Conversation

@bytebro @arstechnica Lunar 3He mining was IIRC originally fostered in SF by crank editor John W. Campbell; it provided a commercial/capitalist rationale for colonizing space. Ever since then, space colonization fanatics have been in love with the idea because they don't want to admit there's no viable 100-year-or-shorter term economic case for space colonization.

It's an ideological shibboleth, basically.