That's a fair point: they did tests and made changes to adjust for what they found, and that isn't normalization. That is a contrast to prior experiences

I was drawing the comparison through the lens of using hardware that was known to be flawed for the mission by convincing themselves it was actually fine. Particularly since they did redesign the heat shield based on the analysis, but it was too late to install on Artemis II, so that new shield will debut with Artemis III

I agree that in sum, it would have been nice to be able to do an unmanned test, but that would have been an exceedingly difficult and expensive decision to make. I look forward to seeing the results for the Artemis II heat shield