This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
Spy satellites contribute so little to the total mass to orbit that you never even needed SpaceX for that (i don't consider Starlink a primarily national security project, because it's not).
For delivering payloads, including probably international ones, China will begin catching up next year. I do not assume that Americans will be contracting them, no, so in that sense SpaceX is poised to maintain its near-monopoly.
It is believed that the crop of reusable rocket startups is attributable to Robin Li, the founder of Baidu, getting into National People's Congress, and advocating for legalization of private space businesses in 2010s. So far, there have been three Chinese entities that have conducted VTOL tests for reusable rockets.
There are others which are further behind.
Technologically, they are several iterations behind, but strategically I'd say they save significant advantages over the current SpaceX (a usual feature of Chinese fast-following). For example Space Epoch Yuanxingzhe-1 is basically a small Starship (or a better, thicker Falcon-9, if Falcon-9 were designed today). Stainless steel, metholox, will naturally plug into the existing and state-subsidized logistics, including military facilities that currently produce aviation parts (as a small point, Falcon's extreme height-to-width ratio is obviously suboptimal and downstream of American highway standards, but China had no problem building dedicated roads). LandSpace Zhuque-3 VTVL-1 is similar (they can boast of the first metholox engine to make it to orbit).
But as you rightfully notice, it's not clear if this will have much effect on the SpaceX bottom line, since Americans can saturate their cadence anyway. In all likelihood it will only unnerve some people in Washington as a symbolic thing.
More options
Context Copy link