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Space: The Final Frontier

C

Clevinger

Member
Treo360 said:


Because CME's rule and threaten our current way of life.
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So is that just solar wind or is it something else?
 
D

Deku

Banned
Most eye-opening episode of BBC Horizon in a long while.

Is Everything We know about the Universe WRONG?

Short of it, cosmologists have a 'model' of our universe and how it is the way it is today, based on newtonian laws.

But our observations of the universe show several 'holes' in this understanding, forcing cosmologists to 'make up' things to allow to model to function properly

1) inflation ( explains how the universe got to have an even spread of temperature after the big bang)
2) dark matter (explains why galaxies don't fly apart)
3) dark energy (explains the continuing expansion of the unverise)
4) dark flow (no one knows what the heck is going on here yet but galaxies are rotating in strange ways)
 
L

Lime

Member
Deku said:
Most eye-opening episode of BBC Horizon in a long while.

Is Everything We know about the Universe WRONG?

Short of it, cosmologists have a 'model' of our universe and how it is the way it is today, based on newtonian laws.

But our observations of the universe show several 'holes' in this understanding, forcing cosmologists to 'make up' things to allow to model to function properly

1) inflation ( explains how the universe got to have an even spread of temperature after the big bang)
2) dark matter (explains why galaxies don't fly apart)
3) dark energy (explains the continuing expansion of the unverise)
4) dark flow (no one knows what the heck is going on here yet but galaxies are rotating in strange ways)
Click to expand...

Wow, that's a great show. Do you know if BBC plan to release the episodes on Blu-ray?
 
J

jett

D-Member
"Over geologic time, before Earth comes uninhabitable, Mars would lose its new atmosphere and freeze again"

:lol What a fucking waste of time!
 
T

Treo360

Member
jett said:
"Over geologic time, before Earth comes uninhabitable, Mars would lose its new atmosphere and freeze again"

:lol What a fucking waste of time!
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I was going to write something similar. The lessons learned on terraforming would be worth the time and money spent. Mars is simply too small and geologically dead to hold on to its atmosphere. Not to mention the extremely weak (re: almost nonexistent) Magnetosphere which would leave the future Martians dangerously exposed to Solar and Cosmic radiation, and yeah, you start to get the picture.
 
M

msv

Member
I'd be more interested in ideas on how to terraform Venus. Would seem like a more durable solution, given that it's feasible.
 
S

Sibylus

Banned
Dechaios said:
That we know of, dude. I don't need to tell you it's a pretty big place and we haven't seen every crazy thing eager to kill our whole species and planet in a blink.
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Gamma ray bursts are probably a lot more worrying than black holes.
 
G

GaimeGuy

Volunteer Deputy Campaign Director, Obama for America '16
msv said:
I'd be more interested in ideas on how to terraform Venus. Would seem like a more durable solution, given that it's feasible.
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living on venus would just be weird, what with the planet taking longer to complete one rotation about its axis than it takes to revolve once around the sun.

You'd end up with 120ish consecutive earth days of daylight, followed by the same amount of nighttime. and by the time the next venus day began, you're 20 earth days into the new venus year. :lol
 
C

Crazymoogle

Member
GaimeGuy said:
living on venus would just be weird, what with the planet taking longer to complete one rotation about its axis than it takes to revolve once around the sun.
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Fair point, but the bigger deal is probably temperature (400+c) and surface pressure (92x earth). :lol Apparently the closest to earthlike conditions is at around 53km...so....we would need some sort of sky city technology and some sort of hardened mining strategy to stand a chance, short term or long term. Interesting to know that all you'd need at a sky location is air and shielding, though.
 
M

msv

Member
GaimeGuy said:
living on venus would just be weird, what with the planet taking longer to complete one rotation about its axis than it takes to revolve once around the sun.

You'd end up with 120ish consecutive earth days of daylight, followed by the same amount of nighttime. and by the time the next venus day began, you're 20 earth days into the new venus year. :lol
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Just put some boosters on that bitch to kickstart the spin, then syphon gas out of the atmosphere to lower the pressure, and get rid of most of the greenhouse gases. Problems solved!
 
G

GaimeGuy

Volunteer Deputy Campaign Director, Obama for America '16
Crazymoogle said:
Fair point, but the bigger deal is probably temperature (400+c) and surface pressure (92x earth). :lol Apparently the closest to earthlike conditions is at around 53km...so....we would need some sort of sky city technology and some sort of hardened mining strategy to stand a chance, short term or long term. Interesting to know that all you'd need at a sky location is air and shielding, though.
Click to expand...
My point was that, even if you could terraform the atmosphere so you manipulate the temperature and pressure to be more human friendly (would require a shitload more effort than a planet like Mars, even if Mars has a weak atmosphere), you still have day/night cycles that completely suck, and wouldn't work, at least, not for homo sapiens.

