# Rosetta mission: Historic comet landing event ...



## Beaver101

Just fascinating ... https://ca.news.yahoo.com/blogs/geekquinox/historic-comet-landing-promises-to-reveal-a-dynamic-and-171051813.html. 

Feeding from the direct source of ESA (European Space Agency) http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Space_Science/Rosetta/Touchdown!_Rosetta_s_Philae_probe_lands_on_comet ... a global collaboration (including Canada's participation) :triumphant:.


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## Nemo2

Watched a vid on this....just amazing! :encouragement:


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## carverman

Hitching a ride on a comet..that is a remarkable achievement in space exploration. Too bad we haven't made any such achievements in human understanding to get along with one another..that may take a few thousand years.

I find it fascinating that this robot can fire a harpoon to anchor itself onto a comet travelling at 60,000 km an hour..that is fast. and the interception point is very small...overshoot or undershoot and you miss it completely. 



> successfully touching down on the surface of a high-speed comet over* 500 million* kilometres from Earth, marking a cosmic first for humankind.


 Comet is At "500,000,000" km from earth, the radio signals to command it take 28 minutes to get there..lets see...speed of light is... 17,987,547.48 kilometers per minute (km/min) or (186,220 per sec) 
the radio waves which travel at the speed of light, wqould take 27.77 minutes one way. That's an nearly an HOUR
to send a command to the spacecraft, then wait for confirmation that the command was successful. 

I can see it would take 10 years and 6 billion kms to travel in outer space to rendezvous with this comet at the interception point...not an easy task.
for sure.


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## My Own Advisor

Crazy how this actually happened...I was driving home listening to this news and thinking, what is the equivalent?

Throwing a dart from Ottawa and hoping it hits a board somewhere in the UK?


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## carverman

There may be problems with keeping it on that comet until the samples are collected and analyzed. The batteries are designed to last about 3 days and won't get recharged again until the comet gets closer to our sun.

At that point, if the deep space robotic probe is still hanging on the heat of the sun may cause high temperature issues as well. 



> “The landing is so difficult,” U.S. Rosetta project manager Art Chmielewski told the PBS NewsHour in August. “So, so difficult. It’s definitely one of the hardest things humankind has ever done.” The comet is currently soaring through space at 36,000 mph, meaning Rosetta has to maintain the exact same speed alongside it, then try to drop the probe into an area that is slightly more than half a square mile.
> 
> Chmielewski likened the landing to grabbing a mosquito by the wings — except the mosquito is in New York, and somebody is working the controls from Los Angeles.


Right now, they need to find out why the harpoon anchors on the deep space robotic probe (PHilae) did not deploy..or they did not get any indication of the anchors deploying or the anchors broke on touchdown. The probe had to rendevous at the same speed and then determine approximately where to land on the free fall from the Mothership Rosetta.

Even if the probe was weightless in space, and the anchors managed to deploy before landing there is still the shock of a 100kg probe hitting the comet's frozen surface. IF it's not level at the point of contact, it could bounce off. 

Very difficult maneover, when the controllers on earth are working BLIND for at least 28 minutes from actual landing sequence to verification of successful landing. 



> But during the free-fall to the comet’s surface, harpoons designed to anchor the probe, named Philae, failed to deploy. Flight directors are considering options to ensure the lander does not drift back into space.


It takes about 28 minutes for any confirmation or digital pictures to be returned to the European Space agency. 


> "Maybe today we just didn’t land once, but landed twice. Hopefully we are sitting there on the surface … and can continue our science sequence.”


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## carverman

Rosetta/Philae are not the first deep space missions to explore the outer solar system. Back in 1977, there were
two space probes Voyageur 1 and 2 that were launched to 'go where no man has gone before'.
However, the latest ones are unique in the fact that they managed to land on a speeding comet. 

I remember reading Carl Sagan's book "Murmurs of Earth, where both Voyager 1 and 2 are described in detail and
there is a 33 1/3 rpm recorded disk and stylus affixed to it's outer shell with instructions for some alien race on how
to play back the recording which had lots of digitized pictures. On the cover of the each disk was a figure of
a man and woman of our earth, and a trajectory map on how to find earth in our solar system in binary language..
assumed by scientists of the day of course...that any alien race would understand.

Do you suppose we could now be visited by aliens peaked with their curiosity from listening to these recordings 
"murmurs of earth"? 

Because of their long mission and trajectory away from our sun, they had a special radioisotope thermonuclear generators designed to generate 470watts of power for its on board instruments and it's transmitters...they are still functioning 37 years later, but expected to stop functioning in 2025..almost 50 years later since launch. 

