annual budget is only around half a billion dollars per year, around 25% per-capita what the US spends on NASA. That wouldn't have even been enough to afford a shuttle flight. But with SpaceX's pricing, Canada can afford to launch our own stuff via private industry. We've already used SpaceX to launch a satellite (CASSIOPE) much cheaper than the alternatives, and if SpaceX hits their manned spaceflight target of $20 million a seat, Canada could actually afford to do its own manned launch with SpaceX. As in, a flight with only Canadian astronauts would actually be something that our meagre budget could afford. And we can always use more Chris Hadfields :)
Basically, the better SpaceX does, the more Canada can do with its limited space budget. Exciting times!
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My Guess (Score:5, Insightful)
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Perhaps. I suppose one reason is that SpaceX will be doing a very cutting edge design with little baggage to hold it back. Boeing will do a much more conservative design.
Then the two will be compared to each other to see how well they compare and to
Re:My Guess (Score:4, Insightful)
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It's not as cut and dry as one is more expensive than the other either. Let's not forget that Boeing has not participated in the COTS funding to nearly the degree that SpaceX has.
It's true that CTS-100 hasn't flown yet. But the only reason Dragon has flown has been because NASA funded the COTS missions. SpaceX received $396M from that program alone. The ISS CRS missions have awarded SpaceX another $1.6B in contracts. So it makes sense that there will be a lot of overlap in that $2B. After all the ca
Re:My Guess (Score:5, Interesting)
There's another factor that everyone is ignoring - SpaceX is proposing a craft that's a modification of an existing vehicle and which is also expected to be subsidized by commercial use. Boeing on the other hand is proposing a craft that's clean-sheet new and has no other customers.
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Boeing on the other hand is proposing a craft that's clean-sheet new and has no other customers.
That is better because?
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I didn't say it was better - or worse. I merely pointed out that the two bids were not identical, and thus comparisons drawn on the basis (assumption) that they were identical were deeply flawed.
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Boeing on the other hand is proposing a craft that's clean-sheet new and has no other customers.
That is better because?
He didn't say anything about one being better than the other (#fileitundereadingcomprehension.)
With that said, from a fault-tolerant point of view, this makes absolute sense. It would be extremely hard and un-probable that any major flaws in one system will be present in the other system. This has been a typical way to create redundant, fault-tolerant solutions, expensive, but totally appropriate when critical systems are concerned.
Re-using an existing design has the advantage of leveraging known factor
That's government spending for you.. (Score:4, Insightful)
Boeing - Giant Company - $4.2B for a space vehicle that is still in design.
SpaceX - Space Startup - $2.6B for a space vehicle that works and has been flying missions for two years.
Spend your money more wisely.
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Re:That's government spending for you.. (Score:5, Insightful)
SpaceX has promise, but Boeing has shown it can deliver.
...eventually, and only after the requisite pork has been spread across a multitude of states and subcontractors to keep the requisite congress-critters happy. :(
Not to knock Boeing's technical prowess, but damn - they do know how to play the game (which explains why they're getting a piece of the contract most likely...)
As a very apt comparison, go back to the days when the F-16 first came out: relatively cheap, by some upstart company (General Dynamics), a revolutionary design, the first 9-G capable fighter, and was an all-around workhorse that could do (within reason) damned near anything you demanded of it. It's still in production today (albeit as a division of Lockheed-Martin), with a design that stands to be around for decades to come. Compare and contrast this with, oh, the F-35/6/whatever that's been nothing but a massive money-sink to date.
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General dynamics was around since 1900, and obtained Convair and Canadair in the 50's, so I don't think "some upstart" is really apt.
(it was called "electric boat" before then, as it mostly made subs (which they still make))
waltz, foxtrot, tango (Score:2)
SpaceX has promise, but Boeing has shown it can deliver.
...eventually, and only after the requisite pork has been spread across a multitude of states and subcontractors to keep the requisite congress-critters happy. :(
Not to knock Boeing's technical prowess, but damn - they do know how to play the game (which explains why they're getting a piece of the contract most likely...)
