India just landed on the Moon for less than it cost to make Interstellar | The Independent

L4sBot@lemmy.worldmod to Technology@lemmy.world – 640 points –
India just landed on the Moon for less than it cost to make Interstellar
independent.co.uk

India just landed on the Moon for less than it cost to make Interstellar | The Independent::undefined

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Why is this even a comparison? India only went to the moon, interstellar had to go to other freaking solar systems and a black hole to make their documentary!

Cool.

The average income in India is 25x ish less than that of the US. If we scale the $75 million cost to land on the moon by 25 times, we get $1.8 billion. The Perseverance rover's cost is estimated at $2.75 billion and that thing landed on Mars.

It's incredibly impressive that India has landed on the moon on their 2nd try. Nothing should take away from that, and India should be very proud of their achievement. But geez this is a braindead article. Yes, poorer countries can pay people less do the same amount of work as someone in another country.

I respectfully disagree with you. It's a bit misleading to compare average incomes like that. I would assume the income disparity is nowhere near as large for valuable scientists and engineers working for a national space program. In addition, you are only comparing labour costs. Some materials can be cheaper in India, but certainly not by a factor of 25 and certainly not all of them. Therefore, I wouldn't say the article is braindead.

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This comparison is predicated on every part of the manufacturing process occurring in each country. As soon as India are buying parts from other countries they’re not paying India prices anymore

Some guy at NASA: “We estimate that the cost of this part should cost 1.8Million dollars. “

Some guy in India: “You know, my cousin can make that part for 35 dollars”

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These titles are dumb.

"NASA's 1969 moon landing was with a computer that can't even power Doom!"

Did you know scientists created ways to use crabs as logic gates?

Someone calculated we need about 8 billion crabs in order to run Doom.

Pretty sure that was the amount to store the files for the game, not actually run it.

"India's Moonventure: When Bollywood Met the Lunar Blockbuster"

Aside from different approaches I think the biggest factor is salary difference. Still impressive though a good example for other Asian nations.

Modern US space projects are also basically welfare programs for aerospace companies.

Can we not have the hundred identical stupid jokes in the comment section like we did in reddit?

Let's also get rid of complete transcription of short videos while we're at it. Everyone else saw the video, no need to quote every part

Transcription is usually something done for deaf people. Like people transcribing memes for the blind.

That's not what I'm talking about. On most of the video subreddits, the whole comment section is just quotes and laughing emojis.

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But Interstellar had a box office of $715 million.

The astronautics is a very expensive sector and with completely uncertain returns on earnings.