Feedback is New Scientist’s popular sideways look at the latest science and technology news. You can submit items you think might entertain readers to Feedback by emailing feedback@newscientist.com
Shooting for the moon
It’s been a while since humans walked on the moon: 54 years in fact. Many robots have visited our satellite since, some even successfully landing instead of plowing into the lunar surface like a bullet hitting a pile of talcum powder. But no people.
NASA’s Artemis project plans to send people to land on the moon in early 2028, two years from now. If that mission is followed by more, perhaps the moon’s permanent population will increase from zero.
So the feedback was surprised to learn that accountancy firm PwC had published its moon market assessment in January. “The Moon,” it wisely tells us, “is rapidly emerging as a potential focal point for future global economic activity in space.”
Finally, someone is saying it: every time Feedback looks up at the planet’s natural satellite, we speculate on how to monetize it. PwC says people now have “ambitions centered on sustained human and commercial presence” and they have been trying to find out how big this new market could be.
“The study adopts a scenario-driven approach, predicting market opportunities for lunar activities from 2026 to 2050,” we are told. “The focus is on five fundamental pillars: mobility, communication, housing, energy and water. Each domain is analyzed in terms of investment needs, technological inflection points and potential revenue streams.”
It seems that lunar entrepreneurs can expect to make a good deal of money. “The total cumulative revenues expected from activities on the lunar surface between 2026 and 2050 are estimated to be in the range of $93.9 (billion) to $127.3 (billion),” PwC concludes. That is more than the GDP of most countries.
All of this depends on one main factor, it seems. “The lunar economy’s revenue prospects are primarily shaped by the intensity of exploration missions, both manned and unmanned,” PwC informs us. When it’s right, it’s right.
Still, the feedback numbers seemed a bit optimistic given that the Artemis missions to the lunar surface have not started yet. Then we noticed that this is the second edition of PwC’s Moon Market Assessment, and we wondered what the first edition said. It was published in 2021 and projected revenues of “cumulative $170 billion until 2040” – meaning that five years ago PwC expected significantly more moon money, 10 years earlier.
Feedback is not sure what has changed in the past five years to dampen the outlook for the lunar economy, but we are disappointed. We hoped to clear our mortgage by investing in moon-farmed beef futures.
More meaningful than fiction
In February, the journal Paediatrics and child health published two corrections. Nothing unusual about that: journals correct errors in scientific articles all the time.
Except these were no ordinary fixes. One listed 15 papers that it corrected; the other listed 123. The headings explained that the purpose was “to add disclaimer”.
If readers scroll, as Feedback did, past the dizzying list of articles that demanded these new disclaimers, they will find the following text: “Each clinical vignette presented in the journal’s CPSP Highlights section describes a fictional case, created as an educational tool and related to a Canadian Pediatric Surveillance Program (CPSP) study or investigation.
This is worded in such an anodynamic way that the meaning may not be immediately clear. However, the nice journalists at Retraction Watch put it much more explicitly: “A medical journal says the case reports it has published for 25 years are actually fiction.”
It turns out that since 2000 the journal has published a regular series of case studies that appeared to describe real patients. Some of them were included in clinical supervision; others prompted doctors to start research programs that followed up on the observations. Except that the case studies were created and the journal never previously labeled them as such.
The feedback is going to go a long way here and suggest that perhaps the disclaimer that the case studies were fictitious should have been there from the start. But maybe we’re looking at this the wrong way. Science often struggles to gain coverage in the mainstream news, but if freed from the shackles of objective truth, it could really captivate readers. “Dark matter is actually the speed of space whales”: admit it, you’d click on it.
Time for a drink
Feedback has an occasional recurring thread on the subject of “Well, they’d say that, wouldn’t they?” It persists because press officers continue to send us press releases that appear to convey objective scientific information, only to sneak further details that reveal their real motives.
Another came through to our overflowing inbox announcing that “Ahead of World Sleep Day (March 13, 2026), we’re sharing expert insights on a simple but often overlooked factor that can affect sleep quality: hydration.” It goes on to explain that “even mild dehydration can contribute to discomfort at night and fatigue the next day”, by causing “common complaints such as headache, dry mouth, muscle cramps and general restlessness”.
The press release was sent on behalf of a company that makes soluble electrolyte tablets.
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