As a very apt comparison, go back to the days when the F-16 first came out: relatively cheap, by some upstart company (General Dynamics), a revolutionary design, the first 9-G capable fighter, and was an all-around workhorse that could do (within reason) damned near anything you demanded of it. It's still in production today (albeit as a division of Lockheed-Martin), with a design that stands to be around for decades to come. Compare and contrast this with, oh, the F-35/6/whatever that's been nothing but a massive money-sink to date.
Did you just called GD an "upstart" (relative to the time the F-16 was built)? #youarenuts
GD is a century old tech mega-ass conglomerate (think GE of defense) that builds from armored vehicles to fighters to satellites to naval warships to communication systems to artillery, you name it, with branches all over the world.
If GD was an upstart at the time the F16 was being build, I'm batman!
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Boeing - Giant company able to funnel money to appropriate Senators and congressmen
SpaceX - Small company able to funnel less money than Boeing to anyone.
Stop voting for Republicrats and Demicans.
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He's too polite to call you a brainwashed dope.
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And your point would be?
He had no point, so he had to rely in the good old ad hominem fallacy.
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The only people who say that are people who would never vote for a Libertarian or a Republican. As in NEVER.
I voted Republican most of my life, and I say that. So your statement is false. Proof by fucking contradiction bitches.
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Boeing is the ISS's primary contractor.. they designed and built a lot of it. I don't see how it is unreasonable to grant them as much as they did in relation to SpaceX - even though I personally much rather see SpaceX make something amazing for less as I expect they will.
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Get your facts more straight. Dragon V2 is in fact derived from the Dragon CRS, but it's not the same vehicle and emphatically has not been flying for two years.
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Boeing - Giant Company - $4.2B for a space vehicle that is still in design. SpaceX - Space Startup - $2.6B for a space vehicle that works and has been flying missions for two years.
Spend your money more wisely.
We are talking about NASA and space exploration, not implementing and deploying ER software systems. Re-using existing designs is a very acceptable approach, but for the type of R&D and work that this involves, NASA (and we) need to also explore new designs. The time to do is now.
I think *our* money is well spent by funding both proposals and to put them into competition. The point is not just to have someone deliver something, but to do R&D and extend our body of engineering knowledge. Our money
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It was cheese rated.
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And the speculation was completely off (Score:5, Interesting)
Not Boeing alone, and not SpaceX alone. This is the best possible outcome for NASA, not reliant on a single supplier like before.
The fact that to deliver the same development and certification process costs $1.6 billion less for SpaceX over Boeing is also interesting. Some are already saying that it is a bigger win for Boeing and that SpaceX is a backup plan, but since the amounts are what the two companies bid on the project, it shows how economical SpaceX believes they can be.
And that there are two companies still competing should reduce the risk of deliberate cost-overruns and delays. If one can get to full certification a year or more ahead of the other, it will be a huge blow to the second-place finisher's chances to win the final operational contract.
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The fact that to deliver the same development and certification process costs $1.6 billion less for SpaceX over Boeing is also interesting.
We won't really know this is true until it happens. I have high hopes for SpaceX - specifically I hope they can do much more with less. Either way though, this is a big win for everyone!
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If some new startup had some better/cheaper/faster alternative to Oracle we'd probably try them out where I work, but I bet they'd get 1/10th the money we're willing to pay Oracle. Trust is a valuable thing. (and yea, I know Oracle sucks, but they aren't going out of business anytime soon)
Don't assume SpaceX is getting less money because their better. SpaceX is getting less money because they know if they charged the same as Boeing there's no way in hell they would have gotten the contract.
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Re:And the speculation was completely off (Score:4, Insightful)
It's not the same development and certification process - as SpaceX will be flying a modification of an existing (certified) spacecraft, while Boeing's is a new and unflown design.
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I didn't follow the speculation, but perhaps you'd know: did they realize that splitting was an option? Did Boeing and SpaceX each get half a loaf, or did NASA somehow manage to "grow the pie"?
