Submitted by Master-Strawberry-26 t3_zz8cc6 in space
goodlittlesquid t1_j2dm94u wrote
Reply to comment by Reali5t in SpaceX caps 2022 with record-setting 61st Falcon 9 launch by Master-Strawberry-26
If there has been no Space Race or NASA, SpaceX would not exist.
SenateLaunchScrubbed t1_j2domy8 wrote
Why would you think that?
Think of the closest example, airplanes. Airplanes exist. We didn't need a government-funded air race to get them. The very first airplane was entirely developed and funded by private capital.
The truth is, had there been no space race or NASA, we would've gotten something like SpaceX far, far sooner.
Government involvement didn't help, it stagnate space development for decades by keeping private endeavors out of it. It's still messing with them to this day.
zephyr_1779 t1_j2dxe0r wrote
Seems like the real problem is the way governments prioritize things.
mooseup t1_j2e5n1r wrote
Who purchased the first Wright flyer?
https://airandspace.si.edu/collection-objects/1909-wright-military-flyer/nasm_A19120001000
SenateLaunchScrubbed t1_j2e73tw wrote
The military was in NO way involved in development or funding. Years later, they saw the capability and showed up to get their hands on one. So what? Lots more where sold in the free market to regular citizens.
mooseup t1_j2ed1i9 wrote
If the military hadn’t purchased the Wright brothers plane they may as well have suffered the same fate as Burrell Cannon.
SenateLaunchScrubbed t1_j2ee4fq wrote
And that proves what? That's how the free market works. Some succeed, some don't. The Wright brothers made many mistakes when it came to business. The thing is, their failure wasn't the failure of the industry. Plenty of other manufacturers quickly showed up, and started selling planes like crazy. The wright brothers models where more expensive, and less well marketed.
cartoonist498 t1_j2e7p2n wrote
>The truth is, had there been no space race or NASA, we would've gotten something like SpaceX far, far sooner.
You're using an example where it was government funded efforts, namely through WW2, that advanced aviation in leaps and bounds and created the modern aviation industry.
At best it's uncertain whether government slows down progress. Government funding seems to still be the only way to pay for technology where the return is too far in the future and too risky to be worth the investment for private investors.
It's the government that's been the primary source of funding for fusion energy since the 1950s. Only recently, as late as last year, after all the government funded work and breakthroughs has private funding started equaling government funding.
Efforts to build a base on the Moon and send humans to Mars are still primarily government funded. Very few private investors seem to see a prospect of return on investing now.
Why would you say that government stagnates the private sector? If the private sector saw a profit in it, what's stopping them from funding, building and launching their own right now?
SenateLaunchScrubbed t1_j2e9jo4 wrote
>You're using an example where it was government funded efforts, namely through WW2, that advanced aviation in leaps and bounds and created the modern aviation industry.
Did it, though? It mostly achieved the opposite. It concentrated power unfairly on a few large companies, heavily regulated the market, and stalled progress for decades.
>At best it's uncertain whether government slows down progress. Government funding seems to still be the only way to pay for technology where the return is too far in the future and too risky to be worth the investment for private investors.
No, it isn't uncertain. Before governments started messing with the market so much in certain areas, those areas where entirely private. Even trains where initially private. Undersea cables. The telegraph.
>Why would you say that government stagnates the private sector? If the private sector saw a profit in it, what's stopping them from funding, building and launching their own right now?
This is the usual BS with government funding. The government enters an industry, heavily regulates it, then becomes the primary customer before the industry has a chance to develop. They arbitrarily and unfairly fund a few large contractors, to the point where it becomes IMPOSSIBLE to compete with them, because they are receiving fortunes in government money. And then you look at it and say "See? This wouldn't have happened without the government".
