Category Archives: Business

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Space, Technology and Society

Japan To The Moon

2 Comments

…privately. Yes, it’s ambitious, but I don’t think this is the problem:

The longer-term goals are laudable, but the company seems to seriously underestimate the difficulty of reaching lunar ice, harvesting it under extremely cold conditions, and producing propellant from ice. These are all significant engineering challenges in unprecedented conditions. Moreover, even under optimistic circumstances, NASA’s plans to return to the Moon wouldn’t put a handful of humans—let alone hundreds—on the lunar surface before the late 2020s, and China doesn’t intend for such landings until the early 2030s.

I don’t think that NASA’s or China’s plans are relevant to private lunar plans.

Business, Culinary, Health, Media Criticism, Science And Society, Technology and Society

Hospital Food

9 Comments

There’s no doubt it could use a lot of improvement, but I think this is bogus:

Dr. Eisenberg says the jury is no longer out on the benefits of eating a more plant-based diet with less refined foods, sugar and red meat. A study published last year in JAMA estimated that nearly half of the deaths from heart disease, stroke and Type 2 diabetes are caused by poor diet.

They are, but there’s zero evidence that red meant causes any of them. Patricia had to spend a night in the hospital for a procedure a few weeks ago, and her breakfast was terrible, nutritionally.

[Update a few minutes later]

Related: Incorrect diagnoses kill 80,000 people per year.

The medical profession gets far too much respect.

Business, Political Commentary, Popular Culture, Social Commentary, Space, Technology and Society

Elon’s Announcement

40 Comments

I didn’t see it, and I couldn’t view it on my notebook because Firefox can’t handle HTML5 (WTF?).

But from what I can glean from my Twitter feed, the plan to send a bunch of artists into space excited a lot of people on Twitter not normally excited about what SpaceX has been doing (we saw a similar effect with the FH launch of the Tesla and rocket man, though some who didn’t like that love this). Anyway, I’ve been saying all weekend, and told people at the conference today that I’d be very surprised if someone booked an entire BFR flight and didn’t take friends along. The other thing that seems clear is that the schedule is slipping (Commercial Crew has slipped from November to December for test flight, and from next April to “second quarter” for first crewed launch).

Only about 5% of SpaceX resources are going to BFR currently, but once development is done on Commercial Crew, that will increase dramatically, but a 2023 lunar mission means no Mars prior to that. His flight, given the amount of the down payment, will be the highest BFR priority. Here’s a link from Business Insider.

[Tuesday-morning update]

Here‘s Eric Berger’s take.