If so, where will they dig up additional billions in funding? If not, will either SpaceX or Boeing be able to accomplish a large fraction of the work for a fraction of the funding they'd hoped to get?
I'm ecstatic to see them say "Why not both?", since if the government is going to be spending tax dollars, I'd rather s
Could have been worse (Score:3)
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It's not a matter of whether Boeing deserves the extra cash or not. Deserve has nothing to do with it.
Boeing simply cannot (and will not) do it for less than the $4.2 billion, otherwise they'd be losing money. But SpaceX can do the same job for less, at $2.6 billion. So you could say SpaceX is much more efficient than Boeing.
So why didn't NASA just give the whole thing to SpaceX and save money? Redundancy, hedging your bets, not putting all your eggs in one basket, etc.
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I don't think the right choice was made here, but I'm not privy to all the information used to make the decision. I hope SNC stays
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The Dreamchaser can still be awarded a contract. NASA described several "On Ramps" where if they finish their paperwork and do a little but of 'make-up' work they can still pass. ;)
It makes sense. Dreamchaser just wasn't ready for this round. But it's good that NASA has a contingency for projects that are farther behind but still long term viably good competition.
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Wow, I am impressed (Score:4, Interesting)
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SpaceX's excellent track record? Ship me some of what you're smoking, as it must be good stuff. (Seriously, where do you guys get this stuff?)
SpaceX's track record is far from excellent. The first flight of the Falcon 9 was six months late, the first flight of the Falcon/Dragon COTS was two years late. (And that's pretty m
Rocket Science (Score:2)
What was that expression?? oh yeah, "It isn't rocket science" which is used to convey that everything is relatively easy compared to rocket science.
It's not an iPhone... even the iPhone is an example of the pinnacle of human manufacturing (note the use of "an" not "the.) A mass produced wireless super computer that fits in a pocket and understands the spoken word better than a congressman.
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They have an excellent track record of what exactly?
Unmanned space flight of course. Given the money they have spent (hundreds of millions instead of billions), their results are amazing so far.
Do you think it's a wise decision to award a contract to a single supplier when that supplier has sort of a little bit of somewhat history doing something that's a little similar to what you're trying to accomplish?
Where do you get all that, the GP post implies 2 instead of one is a good idea. Especially to keep Boeing in check.
SpaceX has had to do none of this because it was all done for them.
It is obvious that if SpaceX had to do everything from scratch, they would not have bid just $2.6b for manned spaceflight. And would not require just 3 years. However how is this relevant to anything? Companies use existing technology/knowledge. Do you me
Commercial Crew Press Conference (Score:5, Interesting)
After watching the Commercial Crew presser this afternoon, I was surprised at how lame the NASA people came off.
NASA director Charlie Bolden simply read verbatim from an email he sent earlier to NASA employees. He spent most of his time aggrandizing the Orion space capsule (Apollo-derived) and its launch vehicle SLS (space shuttle-derived) without devoting much time at all to the commercial crew effort.
Commercial Crew manager Kathy Leuders came off like an old Bob-and-Ray skit where she was armed with only three bits of information and that was all you're going to get out of her. Somebody asked her about the Boeing reliance on Russian rocket engines and her answer was not exactly convincing.
There was an astronaut there who waxed poetic about seeing the Milky Way from the space station. One other NASA guy had nothing significant to add.
Bottom line? Each company (Boeing and SpaceX) bid what they thought the job was worth; NASA awarded them what they asked for. Boeing got nearly twice the funding for a conservative, unimaginative Apollo capsule with a Russian-based launch vehicle. Most of the newsmen asking questions were suspicious about this, as am I.
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What's wrong with a "conservative unimaginative" design? This wasn't intended to be a beauty contest or to provide geek stroke material, it's a contract for workaday vehicles and services. And as for costs, you've got to remember the difference between the vehicles - SpaceX bid a derivative of an existing craft (I.E. with a lot of the development already paid for), while Boeing bid a new design. Comparing straight up doll
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I'd argue that the propulsive landing of dragon 2 makes it considerably more capable than apollo era capsules.