*Voyager 1 is a 722-kilogram (1,592 lb) space probe launched by NASA on September 5, 1977, to study the outer Solar System. Operating for 37 years, 2 months and 8 days as of November 13, 2014, the spacecraft communicates with the Deep Space Network to receive routine commands and return data. At a distance of about 130.29 AU (1.949×1010 km) (approximately 12 billion miles) from Earth as of November 11, 2014,[3][4] it is the farthest spacecraft from Earth.*
AU = a unit of length, equal to the mean distance of the earth from the sun: approximately 93 million miles (150 million km).
Deep intersteller probes use Astronomical Units,to measure their distance from our earth, since miles/km have no meaning in outer space. 


*On a side note:*
Interesting that in the script of one of the StarTek the Motion Picture, the space ship Enterprise goes through a strange Magellanic cloud and is sucked up by a massive alien ship. The brains of this ship is a machine that
has the original "Voyageur" nameplate paint partly erased by cosmic dust to still show only "V---g-er" and it
calls itself V'ger.


> *At the heart of the massive ship, V'Ger is revealed to be Voyager 6*, a 20th-century Earth space probe believed lost.
> The damaged probe was found by an *alien race of living machines* that *interpreted its programming as instructions to learn all that can be learned, and return that information to its creator*.





> The machines upgraded the probe to fulfill its mission, and on its journey the probe gathered so much knowledge that it achieved consciousness.[/B] Spock realizes that V'Ger lacks the ability to give itself a focus other than its original mission; having learned what it could on its journey home, it finds its existence empty and without purpose. Before transmitting all its information, V'Ger insists that the Creator come in person to finish the sequence. Realizing that the machine wants to merge with its creator,


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## My Own Advisor

Thanks for sharing Caverman, crazy how far away Voyager is....almost beyond comprehension....


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## carverman

Latest news seems to be positive..the lander is stabilized on two of it's 3 feet and hitching a ride from the picture,
but the solar panels are in the shadow of a cliff up from where it landed. 



> The lander's harpoons, which were meant to anchor it to the surface of the comet, failed to deploy Wednesday, causing it to bounce twice before it came to rest on the comet's 4 kilometre-wide body, or nucleus.
> "Philae is stable, sitting on the nucleus and is producing data," a scientist on the Rosetta mission, told The Associated Press. "The lander is very healthy."


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## Beaver101

This mission was a 10 years journey and this is only the beginning ... one of the purpose of landing this probe was to collect samples, analyze and study them as to determine the origins of the solar systems. I think a bigger purpose for comet landing probes, now that it has been made possible, is to deflect any catastrophic ones heading earth. Something along the line of the movie Armageddon but instead of sending a space shuttle with astronauts, mount the probe with the nuclear head and deploy it from station earth. 

According to globalTV news yesterday, the communications set up on the probe was (or is still being done) by a Canadian firm in Saskatoon. Also, the "noise" from the comet itself is just as fascinating ... sound like being made by woodpeckers.


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## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> This mission was a 10 years journey and this is only the beginning ... one of the purpose of landing this probe was to collect samples, analyze and study them as to determine the origins of the solar systems. * I think a bigger purpose for comet landing probes, now that it has been made possible, is to deflect any catastrophic ones heading earth. * Something along the line of the movie Armageddon but instead of sending a space shuttle with astronauts, mount the probe with the nuclear head and deploy it from station earth.


This is exactly along the same lines that I was thinking Beav. 
While drilling into the comet to collect samples makes the scientific project undertaken justified for the money spent (over a billion Euros..actually 1.4 billion), the science behind it is probably the evolution to what you are suggesting.
While the cost is significant, the science and benefits of putting a man made object on a comet or asteroid travelling a phenomenal speed /...(a moving target at 66,000kph), is an incredible piece of work. 

To put things in perspective, the first powered flight was about 111 years ago..the modern personal computer was first unveiled in 1977 about 37 years ago, since then constant evolution and miniaturization of electronic circuits make these scientific outer space exploration projects possible, something that we only dreamed about in sci-fi
books less than 50 years ago. 



> Like a lot of blue-skies science, it’s very hard to put a value on the mission. First, there are the immediate spin-offs like engineering know-how; then, the knowledge accrued, which could inform our understanding of our cosmic origins, amongst other things; and finally, the inspirational value of this audacious feat in which we can all share, including the next generation of scientists.


http://scienceogram.org/blog/2014/11/rosetta-comet-esa-lander-cost/



> According to globalTV news yesterday, the communications set up on the probe was (or is still being done) by a Canadian firm in Saskatoon. Also, the "*noise" from the comet itself is just as fascinating *... sound like being made by woodpeckers.


