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> The cost of developing space robots doesn't decline nearly as much. Developing Costs wouldn't, but deployment costs would. If launching becomes cheaper, the

> The cost of developing space robots doesn't decline nearly as much. Developing Costs wouldn't, but deployment costs would. If launching becomes cheaper, then, sure, I could launch more space toilets and freeze-dried groceries. Or I could use that capacity to launch more and bigger robots, more often and further. Guess which of these two has a better ROI given the many many many limitations humans have once they leave our Planet, compared to robots. It doesn't matter how cheap a launch becomes. I have to support an astronaut with food. They have to exercise or their body breaks down in low gravity. I have to let them sleep. All this is time, payload capacity and energy wasted, that I could instead funnel into more, better, bigger more capable robots. And, finally: I have to bring astronauts back home safely, unless I want to risk a PR desaster (which is not good for funding). Once I am done with the robot, I can just leave it where it is and sell T-Shirts with its silhouette printed on.

pfdietz 2y ago
> It doesn't matter how cheap a launch becomes. I have to support an astronaut with food. So, if it were to be as cheap to go into space as to go to St. Louis, sending a person would make no sense because of... food? This makes no sense. Obviously there is some breakpoint at which it would make sense. You can't just handwave and say that universally without doing arithmetic.
- usrbinbash 2y ago
  > So, if it were to be as cheap to go into space as to go to St. Louis Obviously there is a breakpoint at which the cost differential would no longer matter, I agree. It's just as obvious however, that this breakpoint won't be reached in the near future, or even the forseeable future. It would require a radically new propulsion technology, which, and this is the sad truth, we don't have. The way we launch rockets today has remained pretty much the same for more than half a century: By burning chemicals in a tube. As long as that doesn't change, I can pretty much guarantee that the cost differential between doing space-exploration using humans, and doing it with robotic probes, will not look good for good 'ol humans any time soon.
  - pfdietz 2y ago
    Why is it obvious? Starship, if it succeeds, could reduce launch costs per mass by two orders of magnitude over Falcon 9. For the cost of one SLS launch, Starship, if it meets its cost targets, could launch the mass of a nuclear supercarrier into low earth orbit. The cost to LEO would become similar to the cost of transport to the South Pole. You will notice we are not using robots at the South Pole.
    - playingonline 2y ago
      It could be that for the sort of work we want to do on the south pole a human in a jacket outperforms our current robots, but for the sort of work we want to do on the moon a robot, or our future robot, will outperform a human in a spacesuit.
      - pfdietz 2y ago
        Sure, it could be. All sorts of things could be. Making that observation is not an argument that something is.
        usrbinbash 2y ago
        You mean like it could be that launch costs will become so low the differential will not matter any more?
        pfdietz 2y ago
        Good thing the argument wasn't that this will necessarily happen, just that the case can be made that it could happen, and therefore human spacelight is not necessarily a bad idea. Note that I'm not proposing abandoning robots in space. Your whataboutism assumes a symmetry that's not there.
        usrbinbash 2y ago
        > just that the case can be made that it could happen, and therefore human spacelight is not necessarily a bad idea Nuclear war could happen, that doesn't make waging nuclear war a good idea. > Your whataboutism Please explain how advocating for useful allocation of resources within a reference topic, without ever leaving said topic, constitutes "whataboutism". I want space exploration to happen. Right now, the most efficient, most promising, and most fruitful way, including in terms of developing future technology that can one day benefit human spaceflight, is to send robots. Trying to send people to do a robots work in space exploration right now, is a waste of resources that will, long term, hinder our efforts of becoming a spacefaring species. It doesn't make sense for a tribe that just recently invented small canoues to try and send them across the ocean. It is possible to do so in theory, aka. "it could happen", that doesn't make it a good idea. And every tribe member who drowns during these efforts, is one person less who could father the future inventor of the Galleon. Pointing out this reality isn't "whataboutism".

pfdietz 2y ago

> It doesn't matter how cheap a launch becomes. I have to support an astronaut with food. So, if it were to be as cheap to go into space as to go to St. Louis, sending a person would make no sense because of... food? This makes no sense. Obviously there is some breakpoint at which it would make sense. You can't just handwave and say that universally without doing arithmetic.

usrbinbash 2y ago
> So, if it were to be as cheap to go into space as to go to St. Louis Obviously there is a breakpoint at which the cost differential would no longer matter, I agree. It's just as obvious however, that this breakpoint won't be reached in the near future, or even the forseeable future. It would require a radically new propulsion technology, which, and this is the sad truth, we don't have. The way we launch rockets today has remained pretty much the same for more than half a century: By burning chemicals in a tube. As long as that doesn't change, I can pretty much guarantee that the cost differential between doing space-exploration using humans, and doing it with robotic probes, will not look good for good 'ol humans any time soon.
- pfdietz 2y ago
  Why is it obvious? Starship, if it succeeds, could reduce launch costs per mass by two orders of magnitude over Falcon 9. For the cost of one SLS launch, Starship, if it meets its cost targets, could launch the mass of a nuclear supercarrier into low earth orbit. The cost to LEO would become similar to the cost of transport to the South Pole. You will notice we are not using robots at the South Pole.
  - playingonline 2y ago
    It could be that for the sort of work we want to do on the south pole a human in a jacket outperforms our current robots, but for the sort of work we want to do on the moon a robot, or our future robot, will outperform a human in a spacesuit.
    - pfdietz 2y ago
      Sure, it could be. All sorts of things could be. Making that observation is not an argument that something is.
      - usrbinbash 2y ago
        You mean like it could be that launch costs will become so low the differential will not matter any more?
        pfdietz 2y ago
        Good thing the argument wasn't that this will necessarily happen, just that the case can be made that it could happen, and therefore human spacelight is not necessarily a bad idea. Note that I'm not proposing abandoning robots in space. Your whataboutism assumes a symmetry that's not there.
        usrbinbash 2y ago
        > just that the case can be made that it could happen, and therefore human spacelight is not necessarily a bad idea Nuclear war could happen, that doesn't make waging nuclear war a good idea. > Your whataboutism Please explain how advocating for useful allocation of resources within a reference topic, without ever leaving said topic, constitutes "whataboutism". I want space exploration to happen. Right now, the most efficient, most promising, and most fruitful way, including in terms of developing future technology that can one day benefit human spaceflight, is to send robots. Trying to send people to do a robots work in space exploration right now, is a waste of resources that will, long term, hinder our efforts of becoming a spacefaring species. It doesn't make sense for a tribe that just recently invented small canoues to try and send them across the ocean. It is possible to do so in theory, aka. "it could happen", that doesn't make it a good idea. And every tribe member who drowns during these efforts, is one person less who could father the future inventor of the Galleon. Pointing out this reality isn't "whataboutism".