Reusable rockets weren't practical either. But someone was maverick enough to attempt it anyways. [1]
You provide valuable information but I just hate how you succumb to easy thinking, an appeal to tradition [2]: "well it hadn't been done then so it can't possibly be done now." It's a form of anachronistic gatekeeping. It doesn't belong in the age we currently reside in.
We have totally different computational abilities today, powerful beyond reason. Our hardware is smaller and better performing. We can perform digital simulations billions of times before we even execute one physical experiment.
I've seen the same attitude with age-old mathematics problems and it makes even less sense in that domain. The ability to perform computational experiments that our predecessors couldn't, changes the viability of almost every unsolved problem.
Boston Dynamics would have never created Atlas or Spot if they clung to common tropes about robots. And now, due to battery technology, the once tethered robots are dexterously mobile. [2]
> I just hate how you succumb to easy thinking, an appeal to tradition
No. I appeal to PHYSICS.
This isn't an emotional argument. Or one out of "tradition".
The reusable rocket was a question of implementation, not physics. The math actually supported the idea of being able to do that. It wasn't some magical juju bean Musk pulled out of his behind. They did the math. The math proved you could do it. They built it. It took a lot of trial and error and, yes, failure, but they KNEW the math supported the concept.
This inflatable muscle thing (air or fluid) isn't supported by the PHYSICS.
What do I know anyhow? I've only been in robotics since the early 80's. I have literally seen <insert fantastical claim> in robotics and artificial intelligence since that time. And here we are, we still don't have a robot of any kind that is as capable as a house fly, even with a supercomputer running it remotely.
And that, BTW, is the test for fantastical actuators. The technology has to support an amazing range in terms of scale. At one extreme you have something like an ant and, opposite that, an elephant. Even within a human being the range of size and strength in muscles is likely 1000 to 1 (haven't done the math).
> Boston Dynamics would have never created Atlas or Spot
I don't think you have a good sense of what these machines are and are not. Hint: They are not what you think they are.
No, your appeal is to the "cult of science." Science is a moving target. Hydraulics involves materials known as hydraulic fluid. Material science is in its infancy. Your appeal is nothing more than to pessimism and the edifice of cocksure.
As my senior, you should have a bit more tact instead of outgassing petty sarcastic quips. I think the baby boomer generation has actually become somewhat of an ironic label because these people never really grew up, effectively remaining emotionally stunted babies in perpetuity. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this scientific theory.
It is always good to question assumptions. One you could consider is the assumption that all problems are created equal. This isn’t the case. There are fundamental and practical limits to things.
For this kind of artificial muscle actuator, there are fundamental limits to the way the physics works for this design which prevent it from ever simultaneously having good efficiency in energy and power density, high strain and high frequency operation. There are certainly ways to make artificial muscles work, but hydraulics is not the way.
For rockets and space vehicles, the limit has more to do with technology and material science.
Reuse has been a goal since the at least 70s, with the Shuttle project, Buran, later the DC-X, etc. It wasn't one guy maverick enough to attempt it. And it wasn't given up on and then revived by one guy. Blue Origin, Armadillo, Scaled Composites, etc. were all attempting it. It is the largest scale (comparing heavy vs shuttle, though heavy hasn't seen much use) and seemingly most successful, and several other firsts.
The upper stage still is discarded, but if they can pull off the Starshuttle it will be huge and the first operating at anywhere near that scale with full reuse.
You provide valuable information but I just hate how you succumb to easy thinking, an appeal to tradition [2]: "well it hadn't been done then so it can't possibly be done now." It's a form of anachronistic gatekeeping. It doesn't belong in the age we currently reside in.
We have totally different computational abilities today, powerful beyond reason. Our hardware is smaller and better performing. We can perform digital simulations billions of times before we even execute one physical experiment.
I've seen the same attitude with age-old mathematics problems and it makes even less sense in that domain. The ability to perform computational experiments that our predecessors couldn't, changes the viability of almost every unsolved problem.
Boston Dynamics would have never created Atlas or Spot if they clung to common tropes about robots. And now, due to battery technology, the once tethered robots are dexterously mobile. [2]
[1] https://www.fool.com/investing/2020/10/05/how-much-cheaper-a...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_tradition
[3] https://youtu.be/tF4DML7FIWk