The long term advantage I see is that it would be much easier to build a space elevator on the moon. And if industry can be established there, then you could build the components on the moon, and send them up to orbit. This opens up the rest of the solar system and massive scale space construction that’s simply not possible when doing launches from the Earth. Also, a moon base could be largely self sufficient once it’s bootstrapped since we know there’s water on the moon. I personally would love to see humanity create a serious outpost that’s off planet.

Maybe just scientific research rather than any other immediate utility.

The thing with general scientific research is that there isn’t any immediate utility, but you never know what incredible things will be discovered.

In the case of a research station on the moon, there are opportunities for investigation into how the moon and solar system formed, the history of elements present on the moon. Telescopes can be built that can be larger than space based ones and with better imaging potential than earth based ones due to the lack of atmosphere. We can learn how to live far away from earth and improve in-situ resource utilization capabilities, such as water and rocket fuel synthesis and how to grow food. More longer term, as yet untested ground to orbit concepts can be tested more easily than on earth, like space elevators, launch loops, and orbital rings.

take the moonpill