Spacethread Episode 2: Attack of the UFO Guys

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Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Just build an O'Neill cylinder already, geez, we don't want space zombie brains roaming all over Earth now do we?

# ¿ Jun 12, 2023 17:39

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# ¿ May 21, 2024 00:43

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Raenir Salazar posted:

It's a bit premature in any case to assume this means humans can't survive travel in deep space, assuming that is your argument. It is a bit hard to tell after all what you're positions tend to be when you make your posts like this. In any case, discovering a potential problem is the first step to creating a solution.

After all only look towards malaria and its effects and we as a civilization eventually overcome that.

Bizarre posting about posters aside, a lot of these health-related long-term effects such as bone density loss and now brain fluid... Things could potentially be alleviated by having at least some kind of artificial gravity-like forces. I am not sure why this caused you to have an apoplexy :shrug:

# ¿ Jun 12, 2023 17:55

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Raenir Salazar posted:

Also you don't need an O'Neil cylinder for spin gravity! You can do it with basically just a soyuz capsule and a tether!

My secret, cap'n? I'm always joking.

But all kidding aside (get it?), I wanted to quote this rather than engage in an edit-war. An O'Neill cylinder obviously has its inherent dangers, like having the hull penetrated etc., but who exactly wants to be the bullet in David's sling? Yeesh.

And doesn't this actually fit into the idea of further exploiting space for ~~capitalist~~ Marxist expansion? A permanent, large space base would be a nice thing to have for launches and bringing in stuff from asteroid mine sites.

Of course there is a simpler way of bringing in stuff from orbit, but the splashes might make some nation-states irate.

# ¿ Jun 12, 2023 17:59

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Boris Galerkin posted:

You would still need to haul everything up into space to begin with if you're going to use an in-orbit spaceport as a launching point.

This is true, and space stuff is expensive. But if you could assemble a big rig in space out of small bits brought in over time, like the ISS!, you're better off in the long run than trying to launch the Asteroid Eater 3000 from Florida in one piece. Of course long-term thinking is questionable these days.

# ¿ Jun 12, 2023 18:05

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Raenir Salazar posted:

It's not posting about posters to point out that through a perpetually joking tone that swaps between joking and argument it can be difficult to read what you're actually trying to say anymore than your breaking bad gif.

Also do you really want me to repeat the Marxist argument again? I don't see the relevance regarding the technical specifics of O'Neil cylinders, which currently don't exist so it's hard to pull up imaginary blueprints to discuss performance and engineering tolerances, which is why I brought up that spin gravity proposals exist that don't rely on O'Neil cylinders, see zubrins book where he discusses the concept, there's plenty of others.

In any case I'm not sure that "the hull is punctured" is any more of a serious impediment than it is for any other spacecraft, or heck cities on earth which are at an equivalent risk of being struck by a meteor.

It was a png, not a jiff!

No, you don't need to repeat your arguments, I'm all for (cautiously) exploring the solar system. I am... Not sure why you think we need to discuss "engineering tolerances" of O'Neill cylinders of all things? It's great there's other arrangements out there, I'm just saying that it'd be, potentially, nicer to have a space station rather than swinging a capsule over a tether. But it's your space program, you do you.

And what is this? You know (presumably) as well as I do that Earthly cities have an atmosphere around them, a space station would not. Not only does this cut off (limits, if you prefer) certain unfortunate wave-lengths and particles, but it also burns up small objects.

Most other space-craft are on missions whose duration are measured in less than decades, and if they're not, well they see unfortunate side-effects. Our lovely new baby boy JWT was hit by some tiny pebbles somewhat unluckily early in his tenure and it had a noticeable womp-womp-sound attached. Space is dangerous! :ohdear:

# ¿ Jun 12, 2023 18:14

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

All that cattle mutilation is hardly passive, young man!

Now I am mildly curious if RAND or some nerd like them ever did the numbers on that stuff, beef is expensive

# ¿ Jun 21, 2023 23:55

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

cat botherer posted:

Lotsa bugs get squished

I think that was a plot point in Men in Black, that bugs are people too? Only they want to eat actual human beings, which is a bit of a down-side to being pals.

Slightly more serious, haven't all crop circles been confirmed as pranks by drunk college students?

