Yeah, because it is silly to pour huge amounts of cash into a distant, unlikely, huge project. Much better is to fund near-term, incremental, likely, reasonably-sized projects funded by people with a stake in the outcome. All hail the power of capitalism.
You justify one huge govt program by saying it made another one cheaper...
Everyone talks about the vague benefits of the Apollo program, but no one really knows what they are. When they do give specifics, they turn out to be independently developed. At a minimum, it would have been more effective to just develop the technologies directly.
The market reflects what is near-term profitable. Not true. The market discounts all future cash flow -- near and long term -- by an appropriate discount (risk) factor. Your blue sky schemes (space elevators, etc.) are crazy risky with payoffs centuries from now and are therefore heavily discounted. It's fine if you want to invest in them, but stay away from the public treasure chest please.
The reason private firms don't invest in those things is that that don't make any sense today -- financially or otherwise. Why should my tax dollars be used for such senseless things? I know, my government already invests in senseless things. But that doesn't justify investing in more senseless things.
And don't say "just like the interstate highway system." The only reason that seems to have made sense is that you aren't looking at what we could have done with those dollars instead.
Remember that you have to fly the Soyuz 2-3 times to get the same number of crew up/down -- and a hell of a lot more to get the same cargo up -- and even more to get the same cargo down as the Shuttle. All of this results in a significantly reduced reliability compared to the Shuttle.
Nothing remotely like this was considered in anything like the Challenger timeframe (1986) -- or anytime after the Shuttle's CDR -- which was well before the "late 1970s."
There is a lot to comment on here. I'll pick one thread:
"What I'm saying is that I think there are ideas good enough and noble enough that they should be developed and explored without worrying about whether they are going to turn a profit next quarter, but for the good of humanity as a whole. Private enterprise isn't very good at that"
This sounds noble and altruistic until you realize that you are taking the money to do these things with a gun. Make no mistake, if you don't pay your taxes, you will see people with guns at your door.
You call corporations/capitalism flawed. I agree. What method of resource allocation do you suggest? From your words, it sounds as if you favor central planning. Who decides what blue sky research projects should be funded?
This is where we fundamentally disagree. The government doesn't have any money. They take our money by taxing us. Thus, what you are saying is that you think that your ideas are good enough to take my money, against my will to spend on what you believe to be good ideas. In reality, they are nothing more than pet projects. And since you admit you don't have enough money, you must not have a very good track record at picking winning projects. The government isn't very good at picking winning projects either.
"Well, from two minutes with google, cordless drills and smoke alarms were both originally developed for the space program. Scratch resistant and/or polarised sunglasses, lighting protection, and numerous other technologies and products, all of them a side effect of the space program. Very few corporations are in a position to do the long term research to lead to things like this, so it just wouldn't happen otherwise."
All of your examples are myths. The research done to bring these things to market at a cost that is economically sustainable was done by private companies. Plus, if this is where the value is, why not just have an organization that, say, develops a cordless drill?
"Because very few private corporations see the benefit of investing in something with a long term payoff."
How do you know it has a long term payoff? You are just going on a hunch. Use your own money to go after your hunches. If you are right, you will be rewarded with more money.
"When the focus of a corporation and it's shareholders is on getting a good value on the next balance sheet, putting large amounts of money into long term projects is not going to be an attractive proposition."
That's exactly where the focus of a corporation should be. Putting investors money into long term hunches isn't.
"This applies to lots of scientific research. Quantum physics, for instance, isn't worth anything directly, but in 20 years or so it should be paying off big time. Or cryptography."
More hunches.
"Space exploration is one of the areas where government funding makes sense, because the long term effects are overwhelmingly good."
Please list some of these innovations. If you can, why not just invest in them directly? Better yet, fund your investment via the capital markets rather than my taxes.
Slashdot Mirror
Don't forget that taxpayers funded a lot of the research a development that these people are taking advantage of.
There. Fixed that for you.
Great example. But instead, the federal government picked a technology solution of their choice -- something it is utterly incapable of.
The difference being that when a company is stupid they pay for it with their own money and not my tax dollars.