That is interesting because to hear noise for us that requires air compression and a human ear to discern it. In the vacumn of space, there can't be sound waves, as sound requires a medium like air to propagate to our ear. We all have had experience with distant thunder where we see the lightning flash we hear the sound a bit later. 

I would venture a guess that this is some kind of electromagnetic noise emanating from the comet's surface or mayby even its "bow shock wave"..they may be able to figure that out, as long as the batteries hold up..but there is so much to learn about comets..we have just barely scratched the surface.



> Once the particles have been ionized, they attain a net positive electrical charge, which in turn gives rise to an "induced magnetosphere" around the comet. The comet and its induced magnetic field form an obstacle to outward flowing solar wind particles. B*ecause the relative orbital speed of the comet and the solar wind is supersonic, a bow shock is formed upstream of the comet in the flow direction of the solar wind. In this bow shock, large concentrations of cometary ions (called "pick-up ions") congregate and act to "load" the solar magnetic field with plasma, such that the field lines "drape" around the comet forming the ion tail*.[55]


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## Beaver101

> I would venture a guess that this is *some kind of electromagnetic noise *emanating from the comet's surface or mayby even its "bow shock wave"..they may be able to figure that out, as long as the batteries hold up..but there is so much to learn about comets..we have just barely scratched the surface.


 ... yes, that's what they said on the news but of course, without your detailed scientific explanation/write up here. each:



> To put things in perspective, the first powered flight was about 111 years ago..the modern personal computer was first unveiled in 1977 about 37 years ago, since then constant evolution and miniaturization of electronic circuits make these scientific outer space exploration projects possible, something that we only dreamed about in sci-fi
> books less than 50 years ago.


 ... so are we humans, getting smarter? :biggrin: 



Now only if we can find a cure for cancer ... but then that's another topic.


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## Beaver101

Found it ... http://globalnews.ca/news/1661400/saskatoon-firm-has-role-in-historic-comet-visit/



> MONTREAL – A little-known Canadian company is playing a big role in the European Space Agency’s Rosetta mission, the first in history to rendezvous with a comet.
> 
> The agency is hoping to drop a lander, the size of a small fridge, on the comet’s surface in the coming days – a feat that has never been tried before.
> 
> *The mission is being carried out with help from Saskatoon’s SED Systems, which built three ground stations the space agency uses to communicate with the Rosetta spacecraft*. ...


 ... SED Systems - a division of CALIAN Ltd. ... and CALIAN is CTY on the TSX to boot! :encouragement: :applouse: :cool2:


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## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ... yes, that's what they said on the news but of course, without your detailed scientific explanation/write up here. each:
> 
> ... so are we humans, getting smarter? :biggrin:


Waxing philosphical.....smarter yes, but dumber too in some respects. In the last 100 years, we invented more effective ways
of killing each other as well...

Sigh!...Well we have made progress in the cure for cancer...but we have to also put things in perspective as well.

Big Pharma has a price tag on patented drugs that very few of us can afford, so we still die anyway. 

There was a CBC segment a few days ago about a man losing his wife (35?) to kidney cancer. 
There was a drug developed to control it, but being proprietary, it cost $3,000 ($4000?) a month for her treatment
and sadly the provincial health care didn't cover it. 

When his employer changed insurance companies..the new insurance company refused to pay for the drug....
and because of the high cost of the monthly treatment, $36K to 50K a year, from what I heard ,
they couldn't afford it..so she died. 

So this is the sad reality today..you can spend a billion dollars exploring space and maybe come up a smidgeon of
knowledge that could benefit a tiny fraction of earths population..the scientists and engineers..
or spend
10 billion on a cure for a particular type of cancer, patent the invention and attempt to recover the
*cost of that from a small fraction of cancer patients.*..because in the end..like a Kevin O'Leary once mentioned
on DD..." I don't care about saving the baby whales (or cancer patients in this case)....show me the money!" 



> Gleevec, from Novartis, possibly the greatest cancer drug ever invented, cost $24,000 a year when it was introduced in 2001; now it costs $90,000 per year, a quadrupling in price.


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## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ... SED Systems - a division of CALIAN Ltd. ... and CALIAN is CTY on the TSX to boot! :encouragement: :applouse: :cool2:


SED Systems has been around a long time. They first came on the scene when Telesat, 
(whom I worked for in '72/73 at Allan Park ON, near Hanover ON) on the launch of their first ANIK series.
These were built by Hughes aircraft basically two axis stabilized geosynchronous despun antenna satellites ), and their second generation of satellites to replace the aging ANIK series. 