Re:Commercial Crew Press Conference (Score:4, Informative)
"SpaceX is going to have to launch on the same *Lockheed* Atlas V initially as Boeing is"
Fat chance that will ever happen. Falcon 9 has triply-redundant avionics systems, and 2-engine out capability while still completing the mission. I'd be surprised if they have serious difficulty getting Falcon 9 man-rated. They had loss of an engine on a previous cargo flight and still made it to the space station.
SpaceX Minecraft (Score:5, Insightful)
Wow - Java Computer game licensing ... 2.5 billion, the future of America's space dreams ... 2.6 billion.
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Solomon has spoken... (Score:2)
Welp, they sure split that baby.
(No seriously. Remember, the point of Solomon's judgement was to use a decision that's bad for both sides to determine who the real winner should be in the end. Same here. I'm betting we'll see Boeing whine, delay, and run over budget while SpaceX gets down and builds some rockets, but either way, in a few years we'll see who the manned spacecraft baby really belongs to.)
What does this mean for SLS (Score:2)
I'm confused, What does this mean for SLS. Does this mean SLS goes away (if only we could be so lucky).
Squad, take note! (Score:2)
This is how it had to be (Score:2)
You can't unwind the tentacles of the military-industrial complex all at once. You also can't ignore SpaceX and how well they have been doing.
This award is simply acknowledging reality. Boeing has to get some pork to keep the lobbyists happy, SpaceX has to get some money to keep them in the running. It will be a slow shift over time as SpaceX continues to deliver for less money.
SpaceX is playing the game... why do you think they are opening a spaceport in Texas? Gotta spread those jobs around to keep Congre
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Unfortunately that cash can't magically feed and hydrate all the starving children in Africa or wherever your tears fall for.
If it could, you'd have a point. Unfortunately (for your point) it can't.
Re:I hate to be this guy... (Score:5, Insightful)
However, a mission to Mars would require research into food preservation which is one of the largest problems to getting food into remote areas of the world and maintaining nutritional value for the people who need to consume it. For ever argument you can throw at NASA being a waste of money, I can counter that argument with a reason why NASA improves life.
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Is NASA researching how to get food past corrupt warlords and government officials now?
Re:I hate to be this guy... (Score:4, Informative)
The biggest problem getting food into remote areas and is making sure it reaches the people who need it. We could feed the whole world today, but there are people with vested interests in making sure that we don't.
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Firstly, where do you plan to evacuate a significant percentage of the world's population to ? Secondly, how are you going to decide who is worthy of evacuation and who has just put his gun down and is hiding with the locals to make sure he can carry on the abuse and oppression in their new location ? Finally, how are you going to get this food to them ?
Food nutrition or availability isn't the problem - the problem is identifying valid recipients and then getting it past every government agent, checkpoint t
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For ever argument you can throw at NASA being a waste of money, I can counter that argument with a reason why NASA improves life.
But the "Feed the poor!" doesn't (shouldn't) even enter into that conversation.
Because it won't happen. Curing world poverty will not happen.
Curing world poverty is a liberal version of "the free market" or "trickle down economics". Ideas that simply don't work.
We could eliminate every science and technical program in the entire world, and put all of the money "saved" into feeding the poor. We would just end up with more poor that need fed. And stagnant technology.
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Interesting.. have you considered the fact that civilization doesn't need to grind to a halt until your pet political projects are taken care of?
Did you wake up this morning and feed someone less fortunate? I bought a homeless guy a sandwich this weekend. Have you volunteered or done *anything* to help people in the third world?
No?
Oh, but you're mad that NASA, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, is exploring space, as stated in their damned name.
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I would like to point out this story: How the Critics of the Apollo Program Were Proven Wrong [slashdot.org] Of course this is limited to the economic impact in the US, but the I subscribe to the general gist.
Currently starvation and access to drinking water is almost exclusively an economic problem. Although I am not basically opposed to welfare and foreign aid programs, it turns out that getting people to work and letting them pay for their needs more effective in the long run.
So yes, we should build more rockets!
