India is preparing to land on moon for the first time in the country's history (opens in new tab)

Andy Weir (author of The Martian) has a new book coming out that explores tourism to the moon. He has done a ton of research on the topic, definitely worth checking out.

He was recently on StarTalk Radio [1] give it a listen

1. https://www.startalkradio.net/tag/andy-weir/

The Moon has a fair bit of Helium-3. It sounds like that is partly what this mission is about.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helium-3#Extraction_from_extra...

If you want to build anything really big in space, lunar materials would be much cheaper to put there than materials from Earth. Asteroids might beat them both out, though.

That's pretty cool, but you should see a shrink. Something's wrong with you.

I think that reading the article before posting usually leads to more relevant comments.

The article is talking about unmanned moon missions, and mentioned that China sent a rover to the moon in 2013.

Pssst, I heard the last country to land people there laughable still hasn't even made it to the level of free health care for all! They still might, of course, it's not like any of these goals are mutually exclusive.

The cost of this mission is 93 million dollars. If you can come up with a plan to provide basic supply with fresh water for the entire country for 93 million dollars I'm sure the Indian government will be greatly interested in your services. Heck you may even be offered a billion dollars to solve this problem. Maybe then you'll realise the logistical nightmare of getting supply of fresh water to 1.25 billion people.

If you do not understand the dynamics of how developing countries function it's best you not comment. The same "poor people" for whom you feel sad for (in another comment you posted below) sport a smartphone in their pockets. This is the irony of living in a developing country. Technology advances faster and ends up becoming cheaper than building last mile connectivity and basic services. Infrastructure building is always slower and more expensive than tech adoption.

Thanks for looking out for India. I'm sure they appreciate that. You make a good point, all of us should get our own country fixed. Hopefully you're doing something about yours too..

Countries don't generally operate on the myopic principle of addressing issues one at a time.

When America first began the Apollo program, it was almost a full decade before the United States addressed a lot of the racial issues that have plagued it since its inception.

By many measures, such as access to healthcare, incarceration rates, and even basic literacy, the United States still has severe equality issues. If the United States was operating according to this principle, they would still be waiting to send anyone to space. I'd be happily surprised if there was actually any country that had fully conquered this issue.

Point being that every country, all the way up to the largest economy in the world, has unresolved issues. Issues which are fundamental to human rights and equality.

Is your umbrage with India specifically, or are you promoting the idea of singular focus as a global concept? If the latter, I'd be interested (genuinely!) in seeing your reasoning and evidence. If the former, I'd encourage you to reflect on what you are saying, and discover why you are (I assume, and hope, inadvertently) applying your criticism in a discriminatory manner

Clearly by that rationale, because of Flint NASA should scrap all its programs

_You_ may want that. However, _India_, as the biggest democracy in the world, chose to do a moon landing instead.

What makes you believe you know better about what is best? Unless you are an astrophysicist specialized in economic development (not sure that exists) odds are not in favor of your judgement being the correct one.