> SED delivers the ground control system for Canada’s first Communications Technology Satellite.


 circa 1972. 



> SED begins work with Hughes Aircraft Company to provide satellite test and ground control equipment. This relationship continues today with HAC’s successor, Boeing Satellite Systems.
> 
> SED works with Telesat Canada to provide satellite-tracking systems in Canada and Guam.


http://www.sedsystems.ca/about-us/history-of-sed/


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## carverman

Understanding the symbolic naming of this mission (Rosetta), comes from the Rosetta stone originally found in Egypt, that has been the subject of controversy for the last 200 years. Scholars have been studying it for years and it is similar to that black monolith used in the movie Space Odyssey, where man starting off from the apes are constantly squabbling.... until they touch it..then all of a sudden they have this vast knowledge of the universe
imparted on them.... that propels their knowledge even further to exploration of their universe and space.



> The stele almost certainly did not originate in the town of Rashid (Rosetta) where it was found, but more likely came from a temple site farther inland, possibly the royal town of Sais.[32] The temple it originally came from was probably closed around AD 392 when Eastern Roman emperor Theodosius I ordered the closing of all non-Christian temples of worship.[33] At some point the original stele broke, its largest piece becoming what we now know as the Rosetta Stone.[34] Ancient Egyptian temples were later used as quarries for new construction, and the Rosetta Stone probably was re-used in this manner. *Later it was incorporated in the foundations of a fortress constructed by the Mameluke Sultan Qaitbay (ca. 1416/18–1496) to defend the Bolbitine branch of the Nile at Rashid.[34] There it would lie for at least another three centuries until its rediscovery*.[34]


The Rossetta stone:
Three ancient languages..Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, demotic script, and Greek script
*Created	196 BC* (Moved around for a few hundred years) 1416-1496 


then another 300 years passed before it was discovered AGAIN in 1799


> Monumental use of hieroglyphs ceased after the closing of all non-Christian temples in the year 391 by the Roman Emperor Theodosius I; the last known inscription, found at *Philae *


2014: Space probe Rosetta encounter with the comet , deploys Philae lander to explore the comet. 


> The Rosetta spacecraft is on a ten-year mission to study the comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko, in the hopes that determining its composition will reveal the origins of the Solar System.


2210 years have passed since the inscriptions on the stone..do you see the possible parallelism here?


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## carverman

The Philae lander batteries are running out. They can issue one more command to get the lander to hop off the ledge into a better position to catch some sunlight on it's solar cells...if not..the Philae will go into hibernation for a long time. 

They estimate that the gravity on the comet is only about 1, 60,000 that of earth so the weight of the 100kg lander is only a few grams there.
If they are sucessful..it will continue transmitting data..if not..it could drift off into outer space with no chance of recovery from the mothership Rosetta. 
They don't have much of a choice at this point...need to try the very risky maneuver.


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## Beaver101

carverman said:


> Waxing philosphical.....smarter yes, but dumber too in some respects. In the last 100 years, we invented more effective ways
> of killing each other as well...
> 
> Sigh!...Well we have made progress in the cure for cancer...but we have to also put things in perspective as well.
> 
> Big Pharma has a price tag on patented drugs that very few of us can afford, so we still die anyway.
> 
> So this is the sad reality today..you can spend a billion dollars exploring space and maybe come up a smidgeon of
> knowledge that could benefit a tiny fraction of earths population..the scientists and engineers..
> or spend
> 10 billion on a cure for a particular type of cancer, patent the invention and attempt to recover the
> *cost of that from a small fraction of cancer patients.*..because in the end..like *a Kevin O'Leary once mentioned
> on DD..." I don't care about saving the baby whales (or cancer patients in this case)....show me the money*!"


 ... well, without the patient, there would be no need for Big Pharma nor to show KOL "the money". 

It might be a "small fraction" of cancer patients in 2014 but with the on-going contamination of our planet (land, water, and air), that fraction ain't exactly going to be shrinking.


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## Beaver101

carverman said:


> Understanding the symbolic naming of this mission (Rosetta), comes from the Rosetta stone originally found in Egypt, that has been the subject of controversy for the last 200 years. Scholars have been studying it for years and it is similar to that black monolith used in the movie Space Odyssey, where man starting off from the apes are constantly squabbling.... until they touch it..then all of a sudden they have this vast knowledge of the universe
> imparted on them.... that propels their knowledge even further to exploration of their universe and space.
> ....
> 2210 years have passed since the inscriptions on the stone..do you see the possible parallelism here?