Re:I hate to be this guy... (Score:5, Informative)
...but people are still dying of starvation and lack of water on THIS planet. =\
I know space exploration is very important, but shit, let's get real here. I feel guilty driving a newer model Honda Civic knowing that if I bought something cheaper I could maybe feed someone less fortunate.
That's a good point, and that's why we spent several trillions of dollars on welfare and foreign aid since the space program began.
The question you didn't ask, but should, is "What are our priorities in spending?"
You say welfare is more important than space exploration. It appears this is correct because we spend vastly more money on welfare.
Nasa takes about a half percent of the federal budget. What percent would you have it be?
Here's where all the money is really going. This kind of shows how relatively trivial is the amount we're spending on NASA.
http://mentalfloss.com/article... [mentalfloss.com]
Re:I hate to be this guy... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I hate to be this guy... (Score:5, Insightful)
Here's how the war on poverty is doing: http://dailycaller.com/2014/09... [dailycaller.com]
Thanks for the link, it has some numbers that show how relatively little NASA costs.
From the article:
The government has spent some $22 trillion on means-tested welfare programs since the War on Poverty began (in constant 2012 dollars).
This does not include Social Security, Medicare, nor unemployment insurance.
All of NASA's spending since 1958 totals 790 billion (inflation adjusted).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B... [wikipedia.org]
This provides some data on the direct benefits of the space program:
http://er.jsc.nasa.gov/seh/eco... [nasa.gov]
Keep in mind that without the space program, there would be no DirectTV and we would be dependent upon Comcast.
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So why are people of the world still dying of starvation? Maybe instead of throwing money at the problem we can research what works.
Human history shows millennia of improved food production and distribution, and the result is a temporary boon followed by a population increase that consumes all the increased production. Want to fix things, break that cycle. Don't naively think more money or food will end hunger. You have to change and modernize the culture of the populations subject to famine.
That was my point, STOP spending on things like space until the problem is fixed, ...
We can do more than one thing at a time. Go off to Africa and be an emissary of cultural change, that won't cost much money. NASA can continue with
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The cycle of expansion to consume available food seems to break down when people get into a modern society and have access to birth control. The ideal way to control overpopulation would be to get the entire planet to first-world government and economic standards. If there's an actual famine, sending food does help, provided the food can get to hungry people. Otherwise, money is better invested in raising the overall standard of living.
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People don't generally starve to death outside of conflict areas. If you want to end world hunger, you need to solve regional politics.
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Re:I hate to be this guy... (Score:5, Insightful)
I feel guilty driving a newer model Honda Civic knowing that if I bought something cheaper I could maybe feed someone less fortunate.
Oh bullshit, if you were going to feed somebody, you would just do it. The price of a Honda isn't going to keep you from send $5.00 to the soap-kitchen or UNICEF [unicef.org].
Soap kitchen (Score:2)
It's for all those foul-mouthed homeless people that curse at you when you walk by...
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It's white guilt man. I'm not sure what we do about it, but I think the first step is recognizing what it is.
All that shit really ain't your fault. You want to pay for your existence? Give something to charity.
After that, try to have it all. Mostly love. But Civics are nice too. And rockets. :)
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Or I suppose we could just kill the starving people. But that's not in the spirit of the thing.
Ultimately, it's goi
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Well, you have a plan? Because right now, taking over the bad countries and making them good countries that don't starve their citizens doesn't seem to work.
And never will. This is because humans are mean nasty evil motherfuckers who love to kill or starve each other. As we are about to learn again in Iraq, if we want anything resembling out own governance, we will have to be in a never ending war state in the middle east.
Because the second we pull out, they'll start lopping each others heads off again. And a sizable subset will work to make sure we're involved again, because in a region of the world fueled by hate, you want as many people to hate as possible
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I think he probably knew that, considering he said,
The developing world is in a far better state than it was in 1950, which seems to be a low point for what was at the time, the Third World.
Then again, I could be wrong.