Yeah, because it is silly to pour huge amounts of cash into a distant, unlikely, huge project. Much better is to fund near-term, incremental, likely, reasonably-sized projects funded by people with a stake in the outcome. All hail the power of capitalism.
You justify one huge govt program by saying it made another one cheaper...
Everyone talks about the vague benefits of the Apollo program, but no one really knows what they are. When they do give specifics, they turn out to be independently developed. At a minimum, it would have been more effective to just develop the technologies directly.
The reason private firms don't invest in those things is that that don't make any sense today -- financially or otherwise. Why should my tax dollars be used for such senseless things? I know, my government already invests in senseless things. But that doesn't justify investing in more senseless things.
And don't say "just like the interstate highway system." The only reason that seems to have made sense is that you aren't looking at what we could have done with those dollars instead.
The soyuz changes its CG position to change its attitude which rotates the lift vector which changes the trajectory.
There. I fixed it for you.
How does a search box provide information? Oh, you meant the search results -- which are usually provided by marketing...
How did the consumer become informed without marketing?
Try using Newtonian physics at very small scales. I'm not sure I'd say "wrong," but certainly there are limitations on its regime.
Psst -- that's Challenger, not Columbia...
Remember that you have to fly the Soyuz 2-3 times to get the same number of crew up/down -- and a hell of a lot more to get the same cargo up -- and even more to get the same cargo down as the Shuttle. All of this results in a significantly reduced reliability compared to the Shuttle.
Nothing remotely like this was considered in anything like the Challenger timeframe (1986) -- or anytime after the Shuttle's CDR -- which was well before the "late 1970s."
I'd love for you to tell me where you heard this...
You lost me there.
Discounted free cash flow / equivalent shares actually.
Written like someone who does work in IT [sic].
There is a lot to comment on here. I'll pick one thread:
"What I'm saying is that I think there are ideas good enough and noble enough that they should be developed and explored without worrying about whether they are going to turn a profit next quarter, but for the good of humanity as a whole. Private enterprise isn't very good at that"
This sounds noble and altruistic until you realize that you are taking the money to do these things with a gun. Make no mistake, if you don't pay your taxes, you will see people with guns at your door.
You call corporations/capitalism flawed. I agree. What method of resource allocation do you suggest? From your words, it sounds as if you favor central planning. Who decides what blue sky research projects should be funded?
"A government has a hell of a lot more money"
This is where we fundamentally disagree. The government doesn't have any money. They take our money by taxing us. Thus, what you are saying is that you think that your ideas are good enough to take my money, against my will to spend on what you believe to be good ideas. In reality, they are nothing more than pet projects. And since you admit you don't have enough money, you must not have a very good track record at picking winning projects. The government isn't very good at picking winning projects either.
"Well, from two minutes with google, cordless drills and smoke alarms were both originally developed for the space program. Scratch resistant and/or polarised sunglasses, lighting protection, and numerous other technologies and products, all of them a side effect of the space program. Very few corporations are in a position to do the long term research to lead to things like this, so it just wouldn't happen otherwise."
All of your examples are myths. The research done to bring these things to market at a cost that is economically sustainable was done by private companies. Plus, if this is where the value is, why not just have an organization that, say, develops a cordless drill?
"Because very few private corporations see the benefit of investing in something with a long term payoff."
How do you know it has a long term payoff? You are just going on a hunch. Use your own money to go after your hunches. If you are right, you will be rewarded with more money.
"When the focus of a corporation and it's shareholders is on getting a good value on the next balance sheet, putting large amounts of money into long term projects is not going to be an attractive proposition."
That's exactly where the focus of a corporation should be. Putting investors money into long term hunches isn't.
"This applies to lots of scientific research. Quantum physics, for instance, isn't worth anything directly, but in 20 years or so it should be paying off big time. Or cryptography."
More hunches.
"Space exploration is one of the areas where government funding makes sense, because the long term effects are overwhelmingly good."
Like what?
Please list some of these innovations. If you can, why not just invest in them directly? Better yet, fund your investment via the capital markets rather than my taxes.
Just another day working at Burger King for you?
Huh?
A) you better come to my door with a bigger gun than I have then, and B) we would have discovered much more and we'd be much more civilized.