 ... yes ... it would be even more interesting to find out what those drilled samples on the comet will be able to tell us.


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## Beaver101

carverman said:


> SED Systems has been around a long time. They first came on the scene when Telesat,
> (whom I worked for in '72/73 at Allan Park ON, near Hanover ON) on the launch of their first ANIK series.
> These were built by Hughes aircraft basically two axis stabilized geosynchronous despun antenna satellites ), and their second generation of satellites to replace the aging ANIK series.
> 
> circa 1972.
> 
> 
> http://www.sedsystems.ca/about-us/history-of-sed/


 ... interesting to know the company SED has been around 50 years already and it's going even more robust ... and that Telesat (heard of company but never invested in it) is listed on the TSX too. I'm invested in Calian though. :glee: 

And it seems you have been/worked all over these tele-companies in Ontario.


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## Beaver101

carverman said:


> The Philae lander batteries are running out. They can issue one more command to *get the lander to hop off the ledge into a better position to catch some sunlight on it's solar cells.*..if not..the Philae will go into hibernation for a long time.
> 
> They estimate that the gravity on the comet is only about 1, 60,000 that of earth so the weight of the 100kg lander is only a few grams there.
> If they are sucessful..it will continue transmitting data..if not..it could drift off into outer space with no chance of recovery from the mothership Rosetta.
> * They don't have much of a choice at this point...need to try the very risky maneuver*.


 ... all fingers crossed that for a success in moving the lander to a better lite-location and keep the probe alive! :excitement: 

If the 100kg lander only weights 1/60,000th of the weight on earth and can float away, imagine an elephant and then us ... so what weight problem do we have - there? :biggrin:


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## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ... all fingers crossed that for a success in moving the lander to a better lite-location and keep the probe alive! :excitement:
> 
> If the 100kg lander only weights 1/60,000th of the weight on earth and can float away, imagine an elephant and then us ... so what weight problem do we have - there? :biggrin:


The Philea lander batteries are exhausted today. It did transmit some data before shutdown, but now it's in sleep mode.
As the comet gets closer to the sun..comets go around the sun actually in a eliptical orbit coveriing billions (trillions?) of
what we call miles/km..or AU astronomical units .

The Russian named "67P" comet is a short duration comet, so there may be some opportunity to continue with the experiments planned once the comet is closer to perihelion in 2015, as the increased sunlight angles will be able to recharge the batteries via the it's solar cell exposure to the sun where it is.

Interestingly enough, they did not use an RTG on this mission like they did for the deep space probes Voyageur 1 and 2 in 1977. An RTG is a special radioisotope thermonuclear generator using an isotope of PU238 (plutonium 238). 
The Russians had a lot of them at one time.

I presume that because of the short duration mission of Rosetta/Pilae, the ESA did not want to use thermonuclear generator because of the special handling requirements, cost and of course procurement of the isotopes of plutonium 238...half life of 87.7 years.



> A radioisotope thermoelectric generator (RTG, RITEG) is an electrical generator that uses an array of thermocouples to convert the heat released by the decay of a suitable radioactive material into electricity by the Seebeck effect.
> 
> RTGs have been used as power sources in satellites, space probes and unmanned remote facilities such as a series of lighthouses built by the former Soviet Union inside the Arctic Circle.





> Simply 67P, is a comet with a *current orbital period of 6.45 years*,[1] a rotation period of approximately 12.4 hours[5] and a maximum velocity of 135,000 km/h (38 km/s; 84,000 mph).[6] It will next come to *perihelion* (closest approach to the Sun) on *13 August 2015.*





> Orbit of a Comet. Comets go around the Sun in a highly elliptical orbit. They can spend *hundreds and thousands of years out in the depths of the solar system before they return to Sun at their perihelion*. And farthest from the sun it's the aphelion.


Haleys comet (which is more known and a lot larger of course), is a short period comet making it's appearance every 75-76 years and visible to the naked eye.

The next time it will be visible again is around 2061...I won't be here to see it, so maybe you will be able to see it in 47 years for me?:biggrin:


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## Nemo2

carverman said:


> Haleys comet (which is more known and a lot larger of course)


This guy?







.......or *Halley's* Comet.......I always get them mixed up. :wink:


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## carverman

Nemo2 said:


> This guy?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> .......or *Halley's* Comet.......I always get them mixed up. :wink:


LOL! Freudian slip obviously.