# ¿ Jun 22, 2023 05:48

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Yeah, as a physics-person I'd say this is :science:

working as intended. They reported a result, and now others are trying to replicate the experiment and see what's up. We'll know soon enough (by science time terms), but I personally wouldn't be buying stock in whichever company that's prepared to mass-manufacture the material just yet.

# ¿ Jul 31, 2023 20:34

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

quote:

Nasa concedes that the attempt to make contact through the huge dish antenna in Canberra is a long shot. If that effort comes to nothing, as engineers expect, mission controllers will have to wait until October when the spacecraft should reset automatically and restore communications.

Poor little fella :ohdear:

# ¿ Aug 1, 2023 18:56

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Stephen Crane posted:

A man said to the universe:
�Sir, I exist!�
�However,� replied the universe,
�The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation.�

Of course a hefty part of the Fermi paradox and UFO (in the space aliens meaning) discussions lean on the inverse of the idea of saving angel aliens, and sees them as an existential threat. "For God's sake, if someone calls, don't pick up", etc.

# ¿ Aug 1, 2023 20:34

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

This is some "where we're going, we won't need eyes to see" stuff :science:

But seriously, it's pretty dang cool that both of these new telescopes are coming or already are online and producing awesome data for years to come. Yay space!

# ¿ Aug 2, 2023 00:51

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

cat botherer posted:

GOAT probe

I thought cattle mutilation alien probes assaulted cows? :thunk:

# ¿ Aug 2, 2023 16:52

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

cat botherer posted:

It's fun to mix up the kind of anuses you core out from time to time.

Too bad Richard Belzer passed away, this sounds like an X-files - SVU crossover script pitch!

# ¿ Aug 7, 2023 15:38

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Hey space buddies! And apologies for double-posting :ohdear:

Next week is going to be an interesting space week. Both India and Russia (BBC article) are attempting (non-manned :eng99:

) Moon-landings. The Indian mission seems very ambitious, as they plan on deploying a rover :3:

I will let Auntie Beeb fill us in on the deets:

BBC posted:

India's space agency has released latest images of the Moon as its third lunar mission starts descending towards the little-explored south pole. The pictures have been taken by Vikram, Chandrayaan-3's lander, which began the last phase of its mission on Thursday. Vikram, which carries a rover in its belly, is due to land near the south pole on 23 August.

[I love the little Powerpoint arrow pointing at Earth -R]

Chandrayaan-3 and Russia's Luna-25 are among the two spacecraft headed towards the Moon's south pole and both are expected to land next week. Luna-25 - Russia's first Moon mission since 1976, when it was part of the Soviet Union - was launched last week and is expected to make history by making a soft landing on 21st or 22nd August, just days before the Indian touchdown. If it succeeds, Chandrayaan-3 will have to settle for being a close second in reaching the south pole.

India, however, will still be only the fourth country to achieve a soft landing on the Moon after the US, the former Soviet Union and China. Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) said on Friday that the lander module had begun its descent to a lower orbit.

[...]
The south pole of the Moon is still largely unexplored - the surface area that remains in shadow there is much larger than that of the Moon's north pole, and scientists say it means there is a possibility of water in areas that are permanently shadowed. One of the major goals of both Chandrayaan-3 and Luna-25 is to hunt for water ice which, scientists say, could support human habitation on the Moon in future. It could also be used for supplying propellant for spacecraft headed to Mars and other distant destinations.

Obviously that last bit has geo-political (space-political?) implications, and at least in Finnish-language media some commentators have criticized the existing space-usage-treaties as "Cold War relics". I'm not sure if anyone's actually keen on a new space race, but the science missions themselves sound interesting.

# ¿ Aug 19, 2023 09:49

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Welp, one down, badly (BBC) :ohdear:

BBC posted:

Russia's Luna-25 spacecraft has crashed into the Moon after spinning out of control, officials say.

Roscosmos, Russia's state space corporation, said on Sunday morning that it had lost contact with the Luna-25 shortly after 14:57pm (11:57 GMT) on Saturday.

"The apparatus moved into an unpredictable orbit and ceased to exist as a result of a collision with the surface of the Moon," it said in a statement.

# ¿ Aug 20, 2023 10:38

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

India fared better, as they've announced that the lander made a successful touch-down on the Lunar surface.