Venus may be earth's twin, but human settlement on venus makes about as much sense as mercury. Unless we build Cloud City or something like that :lol
 
M

msv

Member
GaimeGuy said:
My point was that, even if you could terraform the atmosphere so you manipulate the temperature and pressure to be more human friendly (would require a shitload more effort than a planet like Mars, even if Mars has a weak atmosphere), you still have day/night cycles that completely suck, and wouldn't work, at least, not for homo sapiens.
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I dunno, day/night cycles doesn't really seem to be an issue compared to maintaining an atmosphere that will leak if you don't pay attention.

But would adapting Venus' atmosphere really cost more effort compared to Mars'? I dunno, both seem like insanely big ventures atm.
 
O

Orgun

Member
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8688781.stm

Audio slideshow: Searching for space dust

For the past year - about a million miles from Earth - the infrared cameras on the Herschel Space Observatory have been capturing images of giant swirling clouds of cosmic dust.
Take a look with one of the Herschel mission's co-investigators, and former president of the Royal Astronomical Society, Professor Michael Rowan-Robinson.
 
D

Deku

Banned
msv said:
I dunno, day/night cycles doesn't really seem to be an issue compared to maintaining an atmosphere that will leak if you don't pay attention.

But would adapting Venus' atmosphere really cost more effort compared to Mars'? I dunno, both seem like insanely big ventures atm.
Click to expand...


Terraforming Venus would be nearly impossible with current tech. Mars at least is more or less about pumping enough Co2 to generate the atmospheric pressure required, terraforming Venus would require changing the atmosphere into something where our technology can have an impact.

As it is now, everything we send there will be crushed by the thich atmosphere.
 
H

Haly

One day I realized that sadness is just another word for not enough coffee.
Naked Snake said:
I've always wondered, when they refer to "space dust" or "cosmic dust" what exactly is it made of?
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It's basically a catch all phrase for tiny bits of matter you find in space, composed of stuff formed in stars (which probably includes every element in existence) or launched into space via collisions between celestial bodies.

So, if I pounded you into bits and then ejected you into space, you'd qualify as cosmic dust.
 
N

Naked Snake

Member
Halycon said:
It's basically a catch all phrase for tiny bits of matter you find in space, composed of stuff formed in stars (which probably includes every element in existence) or launched into space via collisions between celestial bodies.

So, if I pounded you into bits and then ejected you into space, you'd qualify as cosmic dust.
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Cool. So it's not made of dead skin cells :p

I was bored and stumbled upon this video: Using the Space Shuttle Toilet...
Holy shit at the camera :lol
 
H

Hootie

Member
I just completed my senior project for high school. I did it on biomedical engineering and its various contributions to space travel. I really enjoyed enlightening my class and then my judges on all of the fascinating topics in space travel, but I just wish more people knew about what it has to offer.

I opened up my presentation with the "Pale Blue Dot" photograph and read an excerpt from Sagan's monologue. They said it was phenomenal! :D
 
M

McNei1y

Member
I love space. Terraforming seems so cool. For now, though, we should get back into space and create a colony on the moon. Then with that, we build from there and think of ways for space travel. That way Mass Effect can come true! :lol
 
C

Crazymoogle

Member
Deku said:
Terraforming Venus would be nearly impossible with current tech. Mars at least is more or less about pumping enough Co2 to generate the atmospheric pressure required, terraforming Venus would require changing the atmosphere into something where our technology can have an impact.
Click to expand...

Yeah.

Simply put, on Mars, we need to build a Moon Base. On Venus, we need to build Rapture. And the water? Well, this time it's lead. :\ (Neither planet has a magnetosphere worth mentioning.)

Venus might offer a more stable environment after investment for the very long term, but Mars has a far better chance of paying off, since in the thousands of years that terraforming might afford, we can develop better terraforming technology, establish a stepping point for Europa and beyond, and give us a relatively quick path towards mining and resource acquisition (whether it's from Mars itself or the Asteroid Belt). Venus also also starts becoming a lot harder to reach in a few thousand years,

That being said, Day/Night isn't that big a deal; we already have something similar with Arctic communities, and in a hardened outpost we can handle most of the problem with lighting technology anyway.
 
F

Fenderputty

Banned
Not sure if anyone else is following LHC stuff but, some interesting stuff is already rolling in. What they don't know though.

http://cdsweb.cern.ch/journal/CERNBulletin/2010/18/News Articles/1261777?ln=en


Which leads us to:


http://atlas-service-enews.web.cern.ch/atlas-service-enews/2010/news_10/news_W.php

They've already isolated two possible W-boson candidates. It would be fucking awesome if they can add another check mark to proving the standard model and figure out what gives energy mass.
 
D

derFeef

Member
I am following the LHC twitter. They seem pretty busy. Lot´s of black holes sucking the light out of our universe already, eh?
 
abstract alien

abstract alien

Member
A really long time ago, a science teacher told me that a grain of star dust weighed more than Earth itself and would literally fall through the earth if we could drop it onto the surface :lol

Stars are made entirely of gas as far as we know, right?
 
N

Naked Snake

Member
abstract alien said:
A really long time ago, a science teacher told me that a grain of star dust weighed more than Earth itself and would literally fall through the earth if we could drop it onto the surface :lol

Stars are made entirely of gas as far as we know, right?
Click to expand...

