Talk:Why Moderate Sized Rockets Are Better

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Revision as of 07:29, 28 March 2009 by Farred (talk | contribs) (talk)
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I have referred to my concept of Lunar development as "reasonable" in the article, and as "rational" in other places. This means little without the basis for deciding what is reasonable. I take profitability as my basis for deciding. By investment standards profit from Luna is so risky and removed into the future as to make money spent on development no investment at all. The same standards can be used to evaluate development decisions regardless. One merely imagines a very low rate of return for an investment that does not mature for a very long time and is very risky, and then does the best possible within those limitations. One plans for various contingencies. Every thing I know about lunar development indicates to me that if people follow through persistently the environvent of lunar investments will change in the distant (perhaps fifty years) future. There will be a high rate of return and secure knowledge of performance. Making decissions based on profitability leaves some chance of failure; but the Apollo on steroids strategy leaves little chance for success unless your goal is leaving a few footprints on Mars and proving once and for all time that space exploration is just too expensive to have any practical benefits.--Farred 17:31, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

  • Why did I call investment on Luna "risky" if everything I know points to future high returns on investment? Does not long time to maturity cover the entire set of adverse conditions? It is not what I know that indicates risk in lunar investments. It is my ignorance. The total of human knowledge about Luna is much greater than my own, but the total

of human ignorance about Luna, as a fraction of my own ignorance, approaches unity. So there is a vast area out of which the risk of failure arises. Also, there is no guarantee that the individual person, corporation or nation that invests in lunar development will reap the profit. There is no guarantee that others will follow through with investments made today to the point that a profit is ever achieved.

  • Those who care for nothing but the amount left in their retirement accounts at death, those who feel faint at the thought of risk and those who think humanity utterly incapable of sustained efforts of more than twenty years should have nothing to do with lunar investment. Those who think that the spark that caused man to irrigate the Babylonian

empire and build cathedrals is still operating and still admirable should consider the effort of lunar development worthy of itself whether they can live to taste the fruit or not.--Farred 15:29, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

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