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Space: The Final Frontier

Extollere

Sucks at poetry
I don't know if this was posted but you can stream Cosmos, the documentary by Carl Sagan at Hulu here:

http://www.hulu.com/cosmos

Watched one episode so far, plan to watch them all, it's fascinating stuff. It's also fascinating to think that in our own Galaxy we are just residing in one of the spiral arms (of many) who knows what kinda shit is out there in the other arms of the Milky Way (not even counting the other billions of galaxies out there).
 
Extollere said:
I don't know if this was posted but you can stream Cosmos, the documentary by Carl Sagan at Hulu here:

http://www.hulu.com/cosmos

Watched one episode so far, plan to watch them all, it's fascinating stuff. It's also fascinating to think that in our own Galaxy we are just residing in one of the spiral arms (of many) who knows what kinda shit is out there in the other arms of the Milky Way (not even counting the other billions of galaxies out there).

I've almost watched all the episodes. He's got such a powerful way of speaking on the subject matter its really sometimes overwhelming to take in some of his thoughts and the information he gives out.

We are considered in the boondocks of the Milky Way so yeah anything could be out there. I believe there is even one Cosmos episode where CS talks about the possibility that there are many civilizations out there that have mastered space flight and are living among each other, aware of each others existence and basically being part of a galactic community, so to speak...and we'd never know, and never be part of it. Not yet at least.
 

fallout

Member
Topher said:
Anyone else wonder what kind of ship NASA could build with a limitless budget?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Exploration_Initiative

And here's a bit from another site:

The Short Life of the "Space Exploration Initiative"

The year of 1989 brought a change of administrations, and a change of attitudes toward space. On the twentieth anniversary of the Apollo moon landing - July 20, 1989 - President George Bush stood in front of the Smithsonian next to the Apollo 11 crew. He announced his thirty-year plan for human exploration of space: a space station by 1999; a Moon landing by 2009; a Mars landing by 2019. The program was to be called SEI, the Space Exploration Initiative.

NASA formed another commission to decide how to go about accomplishing the Mars landing. Their report, called the Ninety Day Report, was a slightly updated version of the Apollo-era Mars plan, demonstrating how far the NASA bureaucracy had moved in twenty years. According to the Ninety Day Report, a 1000-ton interplanetary spaceship would be built by astronauts at the Space Station. It would be powered by nuclear rockets and fly to Mars in perhaps six months. (There were several variants of this design advocating longer or shorter flight times.) Upon reaching Mars, the astronauts would enter a Mars Excursion Module, stay on the surface for about a month, and then blast back into orbit to rendezvous with the rest of their spaceship. Then they would fire the spaceship's rocket and head for Venus, where that planet's gravity would slingshot the spacecraft back to Earth.

The cost: $450 billion. Because of that figure, Congress made sure that NO funds were appropriated towards any research for Mars missions (an action that continues to this day), and the visionary Space Exploration Initiative died a quick death.
 

Kaako

Felium Defensor
I <3 Andromeda.

317214228_c1bd7ba96c.jpg


Andromeda is the nearest major galaxy to our own Milky Way Galaxy. Our Galaxy is thought to look much like Andromeda. Together these two galaxies dominate the Local Group of galaxies. The diffuse light from Andromeda is caused by the hundreds of billions of stars that compose it. The several distinct stars that surround Andromeda's image are actually stars in our Galaxy that are well in front of the background object. Andromeda is frequently referred to as M31 since it is the 31st object on Messier's list of diffuse sky objects. M31 is so distant it takes about two million years for light to reach us from there. Although visible without aid, the above image of M31 is a digital mosaic of 20 frames taken with a small telescope. Much about M31 remains unknown, including how it acquired its unusual double-peaked center.
 
AndersTheSwede said:
What taketh away also giveth. Just as when stars die and (sometimes) explode they seed heavy elements into the universe, these same elements make up our planet and even ourselves at a molecular level. (Every element heavier than Hydrogen and Helium was made in the center of a star that died. Every single one.)

Black holes can destroy anything they come near too, but they can also stabilize large regions on account of there being nothing else that can come close to them in power. Nothing to dislodge their power, means they're always there. But they also make the center of our galaxy uninhabitable.

Perhaps we wouldn't have evolved if we didn't have a super massive black hole to stabilize our orbit around the galaxy. Earth is pretty untroubled by radiation from our galaxy (on a level that would do serious planet-wide harm anyway).

Then again, I'm armchairing here.
Thats powerful right there.
 
Extollere said:
I don't know if this was posted but you can stream Cosmos, the documentary by Carl Sagan at Hulu here:

http://www.hulu.com/cosmos

Watched one episode so far, plan to watch them all, it's fascinating stuff. It's also fascinating to think that in our own Galaxy we are just residing in one of the spiral arms (of many) who knows what kinda shit is out there in the other arms of the Milky Way (not even counting the other billions of galaxies out there).

Thanks for sharing.
 

Extollere

Sucks at poetry
fallout said:
I love showing off Andromeda to people using naked eye observing. It's hard to find, but I think they always find it extremely impressive because of the perspective it gives. Amist all these stars, you can see another galaxy.

