https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/sep/02/india-launches-space-mission-to-the-sun-a-week-after-moon-landing
Aditya-L1 is to observe sun’s outermost layers and will be first vessel by any Asian nation to be placed in orbit around sun
If the US can go to space while issuing drone strikes on civilians, if Russia can go to space while invading countries, I don't see why India can't go to space while still being backwards about the caste system. Also it's not like the government endorses the caste system, unlike the aforementioned examples.
Whataboutism bs. Two wrongs don't make a right.
whataboutism /ˌwɒtəˈbaʊtɪz(ə)m/ noun the technique or practice of responding to an accusation or difficult question by making a counter-accusation or raising a different issue.
Yeah but I didn't see anyone complaining when NASA Artemis was announced? Everyone rejoiced NASA's return to space. So why the double standard towards India? Credit where credit is due don't you think?
Also what's the caste system has anything to do with the Indian government? How do you think the government has enforced it? What do you think the government should do instead? I am not Indian mind you, but I am sick of these holier than thou attitude of westerners.
Credit is definitely due and this is an amazing feat by India.
I haven't bothered to discuss the other topic. Is there even any point when US issues are always on the front page here? I probably know more about US politics than my own country at this point.
Though of course you could also go there and take a jab at Americans. Let me know when you do so I can give you some support.
I haven’t bothered to discuss the other topic.
Exactly. Verdict issued yet you haven't still thought about it? You haven't bothered. Yet you've already decided that the government is responsible. Otherwise it wouldn't constitute a "whataboutism". There are many cases of "a Texas man doing this and a Florida man doing that" but nobody has blamed the government for these.
Whatever your reasons, that was whataboutism.
Expecting others to know what goes on in NASA discussions is moronic at best. That's not the topic we are in. You didn't even link it or reference it.
The Indian caste system is a humanitarian crisis. Would you rather westerners ignore it? There's just no winning then, is there?
Expecting others to know what goes on in NASA discussions is moronic at best.
So people haven't criticized NASA because they don't know what NASA does. Yet suddenly everyone, including you has opinions about India's space program. I thought NASA had a much bigger space program. And I am the moron to point out the double standard? This is exactly what I was talking about, the "holier than thou" attitude.
Whatever your reasons, that was whataboutism.
You haven't still answered how you think the Indian government is responsible for the caste system. Shouldn't that be resolved first? If you can't say if the claim itself is even true, how is it whataboutism?
I hate the term whataboutism
It's OK to point out hypocrisy. In fact, I think it should be forefront on everyone's mind when your government is criticizing some other government for things they do themselves
In the case of one government criticizing another it’s definitely fair to point out hypocrisy. The problem is that in most cases it’s used to avoid discussion on a topic by changing the subject of the debate.
That said, it is also fair to say that the first comment kind of shoehorned in the caste system on a topic that had nothing to do with it.
How is that related to the space mission? Or are we trying to make this look like a Reddit comment section now? It’s an issue in India but that’s not relevant to their accomplishments in space exploration now is it?
Over 40 million Americans are living below the poverty line (12 million of those are children), that's 12% of the population of the country. To compare and contrast India's got 150 million people living below the poverty line with a population of 1.4 billion, that's 10% of their population. Yet we spend $33 billion on our space program. For those playing at home India's moon landing cost around $75 million.
To pull the poverty card on India for starting a space program that is lifting up their people's national self worth is just about the most imperialist thing you could do.
You explained literally nothing. I am Indian, I am well aware of this, yet it’s still not relevant to their space program. The other comment puts those numbers into perspective.
Even though I couldn't find any connection between a space mission to sun and casteism, I could assure you friend the latter is much difficult to solve. That's why countries still struggle with casteism or racism or sexism or some other evil-ism, but we shouldn't let it hold us back from the technical and scientific advancements. In fact one could argue building a science oriented society is the way to eradicate these issues.
Yeah, I love it when people act like America doesn't have a fucking caste system. As though there weren't millions of Americans who voted for a rich guy who planned to build a wall to keep the "illegals" out of the country. And there wasn't a massive lobbyist effort by multi-billion dollar companies and oligarchs to kill unemployment benefits in order to push people back into shitty service jobs that pay peanuts.
whatever or whoever they land on the sun will no longer be in any system, so maybe this is the first step?
I mean if anything for sure it will be in a system, the solar system. Not in original form though...
I haven't followed this mission. It's not possible they're launching lower-caste people into the sun?