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Have you ever thought that, perhaps, by feeding someone less fortunate, they stopped trying to help themselves , and ended up worse off then if you'd just stopped being a hand-wringing idiot and drove your civic that you earned?
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Have you ever thought that, perhaps, by feeding someone less fortunate, they stopped trying to help themselves , and ended up worse off then if you'd just stopped being a hand-wringing idiot and drove your civic that you earned?
No, he hasn't, and his kind won't stop until they take away your civic, too. Because, you know, you didn't earn that.
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...but people are still dying of starvation and lack of water on THIS planet. =\
I know space exploration is very important, but shit, let's get real here. I feel guilty driving a newer model Honda Civic knowing that if I bought something cheaper I could maybe feed someone less fortunate.
Good question!
join me in a crusade to save one country of the planet which was mistreated by nature and politics. It's a mountain country, covered in snow most of the winter. arable land in valleys is scarce, and one of the staple products is cheese. there are no mineral resources to speak of, and the country was so well known for the war like nature of the inhabitants that it was specifically forbidden to send its men to serve abroad, which was a major source of money remittances at the time. What els
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If everyone stopped buying cars, how exactly would that help the poor people of the world? We would just have a lot of autoworkers getting laid off. In a macroeconomic sense ALL of the money we spend ends up in the hands of other people, helping someone. Like nearly everything else we spend money on, space exploration is part of the "wealthy economy" in that most of those billions will end up in the hands of first-world people (SpaceX employees, various subcontractors' employees, etc.).
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...but people are still dying of starvation and lack of water on THIS planet. =\
I know space exploration is very important, but shit, let's get real here. I feel guilty driving a newer model Honda Civic knowing that if I bought something cheaper I could maybe feed someone less fortunate.
Your post has little to do with compassion, and a lot to do with a base need to show to the world that you *care* and drop a tear for it. #dramaqueen
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But that is not how the government wants us to be. So entitlements and division are the carrot and stick they use to keep us on the path.
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Besides, he needed to brag about having 'a newer model Honda Civic'.
not sure thats something Id be proud of...
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Space "exploration", such as it is, is a hobby.
Space exploration may prove the only way for our species to survive an ELE [wikipedia.org].
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Which is to say that our species probably WON'T survive an ELE, because there's *nowhere else to fucking go.*
Any barge off the coast will be absolutely reliant on everything being shipped up from the mainland.
Any ship at sea will be absolutely reliant on everybody remaining in the ship.
Any colony on an other continent is so far away by the mans of the stone age that it would have never been colonized, even if it was the garden-of-fucking-eden, part deux.
You want to explore the oceans? Great. But don't pretend that there's some sort of massive benefit for our survival as a species. Barring revolutionary breakthroughs in our understanding of fundamental physical laws, the best it's gonna do is make our life here, on earth, better by allowing us to discover new technologies that have terrestrial applications.
I am quite sure that the people that built the first canoe like boats did not think about out massive cargo ships. I can't predict future technology, maybe we will make breakthrough in FTL, or maybe we won't. Maybe living in a self contained space station around Saturn is not so bad in 300 years time.
In addition as you point out the technological advances of a space program sort of pay for themselves. If you can figure out a way to build a self contained space station, feeding people in the Sahara becomes a
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Create a worm hole and communicate through it.
Sheesh.. haven't you ever saw Stargate?
Seriously, I doubt we can even travel light years at present.
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Why the fuck does Boeing get $1.6 Billion extra for the same job?
Because it isn't the same job. Boeing hasn't built anything. They have a pile of paper they have to turn into a spacecraft. SpaceX has been flying the pressure vessel they're using for over a year, on three missions. They have a lot less to do.
Re:Boeing gets free money because why? (Score:5, Funny)
Boeing hasn't built anything.
I've done even less. I'm kicking myself just thinking about how much I could have asked for.
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Because it's Boeing:
https://www.opensecrets.org/lo... [opensecrets.org]
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More corporate vice presidents to feed. Think of the children!
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SpaceX wins more in the public relations/perception. Even if it breaks even, it can always point back to the numbers and say we're 50% the cost of the incumbents.
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nt