[jiggawatts]

They did several revolutionary things with starship:

Full-flow staged combustion metholox engines.

Stainless steel construction.

Biggest rocket to have ever flown.

Highest thrust at launch of any rocket by a factor of two or so.

Live streaming of reentry via a space Internet network.

Etc…

[pclmulqdq]

Those all sound like incremental technology advances to me that have yet to deliver any real advances in capabilities. Which is nice - don't get me wrong - but not exactly worth rolling out the aircraft carrier for.

[jiggawatts]

Someone else in this thread pointed out that Starship could get the ISS built in just 3 launches! It originally took dozens.

Quantity has a quality all of its own.

You should be familiar with this from IT: there’s nothing fundamentally different about the first computer that I’ve ever used to the one I have right now, other than the factor of a million difference in performance!

[pclmulqdq]

Starship today can't launch anything. Saying that it can launch the ISS in 3 launches is what Elon Musk says it can do. I don't trust Elon Musk's word for things until I see what someone does with those words. Generally, he is off by a factor of 10-100 on his promises.

[DarmokJalad1701]

> Starship today can't launch anything

Why not? With the capability demonstrated today, they can just as easily tweak the ascent profile to end up in a stable orbit outside the atmosphere. Their trajectory was suborbital on this flight on purpose.

[satiric]

Well, for one, the payload doors don't work.

[baq]

Full flow methalox is absolutely revolutionary.