The space shuttle orbiter definitely had a lot more cool factor.

I think I’m convinced that VTOL is a better engineering trade off for space ships rather than making space planes.

bluescrn 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

It was extremely cool 45+ years ago. But the space race ended, and while government-funded space programs did some fantastic work beyond that (space telescopes and Mars landers), it took capitalism to develop the resuable rocket, then scale it up to Starship proportions.

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timacles an hour ago | parent [-]

Like 50% of SpaceXs initial development came from tax payer money.

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kortilla an hour ago | parent [-]

The government was a customer. That’s very different from the government giving a research grant.

That’s like saying 25% of Exxon’s development came from tax payer money because the government uses a shitload of oil.

	▲	qlte 2 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		A more accurate analogy would be giving contracts to Exxon back before they had ever found or drilled a single oil well, as their primary source of revenue to subsidize their R&D and learning curve, in the hope that they would eventually be able to supply the government with needed oil, and ultimately succeeded.

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pfdietz 42 minutes ago | parent | prev [-]

It also had a large stupid factor. Like one of von Braun's Germans was reported to have said: "they reinvented the wheel -- and made it square."