BBC's live blogging posted:

Wow, that was intense! So now what? Firstly, the lander will wait a few hours for the lunar dust to quite literally settle.

After that, panels on one of its sides will open and a ramp will be deployed so that Pragyaan, the Moon rover, can slide down to the surface.

It will then roam around the rocks and craters on the Moon gathering crucial data and images to be sent back to Earth for analysis.

The lander and the rover are carrying five scientific instruments which will help find out "the physical characteristics of the surface of the Moon, the atmosphere close to the surface and the tectonic activity to study what goes on below the surface".

The landing date has also been carefully selected to coincide with the start of a lunar day - which equals 28 Earth days - because the batteries of the lander and the rover will need sunlight to be able to charge and function.

# ¿ Aug 23, 2023 13:54

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

I thought the E.T. landfills were full of gaming cartridges :ohdear:

# ¿ Sep 14, 2023 15:15

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Libluini posted:

"what the heck, this is just Broccoli-DNA, those fuckers!"

Look, buddy, the plant aliens are real, and they are our friends :colbert:

# ¿ Sep 15, 2023 19:40

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Hello space buddies, today is an :ohdear:

space buddy day as Osiris Rex (what a name) is about to poop its payload of asteroid sample material into our atmosphere.

BBC explains:

Auntie Beeb posted:

Nasa's Osiris-Rex capsule will come screaming into Earth's atmosphere on Sunday at more than 15 times the speed of a rifle bullet.
It will make a fireball in the sky as it does so, but a heat shield and parachutes will slow the descent and bring it into a gentle touchdown in Utah's West Desert.
The capsule carries a precious cargo - a handful of dust grabbed from asteroid Bennu, a mountain-sized space rock that promises to inform the most profound of questions: Where do we come from?
"When we get the 250g (9oz) of asteroid Bennu back on Earth, we'll be looking at material that existed before our planet, maybe even some grains that existed before our Solar System," says Prof Dante Lauretta, the principal investigator on the mission.
"We're trying to piece together our beginnings. How did the Earth form and why is it a habitable world? Where did the oceans get their water; where did the air in our atmosphere come from; and most importantly, what is the source of the organic molecules that make up all life on Earth?"

Bennu's looking pretty dusty, good job that NASA sent a vacuum squad over there, huh?

# ¿ Sep 24, 2023 07:18

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Sort-of-space-news, Frank Borman, commander of Apollo 8, has died at the respectable age of 95 :rip:

CNN posted:

Apollo astronaut Col. Frank Borman, who commanded the first mission to orbit the moon, has died in Billings, Montana, NASA announced. He was 95.

�Today we remember one of NASA�s best. Astronaut Frank Borman was a true American hero. Among his many accomplishments, he served as the commander of the Apollo 8 mission, humanity�s first mission around the Moon in 1968,� said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson Thursday in a statement.

�In addition to his critical role as commander of the Apollo 8 mission, he is a veteran of Gemini 7, spending 14 days in low-Earth orbit and conducting the first rendezvous in space, coming within a few feet of the Gemini 6 spacecraft,� Nelson said.

In 1967, Borman was a member of the Apollo 204 review board, which investigated a fire that killed three astronauts on Apollo I, according to NASA�s short biography. Borman would later lead the team that reengineered the Apollo spacecraft.

Perhaps the most (pop-)iconic thing of the Apollo 8 mission is the 'Earthrise' photo

# ¿ Nov 10, 2023 07:42

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Apparently I just can't deal with Google anymore :smith:

, so I pose my question to the thread: What is the projected life-time of Nixon's signature on the Moon? Presumably the solar wind will erode it at some time-scale, but how long is that?

# ¿ Nov 24, 2023 20:36

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

As Nessus said, the objects themselves probably will remain identifiable as artificial for quite a bit, I just find it funny that there's a time-line in a potential future where the hyper-intelligent octopuses who will rule the Earth after us will find Richard Nixon's autograph on the Moon. It's not exactly Contact, but hey.

# ¿ Dec 2, 2023 23:49

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

ScienceAlert posted:

In this case, the glitch is coming from a disruption in communication between one of three computers onboard, called the probe's flight data system (FDS), and one of the probe's subsystems: the telemetry modulation unit (TMU).

