>>11526105Don't be gay. The technological limitations are nothing alike. Processing power has gone up like crazy only because we've become better and better at etching silicon wafers into transistor arrays and using those transistors in smaller integrated circuit boards. There was NOTHING physically in the way of our progress in that field EXCEPT our own in-expertise, which has gone away.
Compare that to chemical engines, which quite rapidly hit the ceiling for specific impulse all the way back in the 50's, and 70 years later hasn't been improved upon much (granted engine technology is much better in the sense that they're easier and faster to build, and in some cases are much more flexible, eg Merlin 1D and Raptor). The issue however has never been one of specific impulse. The issue is vehicle design. You could come up with the best engine ever, it's super efficient and all that, and launch vehicle designers today would stick it onto the bottom of a fuck off big first stage, slap on some boosters to get it high and fast enough that the efficient main engine could take over, and then claim that they were saving money by no longer needing a 2nd stage to put decent payloads into orbit, meanwhile the super efficient engine slams into the ocean and is destroyed every time (sound familiar?).
Starship Super Heavy is an awesome vehicle design, but lets not kid ourselves. There's basically nothing on that vehicle that couldn't be accomplished back in the 70's or even the 60's. Sure, without ridiculously high chamber pressure and good Isp Raptor engines the payload takes a hit. Sure, without modern computers landing the stages propulsively on they asses is probably not worth the effort. You know what though? Develop two large lifting body stages, use kerosene on the first stage, hydrogen on the 2nd stage, gas generator engines, stack them tip to tail, and you have a 1970's Starship equivalent using Saturn V engine tech which can put ~50 tons into LEO fully reusable.
