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This would be a great US engineering accomplishment but it's a terrible Chinese accomplishment because it may be used in war. As if the US is not capable of and

This would be a great US engineering accomplishment but it's a terrible Chinese accomplishment because it may be used in war. As if the US is not capable of and eager to weaponise absolutely everything! This shows China is ahead in the space race.

JaimeThompson 5y ago
I'm not sure that using a single data point is a valid way to determine who is "ahead".
- ethbr0 5y ago
  I think it's undeniable to say "the Chinese space program is progressing at a faster rate than NASA." But, it's also starting from farther behind. But, it's also starting with more modern technology. But, it's also working under a command economy. And that's not including US private space companies. Read: SpaceX.
  - JaimeThompson 5y ago
    If we limit it to just Earth science NASA appears to be ahead. https://essp.nasa.gov/earth-pathfinder-quests/projects/active-missions/ https://essp.nasa.gov/earth-pathfinder-quests/projects/activ... If we include space telescopes, missions on and around other planets, space weather monitoring, solar exploration, and such NASA appears to be ahead. Saying "progressing at a fast rate than NASA" is just word games since they start from such a lower level and doesn't reflect the reality on the ground. EDIT: I provided the above as supporting evidence not to start an argument.
    - pphysch 5y ago
      GPS vs. BeiDou Arecibo vs. FAST China recently deployed their own Space Station and Mars Rover, etc... Political and ideological biases aside, it's pretty obvious which space program has more vitality in the current decade. Both sides certainly have novel tech, but what about the bigger trends?
      - JaimeThompson 5y ago
        > GPS vs. BeiDou How is BeiDou evidence for what you claim? > Arecibo vs. FAST Lots of other scopes that have capabilities that neither A or F have. > China recently deployed their own Space Station and Mars Rover, etc... These aren't examples of them being ahead. They may, however, may be examples of them reaching parity.
        pphysch 5y ago
        BeiDou is more precise than US govt's GPS
        JaimeThompson 5y ago
        Can be more precise, it isn't more accurate in all use cases. Also the GPS Block III birds have enhancements to improve accuracy and related metrics.
      - Ekaros 5y ago
        Actually it is sad that they get so little attention in the west. Space exploration from anyone is really interesting stuff, and we should be rather agnostic with whom we follow.
Day1 5y ago
I wouldn’t say this alone indicates China is ahead. Chinese economic growth is truly the key here. Technological capabilities are trivial if you have dramatically more resources than your competitors.
- mrweasel 5y ago
  There's nothing in this project the US could not easily do, and the US still has more resources than China. China is just more willing to allocate those resource to this type of project. Undoubtably the military applications had only made the choice to allocate funding even easily. The US has other more pressing issues and allocating billions of dollars to clean up space isn't appealing to the majority of voters.
  - Day1 5y ago
    I don’t know how the US could possibly have more resources than China.
    - mrweasel 5y ago
      It’s still the largest of the two economies.
      - pphysch 5y ago
        ...by GDP, which is absolutely not a representation of economic resources, especially with how USA calculates GDP. China has something like >1000% as many people working in technical industry jobs as USA, and a massive trade surplus. The two economies are not even comparable. One prints the global reserve currency and smears it around in FIRE, the other makes things.
  - xbmcuser 5y ago
    In the US any NASA project is and will be hampered by competing states wanting the resulting jobs coming to their own cities. China might be behind the US for now in space race and many science fields but the trajectory they are moving at they are likely to get ahead. I do wonder sometimes if the creationist and other such bullshit anti science getting larger support in the US might be a well a financed trojan horse.

JaimeThompson 5y ago

I'm not sure that using a single data point is a valid way to determine who is "ahead".

ethbr0 5y ago
I think it's undeniable to say "the Chinese space program is progressing at a faster rate than NASA." But, it's also starting from farther behind. But, it's also starting with more modern technology. But, it's also working under a command economy. And that's not including US private space companies. Read: SpaceX.
- JaimeThompson 5y ago
  If we limit it to just Earth science NASA appears to be ahead. https://essp.nasa.gov/earth-pathfinder-quests/projects/active-missions/ https://essp.nasa.gov/earth-pathfinder-quests/projects/activ... If we include space telescopes, missions on and around other planets, space weather monitoring, solar exploration, and such NASA appears to be ahead. Saying "progressing at a fast rate than NASA" is just word games since they start from such a lower level and doesn't reflect the reality on the ground. EDIT: I provided the above as supporting evidence not to start an argument.
  - pphysch 5y ago
    GPS vs. BeiDou Arecibo vs. FAST China recently deployed their own Space Station and Mars Rover, etc... Political and ideological biases aside, it's pretty obvious which space program has more vitality in the current decade. Both sides certainly have novel tech, but what about the bigger trends?
    - JaimeThompson 5y ago
      > GPS vs. BeiDou How is BeiDou evidence for what you claim? > Arecibo vs. FAST Lots of other scopes that have capabilities that neither A or F have. > China recently deployed their own Space Station and Mars Rover, etc... These aren't examples of them being ahead. They may, however, may be examples of them reaching parity.
      - pphysch 5y ago
        BeiDou is more precise than US govt's GPS
        JaimeThompson 5y ago
        Can be more precise, it isn't more accurate in all use cases. Also the GPS Block III birds have enhancements to improve accuracy and related metrics.
    - Ekaros 5y ago
      Actually it is sad that they get so little attention in the west. Space exploration from anyone is really interesting stuff, and we should be rather agnostic with whom we follow.

Day1 5y ago

I wouldn’t say this alone indicates China is ahead. Chinese economic growth is truly the key here. Technological capabilities are trivial if you have dramatically more resources than your competitors.

mrweasel 5y ago
There's nothing in this project the US could not easily do, and the US still has more resources than China. China is just more willing to allocate those resource to this type of project. Undoubtably the military applications had only made the choice to allocate funding even easily. The US has other more pressing issues and allocating billions of dollars to clean up space isn't appealing to the majority of voters.
- Day1 5y ago
  I don’t know how the US could possibly have more resources than China.
  - mrweasel 5y ago
    It’s still the largest of the two economies.
    - pphysch 5y ago
      ...by GDP, which is absolutely not a representation of economic resources, especially with how USA calculates GDP. China has something like >1000% as many people working in technical industry jobs as USA, and a massive trade surplus. The two economies are not even comparable. One prints the global reserve currency and smears it around in FIRE, the other makes things.
- xbmcuser 5y ago
  In the US any NASA project is and will be hampered by competing states wanting the resulting jobs coming to their own cities. China might be behind the US for now in space race and many science fields but the trajectory they are moving at they are likely to get ahead. I do wonder sometimes if the creationist and other such bullshit anti science getting larger support in the US might be a well a financed trojan horse.