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A comment on NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission. Parent comment

Re:NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission by bregma on Wednesday October 22, 2025 @06:45AM (#45667218)
What they mean is all the spinoffs of getting there do not count. Microelectronics, computers, leaps in materials science, massive advances in medical and health sciences, and techniques and processes for very-large-scale project planning and implementation hardly count as benefits, especially if you don't count them as benefits.

After all, what have the Romans ever done for us?

Not one dollar was spent in space during the first space race.

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Re:NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission by trenchpilgrim on Wednesday October 22, 2025 @09:45AM (#45669077)
If you want massive returns on medical and health sciences, you get far better returns investing in medical research and public health programs. Same with technology - if you want better materials and electronics, invest in physics research.
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Re:NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission by wredcoll on Wednesday October 22, 2025 @10:32AM (#45669724)
Isn't that basically what they did? The moon landing was just a big test of the research.
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Re:NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission by trenchpilgrim on Wednesday October 22, 2025 @10:41AM (#45669843)
The US spent 6% of its GDP to land on the moon, much of that money going into military and aerospace companies . It is far more efficient to spend that money on medical, health and physics research directly; the moon landing accomplished political and cultural objectives.
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Re:NASA chief suggests SpaceX may be booted from moon mission by wredcoll on Wednesday October 22, 2025 @02:59PM (#45673604)
> money on medical, health and physics research directly

What precisely is the difference? Where was space-race money spent that shouls be reallocated? My point is you eventually need to put the research into practice.

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