Ah, I see what you mean, now. Yeah. I do my best to make lore make sense, but that's one I can't fix.

I suppose one could argue that you want the more dselicate computers behind the pilot, since then it has the greatest achievable shielding on all sides without having excessive distance from the flight controls and without becoming inaccessible if the pod that is loaded into the middle is not traversible. Similar reasoning is used in Formula 1 - delicate bits of the car (such as the fuel tank) are placed between the driver and the engine, to keep them as safe as possible without creating a burden. This would necessitate there being a step down to get to the pilot's chair. It's not a particularly good piece of "lore repair" but it's the best I can do.

The nuclear waste silos were, though.

The feet operated as vertical rockets, so I'd say the designer was thinking along the same lines you are.

The landing pads are also vertical thrusters (which is how they can skim), so you need space for the nozzle, engine, and fuel. The size of the landing pads would seem fine, given everything that needs to be in them.

I'm calculating mass in terms of filled volume. The entire mid-section of the Eagle was a mesh of girders, rather than a solid hull. Since the total space filled is 1/Nth that of a solid hull that has to be able to handle the same rotational forces, the total mass is reduced. The cross-hatch patterning is likely to be good there, as it's strong along those lines. We don't need to specifically know what the material is, or the specific mass, as long as we can use engineering techniques to figure out the percentage of material we need relative to having a solid hull.

That's true of all sci-fi, by nature. The challenge, though, is to make it as plausible as possible. The "traditional" rule (variously ascribed to Arthur C Clarke and Isaac Asimov) was that good sci-fi was allowed to violate one law of physics (although this had to be justified and explained) but everything else shoud be as plausible as possible. S:1999, as a whole, certainly did not comply with that, but if we restrict ourselves to the Eagle, then I'd say that it would just about pass muster there.

Let's look at the various aspects of the Eagle design.

1. It was "designed to work in space" so wasn't designed to be aerodynamic
2. It was modular
3. Mass was kept to a minimum without compromising strength, which is precisely what you would want if your job is to carry a significant mass in space and be able to manoever without ripping apart
4. Cockpits were functional and minimal, not glamorous or more advanced than necessary to do the job

There were terrible aspects as well (nowhere to keep fuel, for example), but if you were going to design a sci-fi ship that is intended to be a simple short-range transport, then the design for the Eagle is close to perfect in a way that most sci-fi vessels really aren't.

Brian Johnson really did a superb job of actually making something LOOK like a practical workhorse.

There we go, no ones freedom harmed.

YOU don't understand freedom. You think your world view is the only correct one and want to impose that on everyone else.
You actually want anarchy, not freedom. You want to do what ever the hell you like with zero restrictions, that is anarchy.
The alternative is laws, social norms, and other restrictions which all remove "freedom" from someone

The kind of paranoid "freedom" you are wanting exists in the back blocks of nowhere with no internet and no cellphone, with probably a very large amount of tin foil.
There lots of countries that are far more free than the USA, I happen to live in one.

That research proves that the bell curve is alive and well, and applies to everything involving nature, human behaviour being one of them.
The people at the other end of the bell curve are also problematic

The Brexit referendum in 2016 did NOT permit all British registered voters to vote. This was taken to court multiple times.

The number of people who were entitled to vote was very tightly restricted. Access to a polling station was limited. There were many factors that could result in you being excluded. Postal ballots were largely not permitted, even though they were officially allowed. If you were overseas at that precise moment, you couldn't vote. You had to specially register to vote for it, but the website (which not everyone could access, strangely enough) was only up erratically. Those in the Isle of Man, although full British citizens, were not permitted to vote, for example.

You need some more tin foil dues, better make it a couple of layers.

Well DUH, then that is not the product for you. That does not make it anti freedom, it's simply another choice in the market.

You ever see all the bitching about needing ID to prove you are over x age on the internet and everyone is saying "Parental responsibility" , so someone makes a device that helps parents do exactly that and you start bitching about "muh freedumb"

Then you go along and list a whole pile of BS sites that no kid is actually going to use their phone for....government web sites...ROTFLMAO.
And guess what, you can still supply your kids what ever the Fk you like.

You have got to be American...MAGA too ????

Good choice for kids then.
Ugly phones won't get stolen as often as high end phones.
Tracking for kids is good too

Not seeing a downside for the intended segment of the market.

Ah history is littered with the vast majority not stepping too far out of line, and what are they going to do, magic up the money, steal the money to buy something different, then who pays for the contract ?
This is not stealing a beer, this is an ongoing cost, and its a large enough cost it will be seen.

Your fairy tale why it won't work is only true for a small group.
I see you are posting as a coward though, you scared your PDF behaviour is going to be made harder ?

Anti-freedom ?
If you don't like it, don't buy it there are a ton of alternative

Be a great phone to give kids though, you know that parental responsibility thing where they can keep kids away from the BS.