Where is it in the sky?
 
http://www.theonion.com/content/news/chicken_shit_asteroid_veers_away?utm_source=a-section

Chicken-Shit Asteroid Veers Away At Last Minute
May 11, 2009

TUCSON, AZ—Though initial calculations showed it to be on a direct collision course with Earth, a pansy-ass asteroid approximately the size of Rhode Island has instead altered its trajectory to avoid the planet by more than 40,000 miles, astronomers at the University of Arizona reported Monday.

"Guess it just didn't have the spuds to go through with it," Richard A. Kowalski of the school's Catalina Sky Survey said. "Real big surprise. Maybe you can try again when you accrete a little more mass than 6.32 x 1015 kilograms, okay? Chicken-shit."

Kowalski said that one month ago Asteroid 2009-XG2—nicknamed "Old Limp Dick"—was following a path that, even accounting for heat friction and gravitational pull from other celestial bodies, gave it a 97 percent chance of striking Earth. Further observation and calculations, however, indicated that the asteroid would instead tuck its balls between its legs and change its course by more than 22 degrees.

"This potential extinction-level event turned out to be a puss-out of cosmic proportions," Kowalski said. "Earth didn't even flinch. You know what, why don't you give it another go, little guy? Huh? You can even take a free shot at the moon to warm up."

Scientists in this observatory used a high-powered telescope to track the asteroid's path right to the point of its monumental puss-out.

After a brief pause Kowalski added, "That's what I thought."

Many astronomers who have spent their careers monitoring asteroids have echoed Kowalski's conclusions. David L. Rabinowitz of the NASA-funded Near-Earth Asteroid Tracking program claimed that, despite the overwhelming data to the contrary, no one in the astronomy community had any doubt that the asteroid was talking out of its ass.

"Everybody knew that asteroid was a poseur," Rabinowitz said. "If it didn't have the balls to come within 100,000 miles of Pluto 15 years ago, how's it even gonna consider messing with Earth? What, did it think it was going to be another 1908 Tunguska Event? Don't make me laugh."

Rabinowitz also estimated that even if the asteroid had managed to remove its giant tampon and hit Earth, it most likely would have landed harmlessly in the ocean or the Sahara Desert.

"This asteroid's an even bigger pussy than 6489 Golveka, if you can believe that," he said.
Though astronomers across the world agreed that the asteroid probably still sucks on its mama's titties, a number of scientists have come out with different theories as to why it tore ass out of the solar system at 47,000 miles per hour.

"Have you seen Earth? It would have housed that asteroid so bad," University of Chicago astronomer Lucas Donovan said. "If it even tried making impact, you would have heard exactly two sounds: us hitting the asteroid and the asteroid hitting space. Little piece of shit got off lucky, if you ask me."

Plans to launch a probe to measure the composition of the asteroid were scrapped after NASA scientists concluded it was made up of 0.5 percent basaltic crust, 0.5 percent carbonaceous chondrite, and 99 percent bullshit.

"Goddamn chicken-shit planetoid ain't even worth it," acting NASA administrator Christopher Scolese said.

There is currently no strategy in place to prepare for a possible return of the asteroid, as NASA physicists have theorized it will likely throw itself into the sun from the utter shame of being such a weak-ass little bitch.
 

demon

I don't mean to alarm you but you have dogs on your face
Kaako said:
I <3 Andromeda.

317214228_c1bd7ba96c.jpg
The idea that it would take two million years to reach the nearest major galaxy traveling at the speed of light just absolutely boggles the mind at how unimaginably huge the universe is. wow.
 
here's what I don't get about these obscenely large telescopes.
They all compare themselves to Hubble, obviously but that's the telescope everyone knows about, but not one of these large telescopes will be built in space so they still have to deal with atmospheric light pollution right? How can they be better than Hubble in that regard?
 

XMonkey

lacks enthusiasm.
The James Webb Space Telescope will actually be put into space (quite far away, too) so we don't have to worry about light pollution :)
 

Kaako

Felium Defensor
I always have this thought that what if there are civilizations advanced enough to be watching us with their own advanced telescopes right now. What if they're not making contact with the human race cause they know very well that we are not uniformly stable yet. What I mean by that is that we have wars over power/greed/oil and a fake sense of bringing justice and democracy to the world.

Maybe that's why we've not been able to make contact yet. Maybe once we get our own shit together and truly learn to live in peace and harmony, others will make contact. Will that day ever come?

This thought has been on my mind recently and I wanted to share.
 

Hootie

Member
Kaako said:
Maybe that's why we've not been able to make contact yet. Maybe once we get our own shit together and truly learned to live in peace and harmony, others will make contact. Will that day every come?

Unfortunately, no.
 

