NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission

Re:NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission by trenchpilgrim on Wednesday October 22, 2025 @01:13AM (#45665106)

There's very little _scientific_ motivation to send humans to do science instead of robots. Robots don't need to eat or drink (much more efficient payloads) and don't expect to survive the mission.

The motivations to send humans to other bodies at this time are political; to prove who is and isn't a superpower of the 21st century.

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Re:NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission by pastage on Wednesday October 22, 2025 @02:24AM (#45665497)

Is there anyone that thinks robots that we can do a 99% robotic mission on the moon and get value from it? I think it would be easier to create a permanent human moon settlement. Doing autonomous robotic missions is really hard at the moment even if they are just 20min away from humans. Even cutting grass is non trivial.

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Re:NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission by mplewis9z on Wednesday October 22, 2025 @03:28AM (#45665878)

You made a big leap there from “robotic missions” to “autonomous robotic missions”, which I think very few think is realistic in the near-term. Some limited autonomy exists as a force-multiplier, sure, but pretty much all robotic space missions are still basically controlled remotely by a human.

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