The Soviets just used hamster wheels

Although I suppose hamster feed for 50 years would weigh more than an atomic pile, or at least go bad sooner. And what if the hamsters eat their young en-route? Tsk.

# ¿ Dec 14, 2023 17:28

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

The NASA website says it'll take Voyager 1 about 300 years to reach our side of the Oort cloud, and I'm not about to check their math.

NASA posted:

The inner edge of the Oort Cloud, however, is thought to be located between 2,000 and 5,000 AU from the Sun, with the outer edge being located somewhere between 10,000 and 100,000 AU from the Sun.

If those distances are difficult to visualize, you can instead use time as your ruler. At its current speed of about a million miles a day, NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft won't enter the Oort Cloud for about 300 years. And it won�t exit the outer edge for maybe 30,000 years.

I don't think Voyager will have juice left then, hamsters or no. But on the positive side, there won't be radio telescopes on a burning Earth either to receive any space messages :haw:

# ¿ Dec 14, 2023 23:29

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

So Futurama :nixon:

was right, we do need a Dyson fence :hmmyes:

And presumably Alpha Centauri is going to pay for it.

# ¿ Dec 18, 2023 23:57

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Another Moon mission launched today:

The Guardian posted:

The Peregrine 1 lander carrying Nasa scientific equipment is on its way to the moon after a successful launch of the Vulcan Centaur rocket at Cape Canaveral. It marks the first launch of the powerful new rocket built by the Boeing-Lockheed venture United Launch Alliance, and an attempt to make the first US lunar soft landing in 50 years. Built by the space robotics firm Astrobotic, the Peregrine lunar lander launched at 7.18 GMT, aiming to become the first lunar landing by a private firm � a feat that has proved elusive in recent years.

Peregrine is set to land on 23 February and will seek to gather data about the lunar surface ahead of planned future human missions. It is the first mission to fly under Nasa�s commercial lunar payload services (CLPS) initiative, a scheme in which the space agency pays private companies to deliver scientific equipment to the moon.

Peregrine carries five Nasa payloads and 15 others. Its instruments will measure radiation levels, surface and subsurface water ice, the magnetic field, and the extremely tenuous layer of gas called the exosphere. [...] Also onboard are the first Latin American scientific instruments attempting to reach the surface of the moon. Five small moon rovers, each weighing less than 60g and measuring 12cm across will be deployed. Carnegie Mellon University has a rover onboard as well.

[...]More controversially, the lander contains non-scientific payloads, including a physical coin �loaded with one bitcoin� and a Japanese �lunar dream capsule� that contains 185,872 messages from children from around the world. [...] As well as the lunar lander, the mission is also delivering a memorial payload into space containing the remains and DNA of several people associated with the Star Trek television franchise, including the actors James Doohan, DeForest Kelley and Nichelle Nichols.

The tiny rovers sound adorable, but do we really need bitcoin in space? :hmmno:

# ¿ Jan 8, 2024 15:51

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Even if the buttcoin "coin" is just a dime-sized aluminum disc, I object to it on the grounds of it being trash. Rubbish. Literal garbage just strewn on the Moon for funsies by some of the most worthless morons humanity has produced. Sending a golden disc with nude people on is at least a symbol of reaching out.

# ¿ Jan 8, 2024 19:43

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

As a non-American, I can give that one a pass since it came with a signed plaque saying it was really from all of us. I wouldn't want anyone (-thing?) believing anyone sensible endorsed a buttcoin coin :argh:

# ¿ Jan 8, 2024 19:50

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

I understand that we live in the Bad Timeline since Marty and Doc didn't assassinate Ronald when he was a GE propaganda man, but it's the principle of the thing. As much as I'd rather sub-Lunar space not be turned into an eternal robotic battle-ground � la Lem's dystopias, I'd also prefer some random billionaire doesn't fund a space program with the caveat they carve Hitler's face on the Moon as a sideproject or what have you.

Of course the cynical response to the realist view is to say you shipped the buttcoin coin up there, but really didn't. What are the coiners going to do, go up there to check? :pseudo:

# ¿ Jan 8, 2024 22:49

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

I don't know why they called it SLIM, but little robots on the Moon, hooray!

