I feel I need to say something about Artemis as a former NASA employee, Space scientist and engineer.

[dick_turpin@mastodon.org.uk]

@SamanthaJaneSmith I suspect you know more than me but I beleive the moon is a dead planet. All this talk of ice and minerals is a load of old rubbish, but the Russians have proved humans can survive in space for a long time with Mir, so building a structure on the moon is probably trivial by comparison.

Imagine the horror that would sweep through America if NBC broadcast images of the Chinese flag on the moon?

[samanthajanesmith@lgbtqia.space]

@synth Politicians in all parties since spaceflight began have used NASA as a means to push their own political ambitions and to get support for their vision of America. Often to the detriment of both astronauts and the country as a whole. An example was the political decision surrounding the SRBs on the shuttle program. Lives were lost due to politics.

At no point did I say that only Trump does this or has done this. I didn't get into much of the political rational behind funding spaceflight, particularly manned, but it's really only about control and domination of space. The politicians and funders don't give a damn about engineering and science. Those are by products of the drive to control space.

Manned spaceflight is a product of this desire and is therefore a show that is very useful to politicians and at this time specifically Trump. If another person was in the white house and this was happening I would say the same. But what makes it worse now is that Trump is gutting the rest of NASA, at least in the past science has survived. So more than ever it is now a show for the public while NASA is prepared for it's demise.

[n0tsure@mastodon.social]

@SamanthaJaneSmith Yet another desperate attempt at denying the complete failure of a dying economic system to advance mankind.

[arazil@elvenstar.cafe]

@SamanthaJaneSmith I have been feeling much the same way. It seems like a pointless spectacle to distract people from the problems happening at home. I guess I would be more enthusiastic about it if there were some actual tangible benefit to it other than the space colonization angle. It is hard to be enthusiastic about Team USA when the government is operating as a highly destructive anti-science criminal enterprise.

[naturemc@mastodon.online]

@Tubemeister so lets repeat history with the 1968 revolution and the anti-war protests! @SamanthaJaneSmith

[ku@c.im]

they probably wanted to get it out the door before Trump guts NASA

[naturemc@mastodon.online]

@SamanthaJaneSmith People in the USA should be aware that this flight would have been impossible without European tech! The rogue US regime might collect all honor for themselves but Artemis would never have started with US tech only.

[djitydjity@mastodon.social]

@SamanthaJaneSmith There can be only one reason Trump is firing them up to a moon landing - he wants to find OIL up there.

[softspeak@defcon.social]

@SamanthaJaneSmith

I am no friend of Trump.
I understand that Trump is temporary, Jan 2029 he will be removed from power, maybe sooner through a newly elected congress, or the stress or diabetes will take 80 year old man. Trump's days are numbered.

As a NASA employee you would understand that the science to travel to Mars or anywhere out the moon require technology we currently do not have for a human to land, survive, and live and perform their duties on Mars comfortably.

Outside the Earth's magnetosphere is Gama Cosmic radiation will cut through any craft and will damage the DNA of any Mars astronaut, and realistically we are century away from creating a safe and reasonable plan for a traveler to land on Mars and come back to Earth.

The current Moon landing is not about a creating a event, nor should we measure success based on that. It is about surveying possibilities of creating a space-port for space craft in the future. That future of that space-port may not be a few years, it may be decades or a century. The ground work have to be laid for the future, and requires a scope see further than the present.

[wendythedruid@thistlenfern.org]

@SamanthaJaneSmith boosting this because it needs saying , thank you sjs

[sapphireangel@mastodon.online]

@GlasWolf @SamanthaJaneSmith This sums up perfectly why I just don't care that people are off to the moon. I hope they come back safe though.

[synth@mas.to]

@SamanthaJaneSmith For sure, politics is deeply intertwined with space exploration and especially so with manned missions. It was really just this bit I was iffy about: ‘Political theatre, a win for a Trump led NASA if it succeeds.’ The clarification that you’d say the same regardless of who’s in office is good context. I wholeheartedly agree with your point about utility and the current admin gutting science.

You definitely know more about this world than I, so thanks for the insight.

[perjakobsen@mastodon.social]

@SamanthaJaneSmith

Not to mention the massive burning of fossile fuels.

[cowman@thecanadian.social]

@SamanthaJaneSmith I don't know a lot about this rocket machine ~ but question: is it really much of an engineering feat?

Cursory wikipedia jaunt implies this rocket is kit-bashed from spare parts from the 1950s-1980s/shuttle program.

Obviously getting to space etc. is a grand feat, but (and perhaps to your point), none of the big things here seem new or inventive or ... if you will ... 'engineer-y'

[rapsneezy@mastodon.social]

@SamanthaJaneSmith

steps to militarisation of the moon?

colonialisation of the moon?

[peachfront@toot.community]

@SamanthaJaneSmith

hard agree

[philleu@mastodon.social]

@SamanthaJaneSmith

"...not using the same technology to do what we did before..."

Thank goodness! I thought that I was the only person to have this thought.

[woozle@toot.cat]

@SamanthaJaneSmith @paranoiapen

Personally, it gives me optimistic feels that we are still able to do stuff like this despite all the BS we are also doing.

Watching an ISS spacewalk during the previous Tr#mp misadministration was one of its few bright spots (for me) -- a brief view of extreme competence amid all the self-serving twittery.

[woozle@toot.cat]

@SamanthaJaneSmith @paranoiapen P.S. for a little more on how this sort of thing provides scientific benefit, I suggest a little Hank Green.

[urwumpe@hessen.social]

@SamanthaJaneSmith I don't see it that gloomy. We are finally let humans travel beyond low Earth Orbit. Right now further than they could ever get from their destination by any means of transportation in the past 50 years. Been there, done that? Sure not.

Also, we won't develop any better spacecraft by sitting around on Earth. Or by just doing in space what we have always done. Even known technologies on the surface will likely not behave the same in space. For getting further, we must go.