Bill Haley and the Comets. circa 1956.."*Rock around the clock*". 
If he was still alive today, maybe he would write a new song called " We Landed on the Rock" that is moving faster than my old Mercury Comet's clock...
which in it's original Ford factory form could barely get up to 120kph never mind 66,000 kph.:biggrin:


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## carverman

Back to more serious discussion on this space project.

The Rosetta mission wasn't a complete success but neither was it a complete failure. Even with some unforseen problems, the science behind intercepting a speeding comet, rendevous with it to actual orbit it is a remarkable achievement...maybe as remarkable as the apple falling on Issac Newton's head (ouch!) leading to his discovery of gravity.



> "Why should it not go sideways, or upwards? But constantly to the Earth's centre? Assuredly the reason is, that the Earth draws it. There must be a drawing power in matter. And the sum of the drawing power in the matter of the Earth must be in the Earth's centre, not in any side of the Earth.


What are the odds of intercepting a speeding comet from a space craft launched from earth? 

What is the science behind comets? Where do they come from? 


> Short-period comets (those which take less than 200 years to complete an orbit around the Sun) originate from the Kuiper Belt. Danish astronomer Jan Oort proposed that comets reside in a huge cloud at the outer reaches of the solar system, far beyond the orbit of Pluto. This has come to be known as the Oort Cloud.


The Kuiper disk/belt is far beyond the orbit of planet Neptune..what is beyond that? 
Why does Pluto which is no longer regarded as the 9th planet by the astronomers since 2006 have an ellpitical
orbit, around the sun compared to the other 8 planets revolving around our sun. 

What is beyond deep interstellar space? Beyond intergalatic space? Is space still expanding? 

Soon we will hear some news of another interplanetary space probe to Pluto..."New Horizons" in January 2015. 


> The entire spacecraft, drawing electricity from a single radioisotope thermoelectric generator, operates on less power than a pair of 100-watt light bulbs.





> Pluto is the only dwarf planet to once have been considered a major planet. Once thought of as the ninth planet and the one most distant from the sun, Pluto is now seen as one of the largest known members of the Kuiper Belt, a shadowy disk-like zone beyond the orbit of Neptune populated by a trillion or more comets.
> 
> Pluto was reclassified as a dwarf planet in 2006, a change widely thought of as a demotion that has attracted controversy and debate that has continued in scientific communities for the last eight years


It will be 8 years since it's launch in 2006. Not too many knew about the launch 8 years ago. With that length of time to get there from earth, I wouldn't expect too many volunteers as in possible manned missions to Mars someday.
http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/news_center/news/20141113.php


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## Beaver101

carverman said:


> The Philea lander batteries are exhausted today. It did transmit some data before shutdown, but now it's in sleep mode. ...
> 
> The next time it will be visible again is around 2061...I won't be here to see it, so maybe you will be able to see it in 47 years for me?:biggrin:


 ... and so the Rosetta/Philea lander is going to hibernate for the winter ...let's hope it gets the energy it needs to wake up early in 2015

Re seeing the Halley's comet for you, not a problem provided 1. earth doesn't get hit/invaded by unknown cosmic visitors (rogue comet, some heavenly body or little green men), 2. a flu/Ebola/an-unknown-deadly-pandemic repeats, and 3. WW3 doesn't start. :frown:

Actually everytime I look up at the night-sky and sees a star, I think it represents someone.


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## Beaver101

carverman said:


> Back to more serious discussion on this space project.
> 
> The Rosetta mission wasn't a complete success but neither was it a complete failure. Even with some unforseen problems, the science behind intercepting a speeding comet, rendevous with it to actual orbit it is a remarkable achievement...maybe as remarkable as the apple falling on Issac Newton's head (ouch!) leading to his discovery of gravity.
> ....
> 
> Short-period comets (those which take less than 200 years to complete an orbit around the Sun) originate from the Kuiper Belt. Danish astronomer Jan Oort proposed that comets reside in a huge cloud at the outer reaches of the solar system, far beyond the orbit of Pluto. This has come to be known as the Oort Cloud. The Kuiper disk/belt is far beyond the orbit of planet Neptune..what is beyond that?
> Why does Pluto which is no longer regarded as the 9th planet by the astronomers since 2006 have an ellpitical
> orbit, around the sun compared to the other 8 planets revolving around our sun.
> 
> *What is beyond deep interstellar space? Beyond intergalatic space? Is space still expanding? *
> 
> *Soon we will hear some news of another interplanetary space probe to Pluto..."New Horizons" in January 2015. *
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The entire spacecraft, drawing electricity from a single radioisotope thermoelectric generator, operates on less power than a pair of 100-watt light bulbs.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Pluto is the only dwarf planet to once have been considered a major planet. Once thought of as the ninth planet and the one most distant from the sun, Pluto is now seen as one of the largest known members of the Kuiper Belt, a shadowy disk-like zone beyond the orbit of Neptune populated by a trillion or more comets.
> 
> Pluto was reclassified as a dwarf planet in 2006, a change widely thought of as a demotion that has attracted controversy and debate that has continued in scientific communities for the last eight years.
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> ....
> 
> ... Not too many knew about the launch 8 years ago. With that length of time to get there from earth, I wouldn't expect too many volunteers as in possible manned missions to Mars someday.
> http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/news_center/news/20141113.php
Click to expand...

