the problem with no applying patches is not money, but culture.
Software is in the early stages. When men were building internal combustion engines, they blew up all the time and many didn't run for very long. Some ran hot, Some would starve for gas, etc.
The same argument could be applied to flight. Early aircraft were anything but safe and reliable.
So to is software. Software today is not safe and reliable. Some software comes close, some are more safe than others, some are more reliable than others, but the state of the art is just not where automobiles or aircraft manufacturing are today.
Just like there were horrific accidentes and disasters in the early days of flight, so too will there be horrible disasters with software. As these disasters happen, we learn much and remember not to do those things the next time.
Look at it this way, with all the safety, engineering, and control we have in our space program today, we can't keep shuttles in space reliably. And yes, space is a harsh environment, but so far all the disasters have been man-made, not by nature.
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