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@chris_hayes Everything else aside, it's a pretty show.
@mike Agreed! This isn't good for Earth, not good for the Carribean, not good for spaceflight, not good for SpaceX. But, boy is this footage beautiful.
@chris_hayes @mike All I can think of are all of the toxic gases being created and the potential for damage from falling debris. We're at a point where there are so many launches and so many satellites, they need to be regulated and there needs to be severe fines (or fees) for using our thin atmosphere as a garbage dump. Additionally, each launch should be required to buy carbon offsets. I'm not a big fan of offset markets, but I know of no other way to neutralize the release of CO2.
@elaterite @mike I'm a big fan of the carbon offset idea (understanding that carbon offsets are not perfect). As a rocket fan, I know a lot of rocket people will point out that the airplane industry pollutes magnitudes more.
But, the focus should really be on solving problems not trying to assign blame. The rocket industry should be offseting all of the environmental harms it is creating, and so should the airline industry.
@elaterite @mike We flew passed +1.5 degrees in 2024, so if an industry cannot offset it's current carbon polluting activities in 2024 and still be profitable, we should really question if we should be doing this activity in the first place.
There is no offsetting environmental harm anymore.
The harm and damage just keeps accumulating and accumulating.
@504DR @chris_hayes @elaterite @mike yeah, offsetting turned out not to work anyway, and even if it had we’d still have to stop extracting fossil fuels.
We don’t need fossil fuels for rockets, they can run on simpler propellants, no need to stop. (But we should slow down a little, and address some of the other problems)
@ShadSterling @504DR @chris_hayes @elaterite @mike
What human problem do rockets solve ?
@the5thColumnist @ShadSterling @504DR @chris_hayes @elaterite @mike
lack of videos of exploding rockets
@kaliagainstallodds @ShadSterling @504DR @chris_hayes @elaterite @mike
We don't need rockets for that AI can just make that up and drain a few watersheds and empty a few coal mines as it does it.
@the5thColumnist @ShadSterling @chris_hayes @elaterite @mike
Good question.
Myself, I'm all for unmanned probes like the Voyagers and the telescopes in orbit, for scientific information.
Anything else is playthings for selfish ppl with too much money and too little brain cells who live in bubbles of egoist grand delusions.
The timeline before 3C eliminates most all life on the planet grows shorter every day.
And we're spending our last days accelerating that timeline with a doubling of the activities that caused the problem in the first place.
Most intelligent species on the planet, my ass.
@the5thColumnist @504DR @chris_hayes @elaterite @mike I don’t know that I would characterize it as “solving a human problem”, but weather satellites and the modeling they’ve enabled have saved countless lives. So has GPS. And communication satellites have done a lot of good. (Not StarLink, but the ones that last decades and don’t ruin the view.)
@ShadSterling @504DR @chris_hayes @elaterite @mike
Certainly GPS and communications satellites have been good for humankind but much of the funds for the space race, even if they indirectly gave us useful technologies, could have been better spent directly on human problems. Probes to explore space probably worthwhile but all he manned missions just human vanity stuff.
@the5thColumnist @504DR @chris_hayes @elaterite @mike the lack of funding for human thriving isn’t really related to the presence of funding for the space race. We could do both, if we gave political power to people who would do it.
Manned missions don’t have the kind of short-term value that GPS etc have, but they do have value. Living in space is a lot harder to learn than rocketry, but we could afford that too, if we chose.
@the5thColumnist @ShadSterling @504DR @chris_hayes @mike Even though the original space race had nothing to do with science, there was a ton of technology spinoffs from the effort. And I assume there is value in maintaining an orbital space station (maybe?). Beyond that, I agree, manned spaceflight is about vanity, hubris, & ego. It's a colossal waste of resources. I'm all for robotic exploration of the solar system, planetary geoscience, navigation, & critical communications missions, however.
@elaterite @the5thColumnist @504DR @chris_hayes @mike the recent commercial manned ~spaceflight is mostly about conspicuous consumption, but a civilizational capacity for living in space can support much more. The science in freefall we can do in the ISS is a start. The ecosystem knowledge we’d need to make an orbital habitat that doesn’t need constant resupply would have applications in almost everything.
@ShadSterling @elaterite @the5thColumnist @chris_hayes @mike
If we had unlimited time, and resources, that would certainly be a possibility.
Unfortunately, we have neither at this point.
@504DR @elaterite @the5thColumnist @chris_hayes @mike there’s no meaningful time limit on learning to live in space. Not even as a race with destroying lifesupport ecosystems on Earth; if we can’t muster the political will to stop doing that, we also won’t be able to sustain lifesupport ecosystems in a pod. It’s not the amount of resources that limit us, it’s the deciding to let reckless destructive people control them
@ShadSterling @elaterite @the5thColumnist @chris_hayes @mike
True.
The predicament is this - those reckless, destructive ppl are in charge, and have been for decades.
We're on the brink already.
No amount of tech, wishful thinking or an omnipotent sky fairly can save us now.
The credible climate scientists say we have 5 years to make drastic changes, bc negative ecological feedbacks are now starting.
Four of those five years will be under reckless, destructive ppl who either don't believe in climate change or think it's inconsequential.
I don't see much progress made towards the climate crisis problem. If anything, their policies and actions will worsen it on all fronts; from emissions to deforestation to increased pollution to more mining/drilling, etc.
Counting on those who intentionally made the problem to fix the problem isn't the answer; especially when they're in charge and making money off it.
We live in an oligarchy now, where the rich own our politicians.