 ... I would call the Rosetta mission a remarkable success as there will be more to come in 2015 ... and now you have mentioned this New Horizons' mission (wasn't aware about it), even more news to come ... a very exciting time for space exploration and all the sciences that come with it. :excitement:


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ... and so the Rosetta/Philea lander is going to hibernate for the winter ...let's hope it gets the energy it needs to wake up early in 2015


I believe it's just the lander that goes into hibernation, until the comets approach closer to the sun gets enough solar energy
to recharge it's batteries..until then Philae can't "Phone Home". :biggrin: (ET's famous quote)

The Rosetta orbiter/mothership will continue to orbit the comet with a defined orbit that will stay with the speeding comet for
at least 17 more months. Unlike the lander, the orbiter Rosetta is capturing sunlight on it's solar wings and it also came equipped with several hydrazine thruster jets for attitude maneovers to maintain it's orbit around comet 67P as the comet heads away into outer space in 2015, so it's mission is still on with some more with photographic mapping, although there won't be any drilling samples analyzed on the comet because the lander doesn't have battery power right now to do it.


> After closing to within about 30 km (19 mi) from the comet on 10 September, the spacecraft entered actual orbit about it.
> ]The Rosetta mission will orbit 67P for 17 months and is designed to complete the most detailed study of a comet ever attempted.


http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Space_Science/Rosetta/Frequently_asked_questions



> Rosetta’s planned lifetime is about 12 years. The *nominal mission ends in December 2015,* after the comet reaches its closest point to the Sun (in August 2015) and starts heading back towards the outer Solar System.


I would think that maybe sometime in January 2015, we will hear more about it. What I find amazing is that the Rosetta orbiter can maintain a very small orbit around the speeding comet with such a small mass 3000kg. . I think the energy imparted from the thrusters help it to maintain that..centrifugal force? may have something to do with it as well.

With the extreme cold temperatures in outer space (possibly) approaching 3 degrees Kelvin(-270C) it is important to keep the instruments on board the Rosetta orbiter somewhat operational, and there is onboard heaters to raise the temperature to at least -150 C or more. 



> These tests involved heating the outside surfaces to more than 150°C and then cooling them to -180°C without damaging the instruments.


----------



## Beaver101

carverman said:


> I believe it's just the lander that goes into hibernation, until the comets approach closer to the sun gets enough solar energy
> to recharge it's batteries..until then Philae can't "Phone Home". :biggrin: (ET's famous quote)
> 
> ...
> 
> I would think that maybe sometime in January 2015, we will hear more about it. What I find amazing is that the Rosetta orbiter can maintain a very small orbit around the speeding comet with such a small mass 3000kg. . I think the energy imparted from the thrusters help it to maintain that..centrifugal force? may have something to do with it as well.
> 
> With the extreme cold temperatures in outer space (possibly) approaching 3 degrees Kelvin(-270C) it is important to keep the instruments on board the Rosetta orbiter somewhat operational, and there is onboard heaters to raise the temperature to at least -150 C or more.


 ... while Philae can't phone home now, I wonder if it's able to continue self-record something (eg. its own whisper in space or low grade pics of its surrounding)? Here're some pics showing the lander (a spec) bouncing around the comet - pretty neat. http://blogs.esa.int/rosetta/2014/11/17/osiris-spots-philae-drifting-across-the-comet/

Regarding Rosetta orbiter being able to maintain a very small orbit around the speeding comet with such a small mass 3000kg. .... does it have anything to do with some force coming from earth? or that that some gravitational force exists around the comet (a planetary body) working like the the moon and earth? Wouldn't the comet have some magnetic properties on them? So many questions ...


