Nasa spacecraft makes historic flyby of Ultima Thule four billion miles away

Discussion in 'Science' started by cerberus, Jan 1, 2019.

  1. Cosmo

    Cosmo Well-Known Member

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    Science illiterates and conspiracy theorists are known to habitually opine on subjects they know little if anything about.
     
  2. cerberus

    cerberus Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Like you do know? :roflol: Face up to it ffs - you only 'know' (note the inverted commas, suggesting I use the word in its loosest sense?) what you've found out by reading space magazines.
     
  3. HereWeGoAgain

    HereWeGoAgain Banned

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    Those are not inverted commas. If they were they would point up.

    Why are you rolling around on the floor. Do you often spend time on the floor?
     
    Last edited: Jan 12, 2019
  4. cerberus

    cerberus Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I'm not on the floor, I'm levitating. Can you see a floor under me? :roll: :mrgreen:
     
  5. HereWeGoAgain

    HereWeGoAgain Banned

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    Ah, so you are possessed by the devil and floating like Linda Blair! Are you also having convulsions?

    Maybe we could use demonic possession as a new type of propulsion system.
     
    Last edited: Jan 13, 2019
  6. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    Maybe the floor we don't see is actually ABOVE him and he's free falling into the abyss - with a smile on his face.

    Just a thought ...
     
  7. HereWeGoAgain

    HereWeGoAgain Banned

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    I thought we were already in the abyss here. :D
     
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  8. cerberus

    cerberus Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Will, old chum, read and digest what I say - don't let yourself be manipulated by these charlatans; and when the penny drops, and your self-respect returns, you'll never stop thanking me for guiding you onto the straight and narrow. This never-ending deluge of nonsense from the space industry is their way of measuring how the mass dumbing down project is going. :nod:
     
  9. Durandal

    Durandal Well-Known Member Donor

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    A full episode of NOVA about New Horizons and its visits to Pluto and Ultima Thule:



    The New Horizons spacecraft attempts to fly by a mysterious object known as Ultima Thule, believed to be a primordial building block of the solar system. Three years after taking the first spectacular photos of Pluto, New Horizons is four billion miles from Earth, trying to achieve the most distant flyby in NASA’s history. If successful, it will shed light on one of the least understood regions of our solar system: the Kuiper Belt. NOVA is embedded with the New Horizons mission team, following the action in real time as they uncover the secrets of what lies beyond Pluto.​
     
  10. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    This is an amazing event.

    It's really too bad that there is no known object in the path that this spacecraft is taking. Someone would have to find some new Kuiiper Belt object that is close enough to the trajectory of New Horizons that the tiny bit of energy it has remaining could alter the course for a fly by.

    It's like there is a cone of possible trajectories from the spacecraft forward with the size of the cone based on how much energy remains for course correction.

    Someone would have to find an object inside that cone. But, these objects are so small, sparse and distant that it's unlikely anyone will be able to detect one before it's too late.

    In that case - Bye bye New Horizons, it's been great knowing you.
     
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  11. Durandal

    Durandal Well-Known Member Donor

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  12. xwsmithx

    xwsmithx Well-Known Member

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    Fascinating. I'm old enough to remember the Voyager fly-bys and how they took our breath away. This one isn't so dramatic, but good job to NASA to get it done. I wish we'd send a probe toward Alpha Centauri. It probably wouldn't even reach it in my lifetime, but just the fact that we did it would be an accomplishment... the first probe to another star system.
     
  13. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    Yes, to give this flyby it's full due I think we need to remember that the primary mission of the New Horizons satellite was the Pluto flyby that changed most of what we thought we knew about that planet.

    New Horizons launched in 2006, It collected data on Jupiter as it passed by, using Jupiter to gain speed. Then, it spent 7 years in shutdown mode, just shooting along with no contact until being told to wake up for its primary mission, Pluto.
     
  14. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    Yeah, at current speed capability, Alpha Centauri would require 100 years of travel time - plus 4 years for the first byte of info to come back at light speed.

    I think it's going to take another month for the full download of data on Ultima Thule. The baud rate over that distance with so little electrical power and such a tiny antenna is just not that great. From Alpha Centauri? Surely that would be an incredible challenge.
     