LOL. This is clearly how to tell
"I'm jealous of another country achieving something better than my country"
without actually telling
"I'm jealous of another country achieving something better than my country"
Lol, im sorry but there's nothing to be jealous of India. Im happy they accomplished the landing in the moon, but they have a lot problems that they need to solve in their country.
I don't disagree that they have problems to solve. But the kind of negativity these comments point out of pure jealousy. Let's just celebrate achievements in the field of science and tech whichever country it is. No country is perfect.
One can mention the problems a country have without being racist/disliking a country. All countries have problems. If I mention the United atates have a problem with ignorancy, racism, between other problems, would that be considered racism?
Would you mention those in a thread about an article, let’s say, the recent Artemis mission? The issue is context, not the actual idea. It’s not relevant, so why mention it in the first place? If people want to discuss those problems, do it under the appropriate post or make a new thread for that purpose.
I 100% would. Americans are idiots. I am mention it now, and the post is not even about them.
Very interesting. Solar probes and low budgets usually don't go together. That's a lot of deceleration.
I usually only thought about slingshotting to speed up, I'd never considered slowing down past that one scene in The Martian. Can you elaborate further?
There are 2 ways to go sunward. You can shed speed to reduce orbital distance, but 30 km/s is a lot of velocity to change. Or you use another body (often antisunward) and a slingshot to put the craft in a highly eccentric orbit that, at times, is near the sun - so you have many proximal destinations you have to hit without error to meet your course. A mars transfer is easier but you want to hit certain proximity windows.
From my knowledge in KSP, in a nutshell if you pass by a large gravitational mass on one side you'll speed up, but if you pass on the other side you'll slow down. Throw in an engine burn across the periapse (closest point) and you'll amplify that much more.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The latest mission in India’s ambitious space program has blasted off on a voyage towards the centre of the solar system, a week after the country’s successful unmanned moon landing.
“Launch successful, all normal,” an Indian Space Research Organisation official announced from mission control as the vessel made its way to the upper reaches of the Earth’s atmosphere.
Raychaudhury said the mission probe would study coronal mass ejections, a periodic phenomenon that sees huge discharges of plasma and magnetic energy from the sun’s atmosphere.
Aditya is travelling on the ISRO-designed, 320-tonne PSLV XL rocket that has been a mainstay of the Indian space program, powering earlier launches to the moon and Mars.
The South Asian nation has a comparatively low-budget space program, but one that has grown considerably in size and momentum since it first sent a probe to orbit the moon in 2008.
Experts say India can keep costs low by copying and adapting existing technology, and thanks to an abundance of highly skilled engineers who earn a fraction of their foreign counterparts’ wages.
The original article contains 571 words, the summary contains 175 words. Saved 69%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
Man the first two acts of that movie are one of the best scifi stories I've ever seen and the third act of that movie is one of the worst slasher films I've ever seen
I was thinking the same. I wanted to see how long it was going to take to get there, then saw in the article it says it is actually only traveling 1% of the distance from the earth to the sun to offset earth's gravitational pull with the suns and then create an orbit around the Sun. It doesn't say how long the travel time was unless I missed it.
Should create a cool vantage point for photos I imagine
He's incapable of being happy. That's why he keeps taking other people's toys and breaking them.
Ice cold take. Space programs are almost entirely about increasing domestic production with a strong R&D and training emphasis.
It's not like they could have taken this money and made any significant impact on the problem. Plus space programs have indirect long term benefits that are hard to calculate.
More scientists and high tech industries is a good thing for a country.
There are too many poor people so it’s not worth bothering ?
You could feed and clothes tens of millions of people with India’s space budget - and educate them as rocket scientists if you wanted .
Space exploration is largely a folly, while people are hungry .
Ok let's say I'm poor. I have a job that pays very little. I could choose to work more hours to get more money OR I could choose to take night classes and get a degree in something.
In the second case, I'm giving up temporary income for more long term income. Just because I'm giving up income does not mean I'm making the wrong decision.
This is a similar thing in India. They are not wasting very much money on these space projects. But if it could kick start a space industry, it'll more than pay for itself in the long term. Space is only going to get increasingly important and if India is left behind they will lose more money (and therefore more hungry people) in the long term.
It's not black and white like you are trying to make it.
There are corrupt politicians and businessmen who steal money from the poor and spend it on stupid shit that is definitely higher than ISRO's budget and yet ISRO's budget is the only thing that we need to shit about.