Technically, not all of them I think. For example a white dwarf star can consist of very dense material.
 
abstract alien

abstract alien

Member
Naked Snake said:
Technically, not all of them I think. For example a white dwarf star can consist of very dense material.
Click to expand...
Hmmm...I'd always thought he was spouting nonsense when it came to that, but I guess he might be as least partially right in the fact it actually exists.
 
F

Fenderputty

Banned
abstract alien said:
Hmmm...I'd always thought he was spouting nonsense when it came to that, but I guess he might be as least partially right in the fact it actually exists.
Click to expand...

If the grain weighed as much as earth, wouldn't the gravitational pull be the same for both objects?

why would it fall all the way through? Wouldn't it stop in the middle?
 
D

Deku

Banned
Fenderputty said:
If the grain weighed as much as earth, wouldn't the gravitational pull be the same for both objects?

why would it fall all the way through? Wouldn't it stop in the middle?
Click to expand...

That's a bit beyond my expertise, but it requires a certian trajectory/velocity for objects to enter orbit.

Two equally massive stars enter a different kind of gravitational tug, a piece of white dwarf flying through space is unlikely to come to a stop. just because it comes into proximity other other massive objects.

It would rip through the planet becomes the its Mass, and velocity.
 
M

MisterAnderson

Member
Sirius said:
I'd say the only thing more dangerous, if not a black hole, would be a Neutron Star hurling in our direction.

Heck, it'd only have to enter our Solar System to put an end to the orbital harmony of the planets.



Now that is mind blowing. Would have been unreal if it showed some more realistic fluid resistance during entry of the planet's atmosphere.

I wonder how many games out there realistically showcase space-time dilation due to relativistic travel? Or even simple things like redshift / blueshift and headlight effects.
Click to expand...

This made me wish that Earth had rings, they look so beautiful from the planet's point of view looking up at the sky.

Also, does anyone ever think about how other races out there might totally see the universe differently from us? As in, in our minds we lay out the solar system and galaxy and what not on a horizontal axis (clearly there's no true up and down in space, is my main point). They could easily view the galaxy/solar systems/orbits in a more vertical sense. Kind of cool to think about...not mind blowing or anything, but it entered my mind just now.
 
D

Deku

Banned
MisterAnderson said:
This made me wish that Earth had rings, they look so beautiful from the planet's point of view looking up at the sky.

Also, does anyone ever think about how other races out there might totally see the universe differently from us? As in, in our minds we lay out the solar system and galaxy and what not on a horizontal axis (clearly there's no true up and down in space, is my main point). They could easily view the galaxy/solar systems/orbits in a more vertical sense. Kind of cool to think about...not mind blowing or anything, but it entered my mind just now.
Click to expand...

Earth with rings = hazard. Ring formations are also quite temporary on the cosmological scale.

As for alien life, the most interesting is the idea of alien life in planets that have been hurtled out of their star systems so its just a ball of ice floating in space powered entirely by the planet's geology.

There's speculation that tens if not hundreds such formations are normally flung out of star systems during the early formation of a star system or during the violent death of one.

I can imagine if such intelligent life exist they would find the idea of being captive to a star to be quite unusual.
 
M

moist

Member
GaimeGuy said:
you still have day/night cycles that completely suck, and wouldn't work, at least, not for homo sapiens.
Click to expand...

This pretty much already happens in principal above the arctic circle and below the antarctic circle. People live there just fine.... and being able to mountain bike at 2:30 in the morning without using lights is pretty fuck awesome.
 
S

SolarPowered

Member
abstract alien said:
Hmmm...I'd always thought he was spouting nonsense when it came to that, but I guess he might be as least partially right in the fact it actually exists.
Click to expand...
I know I'm a little late on the take, but here ya go.

Carl Sagan said:
Neutron star matter weighs about the same as an ordinary mountain per teaspoonful-so much that if you had a piece of it and let it go(you could hardly do otherwise), it might pass effortlessly through the Earth like a falling stone through air, carving a hole for itself completely through our planet and emerging out the other side-perhaps in China. People there might be out for a stroll minding their own business when a tiny lump of neutron star plummets out of the ground , hovers for a moment, and then returns beneath the Earth, providing at least a diversion from the routine of the day. If a piece of neutron star matter were dropped from neaby space, with the Earth rotating beneath it as it fell, it would plunge repeatedly through the rotating Earth, punching hundreds of thousands of holes before friction with the interior of our planet stopped the motion. Before it comes to rest at the center of the Earth, the inside of our planet might look briefly like a swiss cheese until the subterranean flow of rock and metal healed the wounds. It is just as well that large lumps of neutron star matter are unknown on Earth. But small lumps are everywhere. The awesome power of the neutron star is lurking in the nucleus of every atom, hidden in every teacup and dormouse, every breath of air, every apple pie. The neutron star teaches us respect for the commonplace.
Click to expand...
 
N

noah111

Still Alive
SolarPowered said:
I <3 Cosmos.
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Fucking this. I remember watching the whole series on Hulu back to back, literally an episode or two (even 3) a day. Next time I have the time, i'm going to watch the whole series again.
 
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