  15. Durandal

    Durandal Well-Known Member Donor

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    I like this mission as a technological and spiritual successor to those earlier solar system explorers. It pulled off a much more difficult trick zipping by Pluto and successfully exploring it, let alone passing by this relatively tiny object, especially as something not originally planned when it was launched (the object wasn't even found until 2014!).

    Speaking of the outer planets, though, I would absolutely love to see Uranus and Neptune get orbiters. Imagine the awesome images we would get then! We've gotten a lot of great material from Jupiter and Saturn from such missions.

    I do agree about getting something sent out to another star system, though. I'd especially like for such a mission to travel so fast that it makes it there before we all drop dead. At least it could use the target star's energy to recharge and stay charged while it is in the system. Perhaps the advanced astronavigation over vast distances practiced with New Horizons will help make that possible! Unfortunately, though, we're talking about YEARS just to get signals back! It's mind-boggling how very vast and challenging space is. As earth critters, we just have no proper conception of the distances and scales involved.
     
  16. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    Amen!

    The only real catch is that there are so many interesting places to go! How can we not go and sample the water plumes venting on Enceladus? We're not paying much attention to Venus.

    I think going to other star systems is just too much until we figure out how to go a lot faster than we can today.

    I'll also have to say that I'm happy with not rocketing humans to various places. Humans are unbelievably expensive - MANY times what these missions are costing. We're getting good with robots. And, there are serious unanswered questions, such as how to protect humans from the serious radiation that is outside our magnetosphere. Losing satellites due to being blasted is bad enough.
     
  17. Durandal

    Durandal Well-Known Member Donor

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    Right. We are realistically going to be earthbound for a long time yet, no matter how we dream of colonizing, even terraforming, other planets. Reason #1 everyone has to quit bickering about climate change and get serious about it, incidentally. We can't escape earth if we ruin it.

    Venus is a planet I don't mind ignoring too much. It is so incredibly hostile even to robotic probes, I'm not sure what else we should even do with it. Far as I know, it has been explored from orbit quite a bit. But I like the idea of doing more with those gas giant moons. I hear Titan has an atmospheric pressure very close to that of earth. Bit cold, though. Wouldn't that make for a fun little colony?

    One thing I'd like to see explored is a super earth exoplanet. I have to assume that those orbiting very near their stars are the cores of what used to be gas giants like Neptune and Uranus. Got to check those out, and we especially have to get a closer look at the more earthlike worlds out there, even if they're tidally locked and orbiting crazy stars that probably make life impossible. What a thing to see, all the same, and what intriguing possibilities for potential future human settlement.
     
  18. cerberus

    cerberus Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    And having understood it . . . or not, as the case may be . . . then what? [​IMG]
     
  19. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    Understanding??

    Today, we have two different models of physics - general relativity and quantum field theory. They are different in that general relativity theory includes or focuses on gravity and the large and quantum field theory unifies the other three forces seen in particle physics - electromagnetism (including light) and the nuclear forces.

    Through years of testing, we know these two models are incompatible - they can not both be right!

    When Einstein came out with relativity theory it was seen as merely interesting by those outside physics. Today, it's in every cell phone by law, has enabled us to build the power to destroy human life on the planet, and is a major source of electrical power.

    And, our fractured physics is not the only unanswered question, obviously.

    I just don't believe we know what the impact of "understanding" would be or precisely where we will find the clues that help make progress.
     
  20. cerberus

    cerberus Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Don't you fret about making progress, Will - we've managed quite well so far for things that matter?
     
  21. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    Physics is one of those things that absolutely does matter.

    Think Einstein, bombs, the law requiring relativity being in every cell phone for location and emergency - and this list could go on and on.
     
  22. cerberus

    cerberus Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Of course it does - what intelligent person would deny it?
     
  23. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    Well, I get the feeling that this thread includes a fair amount of resistance to some of our work in extending physics.

    So, I thought I'd say it.
     
  24. Pycckia

    Pycckia Well-Known Member

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    As an intellectual exercise, try listing the bad things that have happened through the extension of physics, start with the human misery attendant on the discovery of thermodynamics.
     
  25. BaghdadBob

    BaghdadBob Well-Known Member

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    This fly-by is making me uncomfortable.

    [​IMG]
     

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