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I agree, everything SpaceX come out with leaves me with a futuristic feeling in my bones. The first grasshopper flight, and indeed the recent F9R test look like CGI from a 90's film and I keep watching them with wonder. The least amazing thing about the footage is that it's taken from a drone hovering next to a rocket, and said drone is recording HD footage... If I'd said that 20 years ago it would have been in a sci-fi novel.

20 years ago, people would have asked what HD is :)

The Figure Gala Show Lillehammer Olympic was broadcasted in HDTV, exactly 20 years ago. [1] Though I do completely agree with you and the parent comments.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u1bgR2X-vIA

You aren't hitting anything other than "abort" during launch. And for a modern system, the space of problems where the computer hasn't already done it and you're not already dead must be pretty small.

It doesn't particularly need to have a "pilot", even. It's entirely capable of autonomous/ground-controlled operation, as witness the several unmanned Dragon flights. But it probably makes the passengers feel better to have some token control. And I suppose it gives them some options if things go wrong.

So in a way, a better metaphor is an elevator, not an airplane. Like you say, there's very little the occupants can do to properly get the craft where it's supposed to go, aside from a few basic aspects.

It could be argued the airplane metaphor, and the space shuttle, did more to hold back progress ... with current technology anyway ('course you don't necessarily know 'til you try). Perhaps in the future we'll have the ability to go to/from space with the freedom, abilities, and choices pilots have in airplanes.

But until changing orbit / inclination / altitude / destination becomes no big deal (i.e. right now where the majority of your choices are already made for you), the elevator metaphor is a better fit.

As early as during the period of Gemini project (50 years ago!), the engineers wanted to put in computer controlled flight system and not add in any human controllable flight control. The test pilots who were going to sit in them objected though.

They'll just be playing angry birds while waiting for the ship to dock with the ISS

That's pretty critical of Orion. I don't think NASA can make something that's designed to last 2-3 weeks in space look 'sexy' like the Dragon vehicle. Its just going to need big ugly shield, big clunky switches, etc.

The Dragon is like a yacht. Sure it can have some sexiness to it, but Orion is more like a ferry boat or cargo ship. Sexiness at that point becomes a liability.

I also don't see how parachutes will cost so much more. Orion is designed to land on the ground. Retrieval isn't a big deal.

>I really feel like somebody from the future popped into the present and 'snuck' in design that wouldn't normally be seen for 50 years or so.

Tossing in a tablet and some curved plastic doesn't make it properly futuristic, it makes it hollywood futuristic. Actually ferrying humans, safety, and cost is all that matters. Musk and Boeing play up the interiors of their capsules because its easy to do and looks good to Joe Public. NASA has no one to impress with Jonathan Ives-looking solutions, why spend time/money making them when they have really difficult problems to solve like getting the SLS going.

You say that retrieval isn't a big deal, but relative to what?

First, is Orion actually designed to land on ground? Wikipedia says water. Sounds like they were debating it for a while and eventually chose water. That means ships and salt water exposure and all sorts of fun.

Even if landing on ground, parachutes don't steer too well so you need a pretty big empty area to recover in. How far is that going to be from Florida? How long to ship the capsule back, make sure nothing broke, and prep it for flight again?

It sounds like SpaceX's plan is to land Dragon back at the launch site, at which point it will be ready to go again almost immediately. No need to arrange for long distance transport, no worry of things being jarred loose by the impact of landing, and no need to worry about all the places salt water will get.

As for yacht versus cargo ship, Orion is only designed for 21 days in space with people on board. Longer missions need a separate habitat module. It doesn't really sound much more capable than Dragon. Add in the likely vast disparity in cost between a Dragon launch on a Falcon 9 and an Orion launch on SLS, and that Dragon will probably be flying routinely for years before Orion makes its first manned flight, and I start to wonder if there's any point in continuing to develop Orion now.