For some odd reason, they'd prefer to keep making money rather than save the planet, and us.
@504DR @elaterite @the5thColumnist @chris_hayes @mike while that’s true, I’m not sure how it fits with the question I was trying to answer, about what rockets are good for; they’re not causing those problems any more than solving them.
And while climate change might kill billions of people, civilization won’t end. If they can muster the political will, our descendants will still have the potential to do good things with rockets
@504DR @elaterite @the5thColumnist @chris_hayes @mike (I don’t like things like “we have 5 years to fix it” because there’s nothing special that happens at 5 years, the more we do sooner the better, but it’s never too late to reduce the harm. Even being above +1.5C now, that means we missed one ~arbitrary political goal, but it does not mean we can’t reduce harms by reducing fossil fuel extraction now.)
@ShadSterling @elaterite @the5thColumnist @chris_hayes @mike
There is certainly nothing to like about these predictions, but it's inescapable that they are facts backed up by real world evidence.
The only errs made was their timelines were much longer than reality proved.
Most every climate prediction has come be true, and much sooner than predicted.
That's not to say there is nothing to do; rather a shift in what we do - on a personal level only; bc no one in roles of leadership will be shifting away from the current directives of destroying the planet in the name of profits.
The current climate "solutions" pursued by govts; "electrical everything!", carbon capture, seeding clouds, seeding the ocean, build more renewables - all of that is chasing money for investors while continuing the same harmful practices that created this crisis; ravaging the planet for the resources to fuel these projects.
Destruction of the natural world is the third leg of the climate crisis, as important as CO2 emissions and overshoot.
All three of these need to be addressed, together and equally.
Currently the only focus is on CO2 emissions, which hasn't seen any success, as emissions rise every year.
If your car isn't running correctly, will it help to put new tires on it?
That is what we're doing towards the climate crisis predicament.
That doesn't bode well for the future of us or the planet, whether we like it or not.
@504DR @elaterite @the5thColumnist @chris_hayes @mike that doesn’t address my point at all, which was that framing something as a deadline makes it sound like missing that deadline means no more good can be done, but there is more good that can be done
@ShadSterling @elaterite @the5thColumnist @chris_hayes @mike
You're correct there; there's always something that can be done, lots to work on.
As long as the work is something that's actually fixing and making things better.
Regarding space exploration, unmanned vehicles and space telescopes are good things.
Manned space flight is a waste of time, money and resources, imo.
It's a dead end road.
Bc of that 3C deadline.
There won't be anyone around to reap any benefits from it.
@ShadSterling @elaterite @the5thColumnist @chris_hayes @mike
The issue of rockets becomes moot on a dying planet.
If you think there will be descendants after us, a deep dive into a 3C world may change your mind.
We've surpassed 1.5 already.
That trajectory won't be changing anytime soon.
3C means an unliveable planet for most life forms currently on the planet.
Billionaires in their bunkers may survive a short time longer than the rest of us, but even they will succumb to a barren planet unable to support life systems above the level of microbes.
@ShadSterling @504DR @the5thColumnist @chris_hayes @mike Indeed. The money hording class is certainly our biggest problem.
@elaterite @the5thColumnist @504DR @chris_hayes @mike it’s not developing that capacity that’s wasteful, it’s allocating all of our resources to systems that destroy our lifesupport ecosystems on “spaceship earth” and deprive nearly all of our people of the means to seek anything more than survival. If we stopped doing that, then we could build most of the things that today we can only dream of, and I don’t think that’s a waste
@ShadSterling @the5thColumnist @504DR @chris_hayes @mike That's a good point about trying to make the space station as self-sufficient as possible. I'm sure things could be learned from such an effort. Still, flying people back-and-forth every few months is problematic. Maybe once per year wouldn't be too bad, though. (Not a mission I'd want to be on, lol!)
@chris_hayes @mike I am/was a rocket fan. Can't helped but be impressed with today's technology, but not the people that run the companies. My Dad was a civilian contractor for Douglas Aircraft & was assigned to Project Paperclip which dealt with testing the captured WWII V2s at White Sands. They didn't have telemetry yet & had to attach a couple of miles of wire to the rockets to get data back. o_0 He was also on the crew that launched the 1st rocket from the Cape. 1/2
@chris_hayes @mike Regarding CO2 offsets: I'm physiocrat. CO2 needs to be displaced with energy efficiency, democratizing renewable energies, & programs that use EVs as storage for the grid. (V2G a la Dr. Kempton at UDel. The Rocky Mtn Institute called it Smart Garage a couple of decades ago.) It blows my mind how much people fly. My problem with offset & renewable energy credit markets is the financial/trading/middlemen. They aren't producing physical solutions. They just milk the system. 2/2
@elaterite @mike ah, cool dad
@chris_hayes @mike I sure wish he had lived long enough to see a Falcon booster return to its pad. It would have blown his mind! At White Sands & later with Bumper 8, the 1st rocket launched from the Cape, they were the 1st two stage rockets: a V2 with a WAC Corporeal second stage. Most of them blew up on the pad. But some flew & now look where we are! I just want to throw up when I think of the owners of those private companies, though. Very sad. What a wonderful legacy they have squandered.
El Murciélago 
|FCK|NZS| @chris_hayes @elaterite @mike
Include space debris orbiting around our world in that. Some day we won't be able to reach for the stars anymore because of the dangers to collide with old satellites and stuff and are stuck here, on a yet beautiful planet we destroyed as well.
@wahoonie @chris_hayes @mike Oh ya, that too!