# ¿ Jan 19, 2024 16:58

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

I mean OK, it's cool to photograph dead rocks I guess, but where are the aliens, man

# ¿ Feb 3, 2024 16:43

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Jonesy is prepared

There will be no alien nincompoopery here

# ¿ Feb 3, 2024 17:25

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Another contender enters orbit: Intuitive Machines' Odysseus Moon lander is going to try touching down today :ohdear:

Space dot com posted:

The private company Intuitive Machines could soon make history as its commercial lunar lander, Odysseus, will attempt to land near the moon's south pole on Thursday (Feb. 22).

If successful, the Intuitive Machines lander will become the first-ever private probe to soft-land on the moon and mark the first U.S. landing on the lunar surface since NASA's Apollo 17 mission achieved the feat in 1972. The mission is carrying a suite of NASA experiments (as part of a $118 million NASA contract) and several commercial payloads for paying customers.

[...]

Intuitive Machines' IM-1 Odysseus spacecraft is targeting a region on the moon called Malapert A, a small crater about 190 miles (300 kilometers) from the lunar south pole.

The crater is about 43 miles (69 km) wide and is a satellite of the larger Malapert Crater nearby. Near Malapert A, there's also an area called Malapert Massif, a lunar mountain that rises up 16,400 feet (5,000 meters) above its base. This location is on NASA's shortlist for the Artemis 3 crewed lunar landing mission.

After a planned nine-day trip to the moon, Odysseus is expected to last for about seven days on the lunar surface, according to a mission overview. The mission will end once the two-week-long lunar night begins because Odysseus isn't expected to survive the harsh, cold lunar night.

The article mentions that NASA and Intuitive Machines will both have live streams of the event, too, because of course they will. Good luck, robot buddy!

# ¿ Feb 22, 2024 05:52

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

For every Uri Geller a Jack Parsons

# ¿ Mar 22, 2024 03:21

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Nessus posted:

Our missile radars are giving their encrustlings "H'bb'na Syndrome," and let's not even get started on them decrypting our horrible entertainment slop.

If we'd been listening in the 14th century the shoe would be on the other tentacle, but of course the aliens have moved to a fiber-optic telecommunications paradigm for the last five hundred Earth years.

A puppeteer would say that

# ¿ Mar 28, 2024 15:40

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Nasa egg heads posted:

The probe and its twin, Voyager 2, are the only spacecraft to ever fly in interstellar space (the space between stars).

How would you know?

# ¿ Apr 23, 2024 13:28

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Nessus posted:

NASA knows the aliens are using hyperwarp once they get past the Neptune orbital limits.

The Outsiders sold humanity hyperwarp to win the Man-Kzin wars. It's completely coincidental that the Outsiders like living on Neptune's moons.

On a more serious note, good job Voyager. It's amazing the sort of probes humanity managed. We landed a robot on freaking Venus and that is roughly the third-most inhospitable place in the solar system.

Fourth? The solar system is an unfriendly place.

# ¿ Apr 23, 2024 14:10

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

DrSunshine posted:

It's abundantly obvious that you can't use the wormhole system without being significantly outside the strongest curvatures of a star's gravity well, everyone knows that!

I didn't catch this on my first read, but you know Niven ret-conned that, right? It's Lovecraft all the way, baby

# ¿ Apr 23, 2024 14:22

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

DrSunshine posted:

I've only read Ringworld and stopped after that. Too much 1970s sci-fi guy horny for me, I'm afraid, despite the novel concept.

This is the line you draw? In the first novel, the only people who have sex are Louis and Teela!

This may be a loaded question, but have you heard of Robert Heinlein?

# ¿ Apr 23, 2024 14:52

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# ¿ May 21, 2024 00:43

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Vorenus posted:

I mostly came in to shitpost about a cool theory I recently encountered: Our universe is actually the other side of a black hole in another universe. There's no evidence that this absolutely is or must be the case, but a CERN physicist made a very good (to my non-expert understanding) case for why the math says this is absolutely possible. The best part being that there's no way to prove this by testing black holes in our own universe given the whole one-way trip thing.

I don't really have anything cool to contribute, but I love that Lucius Vorenus is pondering about CERN poo poo. Pullo would tell him right off, though.

# ¿ Apr 23, 2024 16:01

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