Thread

SpaceX's Starship launching to orbit for first time ever today

304 points · 367 comments · geox

fakwandi_priv · 1790601680 · focus · HN ↗
I’m a bit saddened this thread has so little activity, 55 comments as of posting, here even though there are half a million people watching the spacex stream. Just watching the launch, the amount of technology and people involved is incredible.
Prompting claude 5.5 has more appeal it seems.
1. trentnix · 1790602211 · focus · HN ↗
  I'm watching in awe and not worrying about the malcontents that can't leave their politics at the door and celebrate genuine achievement.
  1. jimkleiber · 1790603080 · focus · HN ↗
    The challenge is launching things into orbit is politics, aka how humans should organize society.
    So it's hard to leave that out. It's genuine achievement and it's politics, both.
    marcusverus · 1790603536 · focus · HN ↗
    This is nonsense, obviously, but is a perfect validation of his point. Well done and enjoy the show!
    DauntingPear7 · 1790603868 · focus · HN ↗
    Everything is political, even your stance that it isn’t
    baggy_trough · 1790604421 · focus · HN ↗
    A ridiculous claim. The cry of an infant is political? My houseplant? Fixing a buffer overflow?
    jimkleiber · 1790608235 · focus · HN ↗
    Not everything but way more things than most people want to admit because so many of us have collapsed "political" into meaning "partisan."
    pigpop · 1790604295 · focus · HN ↗
    That doesn't make much sense, a previously private corporation (which just recently went public) is achieving economical launch to orbit and has made continual progress on that front over decades while politics has both worked for and against them. To me, that is a refutation of "launching things into orbit is politics" especially when you compare the very politically entangled incumbents' launch cadence and capacity.
    jimkleiber · 1790608145 · focus · HN ↗
    Orbit is a global public commons, how is it not a political issue? It can be a political issue AND an engineering marvel, regardless of what other organizations are doing
    AustinDev · 1790610832 · focus · HN ↗
    Is it the public commons if you can't reach it?
    jimkleiber · 1790618795 · focus · HN ↗
    Plenty of programs from many places can reach orbit, im not really sure what you're talking about. And yes. It still is, unless a sole individual can claim ownership of a global orbit, which i imagine even some of the most capitalist-minded people would find absurd.
    So the US owns the moon? Or does Neil Armstrong?
    I'm a bit sassy today just kinda tired of certain arguments.
    AustinDev · 1790622356 · focus · HN ↗
    The US does own the moon for all practical purposes, or we did until we gave up our capacity to reach it.
    jimkleiber · 1790624714 · focus · HN ↗
    Well it soothes me to know that the people who actually took us to the moon didn't have such territorial obsessions:
    > Some Americans anticipated possible controversy over planting the United States flag on the Moon, since the Outer Space Treaty prohibited territorial claims to any extraterrestrial body. Since it was made clear the United States had no intention of making a territorial claim to the Moon, no serious controversy materialized. Four months after the Apollo 11 landing, the United States Congress passed a bill in November 1969, which was signed into law by President Nixon, stating:
    > The flag of the United States, and no other flag, shall be implanted or otherwise placed on the surface of the moon, or on the surface of any planet, by members of the crew of any spacecraft ... as part of any mission ... the funds for which are provided entirely by the Government of the United States. ... this act is intended as a symbolic gesture of national pride in achievement and is not to be construed as a declaration of national appropriation by claim of sovereignty.
    <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_Flag_Assembly" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_Flag_Assembly
    pigpop · 1790632261 · focus · HN ↗
    Maybe with a more expansionist attitude we'd already have a moon base.
    jimkleiber · 1790633845 · focus · HN ↗
    Perhaps Russia might also have one and we could bomb each other up there.
    Pros of expansionism can also come with cons.
  2. TkTech · 1790603772 · focus · HN ↗
    This is ballistics weapons technology, being progressed by a country that can't stop missile striking people, who has recently declared its intent to heavily weaponize space, whose leader has recently "claimed the moon", who is actively declaring its desire to annex its own allies, done by a corporation whose profits will be almost exclusively concentrated in a very small group of the already-wealthy in a country with horrific wealth disparity.
    The V-2 was also a technological achievement. Doesn't mean the UK was cheering it on.
    inglor_cz · 1790604277 · focus · HN ↗
    Calm down. V-2 was a missile whose very design intent was to kill people.
    If Starship ever kills people, it will be a disaster, but not intent.
    This will help grow Starlink. Plenty of people are already enjoying their Starlink connection in places where the previous provider had either absurdly low quality for high price, or where connectivity was not a thing at all.
    I for one am happy that kids living in remote villages can now access online schools and sick people can consult their problems at least with some online doctor. Sailors are pretty happy too.
    TkTech · 1790606134 · focus · HN ↗
    All rocket development is weapons development, which is why ITAR (International Traffic in Arms Regulations) classifies rocket and space tech as sensitive national security items and is why foreign nationals can't even work on Starship. The entire US space program was funded for military development in the first place.