Think about SpaceX. Getting into the launch market, where monsters like ULA and its parents Boeing/Lockheed where so well established thanks to the government, getting billions, and all the launches? How about launching itself. Wanna build your own launchpad? Good luck with that, think about how hard BC was and still is to get going thanks to regulations. The government already had all the land that was good for launching, and they weren't sharing. They made SpaceX pay for Vandenberg, and then still didn't let them launch from there in the end. Add to that ITAR, and all the other stupid regulations.
The government never helps, all it ever does is get in the way.
cartoonist498 t1_j2ee0uf wrote
> stalled progress for decades.
You're just making this up. It's pretty much the consensus that World War 2 advanced human technology by leaps and bounds in a way that wouldn't have happened without it.
Unless you're arguing that the private sector would have increased advancement by the same amount, or even anywhere close to the same amount, the rest of what you're saying is built on a house of cards and what seems like a hatred of government funding that's unfair to bring up because it's not based on logic.
Space travel being difficult is the reason it took so long, not government bureaucracy. I'm not seeing your POV which is basically saying humans would already be on Mars if it wasn't for the government. In no reality would that have happened.
The same example you provided, SpaceX, disproves your point that an impenetrable oligopoly is always the end result because a brand new company has entered to challenge the big players in the space launch industry and successfully disrupted the market, and probably will become a leader in the industry by later this decade.
And all this progress built on the back of 70 years of government funding long before any private investor would touch it.
SenateLaunchScrubbed t1_j2eeji9 wrote
But that isn't a fair assessment. The world was in chaos during the entirety of WWI, and then afterwards with the great depression, and afterwards because of WWII. So it was a messy time, bad for business. Governments destroyed the world, and your argument is "but private industry wasn't doing so well back then".
cartoonist498 t1_j2efp6z wrote
That's why I said it's uncertain at best, at which point you replied that you're certain. Obviously we can't look into alternate realities so I don't know why you'd reply that you'd be certain.
I gave specific examples, fusion power and space travel, where government bootstrapped the research and development 50 years before any private investor would touch it. At any point during the last half century a private investor could have taken the reigns but that never happened.
"Governments destroyed the world"? It really feels like I'm getting into a political argument here with no clue what your politics are. Government and private industry aren't blood enemies in some epic battle of good vs evil, most of the time they work hand-in-hand to build a functioning society with pros and cons of each. The pros of government funding is that they'll fund advanced technology long before any private investor would.
SenateLaunchScrubbed t1_j2egaps wrote
>That's why I said it's uncertain at best, at which point you replied that you're certain. Obviously we can't look into alternate realities so I don't know why you'd reply that you'd be certain.
Because we have history. We've seen what happened previously to other developments the government didn't mess with, and the private market doesn't drop things like the government does. It doesn't find something new and then puts it on the backburner for years. The government does. All the WWII up to Apollo progress was then made up by decades of stagnation.
>I gave specific examples, fusion power
That has gone nowhere and will most likely never go anywhere.
>and space travel
Which was in the hands of private individuals before, until the government took over, and then they took care that nothing happened in it for decades, and only now we're rescuing it from the government's incompetent hands.
>"Governments destroyed the world"? It really feels like I'm getting into a political argument here with no clue what your politics are. Government and private industry aren't blood enemies in some epic battle of good vs evil, most of the time they work hand-in-hand to build a functioning society with pros and cons of each. The pros of government funding is that they'll fund advanced technology long before any private investor would.
The government is everyone's enemy. There are no pros to government funding other than cronyism and corruption.
cartoonist498 t1_j2ekjaq wrote
> decades of stagnation.
So do the moon landings themselves don't count as significant government progress?
Even after that, you'd really consider the launch of countless satellites into low earth orbit which revolutionized earthbound technology including communication and GPS for everyone on the planet, an international space station, countless probes to the furthest reaches of our solar system and probes entering interstellar space, and space telescopes that have revolutionized our understanding of the universe "stagnation"?
You're seriously in a space enthusiasts sub saying that there has been no significant progress in space technology for the last 50 years?
Have a good day.
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