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In American culture, the death of one person is typically considered unacceptable, and "we will do everything to ensure it never happens again." To date, NASA has flown many more manned missions than its private competitors. Most unmanned missions can have their cargo and vehicle replaced (albeit at great cost), but from the first-world view of "every life is precious," the same cannot be said of manned missions. So there is a fundamental, qualitative difference between the two types of missions and organizations. You can well imagine what will happen each and every time a human life is lost on a private space mission.

Will we ever consider it the cost of doing business? Probably not, except for military missions--and in the context of going to Mars, we might see more of those.




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