    The difference between Starship and a missile designed to kill people is a simple swapping of the payload. More realistically given vehicle costs, its an ideal heavy lift platform for cheaply placing other weapon vehicles into orbit - a stated goal of the current administration.
    > This will help grow Starlink. Plenty of people are already enjoying their Starlink connection in places where the previous provider had either absurdly low quality for high price, or where connectivity was not a thing at all.
    Plenty of people are also using Starlink to wage war, and its already become political as access is provided and removed at whim.
    I love space. I love space technology. I work on a game set in space. I am not enthusiastic about notorious individuals having the will and capability to mass-weaponize space.
    inglor_cz · 1790606701 · focus · HN ↗
    Almost every technology can be used to wage war. But not all war activities are evil. I am happy that the Ukrainians can use Starlink to defend themselves against a brutal aggressor and preserve sovereignty of their country.
    "The difference between Starship and a missile designed to kill people is a simple swapping of the payload."
    If you insist on this worldview, you will always be miserable around every technological development out there. Just imagine what can be done with mRNA or maybe 3D printing.
    "I am not enthusiastic about notorious individuals having the will and capability to mass-weaponize space."
    I am pretty sure that militarization of space will be a decision of governments, not Musk himself. He is not rich enough to be able to build an actual orbital army and not get arrested.
    Unless by a "notorious individual" you mean Trump or Xi... in which case, there isn't much new under the sun, because governments have weaponized space since the very beginning.
    What I feel is positive is the civilian use of the technology. The military use will always be there, but the civilian use needs better and cheaper tech, which is what Starship is. Some medications could be produced in the orbit for example, and with enough launch capacity, they could be produced for the entire planet at once.
    dzhiurgis · 1790642515 · focus · HN ↗
    > I for one am happy that kids living in remote villages can now access online schools and sick people can consult their problems at least with some online doctor.
    It is going to be truly amazing for a lot of small communities around the world. I don't want to deny this game changing technology at all.
    But given how much of us westerners are beginning to loathe screens and internet (or social media for no good reason), I wonder how this "lets connect everyone" movement changes?
    p.s. the biggest sleeper is that v3 finally enables mass direct-to-cell feature. "Villagers" won't need special terminal anymore - even the cheapest android smartphone will be able to get online. There's even been a quiet campaign on X to enable direct-to-cell capability in Iran during protests, so imagine what sort of societal changes this can pull off.
    inglor_cz · 1790667246 · focus · HN ↗
    I think we are bound to have a sinusoidal relationship with tech: "oh it is wonderful" - "actually it damages people" - "if we mitigate XYZ it is still wonderful" etc.
    Ntrails · 1790604397 · focus · HN ↗
    > This is ballistics weapons technology
    It's like a thousand different technologies, some ancient some relatively new. I don't precisely delight in my new space overlords, but I can still wonder at the enormous object being launched into space!
    rafram · 1790605789 · focus · HN ↗
    Starship wouldn't be a very effective missile IMO.
    kibibu · 1790607674 · focus · HN ↗
    Depends which alpha version of Full Self Driving it has installed.
    parineum · 1790608765 · focus · HN ↗
    Imagine re-useable missiles though...
    /s because the Internet is crazy.
    pigpop · 1790614352 · focus · HN ↗
    Not as crazy of an idea as it sounds. A bomber that could fly as fast as a missile and orbit the planet allowing it to deliver a payload and then return and land would be a useful technology. Might be a preferable way of delivering "Rods from God" style kinetic impactors since it wouldn't involve keeping an armed satellite in orbit where it could be targeted.
    [deleted] · 1790610948 · focus · HN ↗
    [deleted]
    redox99 · 1790612647 · focus · HN ↗
    Cryogenic propellants alone are a deal breaker for this application.
    chasd00 · 1790622199 · focus · HN ↗
    > Starship wouldn't be a very effective missile IMO.
    that's putting it mildly, a war where ICBMs are used would be over before they could get the road closed to roll Starship and a booster to the pad...
    fragmede · 1790623985 · focus · HN ↗
    Though, for point of reference, the biggest Soviet ICBM, the SS-18, could lift about a 9 ton payload for a 20 megaton nuclear explosive warhead. The minutemen iii's have 1 ton payload. Starship has shown today that I can do, call it a 60 ton payload.
    That's a whole lotta MIRV capacity.
    dzhiurgis · 1790642160 · focus · HN ↗
    By itself no, but parking bunch of ballistic sats / hypersonic vehicles in orbit for 10th the price of enemy is attractive. A lot of strategy in war is not just capability but logistics and cost. And US has been particularly bad at keeping costs at bay.
    dzhiurgis · 1790642200 · focus · HN ↗
    Oh please stop it, you don't need to make it even more attractive.
  3. bix6 · 1790603856 · focus · HN ↗
    [dead]
  4. [deleted] · 1790604035 · focus · HN ↗
    [deleted]

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