[1] https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/01/all-european-crew-take...
By filling this astronaut reserve pool, ESA seems to have created a market for Axiom Space, a move that might raise questions given the agency’s purpose is to promote the European space sector. In fact, the ESA’s founding Convention enshrines the principle of geo-return, which grants member states at least an 80 percent return on their contributions into ESA’s budget in the form of research and development contracts. Although the cost of the Axiom missions is paid through ESA, most of this money goes to the Texas-headquartered Axiom Space and its launch provider, SpaceX.
https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/01/axiom-and-spacex-are-d...
Considering the crew, and who actually pays for the launch, I guess commercial or sub-contracted are bettwr terms to discribe the mission. Private space mission aoinda way to much like rich dudes space tourism. Military astronauts and a selected scientist using a non-government launch and space craft, commanded by a proper, and experienced, mission commander is a different sport all together.
As prices come down for access to space, there is obviously going to be a point between only being affordable by governments and being affordable by everyone, where only governments and particularly rich people can afford it.
I don't think everyone is as excited to have capitalism take over our priorities in space, after seeing what it has done to Terra.
edit:
https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Images/2021/05/The_increa...
Rounding up to 30000 objects in orbit (not even in space), that would mean 0.3 objects weren't made by capitalism. 1 object put up by government invalidates OP.
At the end of 2022, there was only 6,718 active satellites[1] in space - total.
The amount of government objects (from any country, of any kind, station, spy satellite, probe, rover, etc) is dwarfed by commercial interests. This just illustrates the sheer volume of commercial objects in space...
In fact, here's a list of all publicly acknowledged satellites launched by the USAF since 1984[2]. It shows 331 in total, counting inactive satellites.
[1] https://blog.ucsusa.org/syoung/how-many-satellites-are-in-sp...
So it’s kind of unreasonable to be adamant that only because of capitalism we have stuff in space.
The initial Iridium constellation is estimated at around $5 Billion in 1998 money (~$9 Billion today), and it nearly killed the company in the process. That was just initial constellation expenses - monthly subscriptions are still cost prohibitive for majority of the population/general use, and ongoing maintenance is very expensive.
The point is - it's not only cheaper to do land-based communications, but it's more reliable.
There doesn't seem to be any reality where a centrally planned economy would take this sort of project on just for funsies...
All that is needed is motivated labour that gets fed and housed. There is no magical law that you have to pay “market rates” so people can buy themselves gadgets.
Now to be clear I am not advocating for the Soviet Union or central planning, far from it. I am only saying that there is no inherent reason why you’d need capitalism to fill space up with stuff.
It is obviously a very powerful system but it is not the only possible system or necessarily the best. Again I very much like regulated and properly taxed market capitalist economies and want to keep living in one.
Which cements my point... commercialism is the only way these sorts of activities can exist.
Was ancient Egypt capitalist and the pyramids a commercial enterprise?
Again I am not advocating for anything except that we don’t turn economic systems into religious beliefs.
Sure, I agree entirely with this statement.
> Was ancient Egypt capitalist and the pyramids a commercial enterprise?
Slave Labor is difficult to beat, eh? This is a strange way to make a point about government spending vs. commercialism.
The overall point was the incentive for someone to make a profit is what motivates many if not all of the risky endeavors. If governments were solely in charge of launching rockets, then there would be no push by SpaceX to develop cheaper alternatives (and therefore win contracts, therefore make money).
The government being solely in charge of any particular industry has rarely if ever resulted in innovations and ultimately a better service/product. The incentives are just not aligned under those circumstances.
If we’re being brutally honest a lot of today’s economy depends on slave-like conditions for workers. Not necessarily in the “developed” world although people debate that, but definitely in poorer areas of the world.
> The overall point was the incentive for someone to make a profit is what motivates many if not all of the risky endeavors. If governments were solely in charge of launching rockets, then there would be no push by SpaceX to develop cheaper alternatives (and therefore win contracts, therefore make money).
I don’t entirely agree with that statement. Of course the profit motive is powerful and it does matter to people but that is largely because of the capitalist system itself. So if that is changed the profit motive ceases to be as strong.
The case could be made that many of the greatest companies were founded by people motivated by strong vision and the desire to make an impact, much rather than profit motive. However in order to be able to do anything under capitalism they needed to focus on things that could be made profitable.
And certainly taken too far the incentives of the system are not at all aligned with making ordinary people’s lives better, but rather that they keep buying or subscribing to your stuff. See social media motives and incentives for instance.
Pyramids weren't built by slaves.
2. If we do want to be pedantic, they said "in space" and sputnik is not in space anymore.
Totalitarian regimes in space haven't gotten us very far, and frankly sound very depressing for the future of humanity.
That would be the market economy, not capitalism. Since we have state capitalism as well as other varieties that aren't free markets.
I think the criticism upthread was aimed more generally at large undertakings for the sake of profit with barely anyone getting goods/services out of the deal, which does fit space tourism.