Kaako

Felium Defensor
Hootie said:
Unfortunately, no.
I believe it will someday. I believe in the human race even though we've done some really stupid mind boggling shit. We've also done some amazing mind boggling shit as well. I just wish I would be alive when we make contact...I wanna be alive when that happens, but sadly I most likely will be gone by that time.

fixed grammar lol
 

deadbeef

Member
Kaako said:
I believe it will someday. I believe in the human race even though we've done some really stupid mind boggling shit. We've also done some amazing mind boggling shit as well. I just wish I would be alive when we make contact...I wanna be alive when that happens, but sadly I may most likely will not be.

fixed grammar lol

As soon as we have the ability to travel across space, we will find those civilizations, and we will destroy them.
 

Kaako

Felium Defensor
deadbeef said:
As soon as we have the ability to travel across space, we will find those civilizations, and we will destroy them.
Would be one of the saddest times in mankind's history. On second thought, I'd rather be dead than see that happen. It would be one thing to defend ourselves from other hostile galactic civilizations, but to actually be the aggressor and cause harm to another civilization would be such a waste. What kind of message would it send across the universe?
 

Quazar

Member
http://www.physorg.com/news161446078.html

James Webb Space Telescope unfolds by animation (w/Video)

Interesting read.

Also:

Let the Planet Hunt Begin

PhysOrg.com said:
(PhysOrg.com) -- NASA's Kepler spacecraft has begun its search for other Earth-like worlds. The mission, which launched from Cape Canaveral, Fla., on March 6, will spend the next three-and-a-half years staring at more than 100,000 stars for telltale signs of planets. Kepler has the unique ability to find planets as small as Earth that orbit sun-like stars at distances where temperatures are right for possible lakes and oceans.

"Now the fun begins," said William Borucki, Kepler science principal investigator at NASA's Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif. "We are all really excited to start sorting through the data and discovering the planets."

Scientists and engineers have spent the last two months checking out and calibrating the Kepler spacecraft. Data have been collected to characterize the imaging performance as well as the noise level in the measurement electronics. The scientists have constructed the list of targets for the start of the planet search, and this information has been loaded onto the spacecraft.

http://www.physorg.com/news161452332.html

Kepler is so exciting.
 
Man the James Webb telescope is going to absolutely amazing. Just massive and so far beyond Hubble in capability. And considering what Hubble can put out that is seriously saying something. Brilliant to put it out at a Lagrange Point.
 

Extollere

Sucks at poetry
Kaako said:
I always have this thought that what if there are civilizations advanced enough to be watching us with their own advanced telescopes right now. What if they're not making contact with the human race cause they know very well that we are not uniformly stable yet. What I mean by that is that we have wars over power/greed/oil and a fake sense of bringing justice and democracy to the world.

Maybe that's why we've not been able to make contact yet. Maybe once we get our own shit together and truly learn to live in peace and harmony, others will make contact. Will that day ever come?

This thought has been on my mind recently and I wanted to share.

You know I was actually thinking about why we hadn't made contact, or rather why nothing else has made contact with us, and a rather simple explanation came upon me. We're light years away. Light speed as far as we know it, is a constant across the universe. The distance between local arms in our galaxy is 6,500 light years apart, and the distance from Andromeda, the closest galaxy to us is 2.5 million light years away. If there is any civilization out there looking at us whatever they are viewing isn't there anymore. They would be looking at a prehistoric earth with no intelligent life. They might say there is a planet with the potential for intelligent life forms, but wouldn't see it. If we zoomed in on some planets in Andromeda we'd be looking at their past too. Who knows, maybe some of those planets would be destroyed and we wouldn't even know it.

That if we are to believe the theory that nothing with mass can reach the speed of light, then nothing could get to us within millions of years no matter how advanced it is. (I know there are other theories for warping and space travel but none proven) Then there's the fact that there are trillions of stars out there with billions of potential solar systems, and uncountable chances for life. If there are other species so much more advanced then we are, and the rest of the livable planets, if they set out to explore why would they find us among the other billion planets? It's a one in some billion chances. But who knows maybe there are other alien life forms out there, and they are traveling among other galaxies, and co existing together. It doesn't seem likely to me that we'll make contact with anything in the near future of the human race, but who knows...anything is possible, maybe tomorrow we'll stumble upon the secret of intergalactic space/time travel.
 

Windu

never heard about the cat, apparently
A Week of Work

Click For Bigger Image:

Astronaut John Grunsfeld performs work on the Hubble Space Telescope as the first of five STS-125 spacewalks kicks off a week's worth of work on the orbiting observatory. Grunsfeld, a spacewalk veteran who previously worked on the telescope, will participate in two of the remaining four sessions of extravehicular activity later in the mission.
Hubble

Click For Bigger Image:

The Hubble Space Telescope stands tall in the cargo bay of the space shuttle Atlantis following its capture on Wednesday, May 13, 2009. The STS-125 mission began a series of spacewalks the following day to service Hubble. Over 11 days and five spacewalks, Atlantis' crew will make repairs and upgrades to the telescope, leaving it better than ever and ready for another five years--or more--of research.
 

Wes

venison crêpe
I wonder, are there any novels out there that have used the James Webb as a plot point already? In the same way CERN seems to be incredibly popular.

I was reading up on some of the astronaught bios of the people up there now. The lady has a PHd in Oceanography. For some reason that made me smile.
 
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