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ... while Philae can't phone home now, I wonder if it's able to continue self-record something (eg. its own whisper in space or low grade pics of its surrounding)? Here're some pics showing the lander (a spec) bouncing around the comet - pretty neat.


Those pictures were taken from OSIRIS which is a high resolution camera on the orbiter which still has power. 



> Regarding Rosetta orbiter being able to maintain a very small orbit around the speeding comet with such a small mass 3000kg. .... does it have anything to do with some force coming from earth? or that that some gravitational force exists around the comet (a planetary body) working like the the moon and earth?


The actual science and mechanics of orbital behaviour is quite complex and involves several principals and laws.
Earth's gravity is no longer in the picture...neither are the other planets, except Rosetta did get a "kick" from Jupiter in its flyby on the way to rendezvous with 67P.



> In astrodynamics or celestial mechanics a hyperbolic trajectory is the trajectory of any object around a central body with more than enough velocity to escape the central object's gravitational pull.
> Planetary flybys, used for gravitational slingshots, can be described within the planet's sphere of influence using hyperbolic trajectories.


This is common practice in deep space probes..the energy to accelerate the space craft is used through the gravitational field of a specific planet during the flyby. Voyageur 1 used Jupiter and Voyageur 2 used Saturn as it was launched later and the planets didn't have the same alignment then as earlier. 



> The gravitational assist trajectories at Jupiter were successfully carried out by both Voyagers, and the two spacecraft went on to visit Saturn and its system of moons and rings. Voyager 1's Saturnian flyby occurred in November 1980.
> 
> In Rosetta's mission to hitch a ride on the comet 67P, it had to perform some precalculated " flybys" for gravity assist.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> To achieve the required velocity to rendezvous with 67P, Rosetta used gravity assist manoeuvres to accelerate throughout the inner Solar System. The comet's orbit was known before Rosetta's launch, from ground-based measurements, to an accuracy of approximately 100 km (62 mi). Information gathered by the onboard cameras beginning at a distance of 24 million kilometres (15,000,000 mi) were processed at ESA's Operation Centre to refine the position of the comet in its orbit to a few kilometres.
> 
> The first flyby of Earth occurred on 4 March 2005.
> 
> 
> 
> On 25 February 2007, the craft was scheduled for a *low-altitude bypass of Mars, to correct the trajectory. This was not without risk, as the estimated altitude of the flyover manoeuvre was a mere 250 kilometres *(160 mi). During that encounter, the solar panels could not be used since the craft was in the planet's shadow, where it would not receive any solar light for 15 minutes, causing a dangerous shortage of power. The craft was therefore put into standby mode, with no possibility to communicate, flying on batteries that were originally not designed for this task.[38] *This Mars manoeuvre was therefore nicknamed "The Billion Euro Gamble*".[39] The flyby was successful, with Rosetta even returning detailed images of the surface and atmosphere of the planet, and the mission continued as planned.[20][40]
> 
> *The second Earth flyby occurred on 13 November 2007*.[41][42] As it approached Earth, the spacecraft was briefly designated as minor planet 2007 VN84 due to it being misidentified as an asteroid.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Rosetta '​s third and final flyby of Earth happened on 12 November 2009
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> Ok, 3 flybys of Earth to get into the right orbit for rendezvous with 67P...a daunting task. It also visited a couple asteroids on the
> way for mathematical orbit corrections.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> In May 2014, Rosetta began a *series of eight burns*. These reduced the relative velocity between the spacecraft and 67P from (2,540 ft/s) (26 ft/s).
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> These "burns" would be retro rocket burns from it's onboard hydrazine thrusters to slow it down.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> In August 2014, Rosetta rendezvoused with the comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko (67P) and commenced a series of manoeuvres that took it on two successive triangular paths, averaging 100 and 50 kilometres (62 and 31 mi) from the nucleus, whose segments are hyperbolic escape trajectories alternating with thruster burns.[9][10] After closing to within about 30 km (19 mi) from the comet on *10 September, the spacecraft entered actual orbit about it*
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> The science of orbiting around celestial bodies involves specific orbital kinetic energy.
> The math is too complex for me to explain because I don't understand it. ..maybe someone might be able to explain it? . It's all there in Wiki.
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperbolic_trajectory
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Wouldn't the comet have some magnetic properties on them? So many questions ...
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> Lots of questions, and that's what ESA wanted to find out.
> Possibly, but that depends on what's in the actual core of the planet. Philae's mission was to drill and analyse what kind of properties it has,.....since up to now..nobody has actually "harpooned" a comet to land on it.
> 
> If luck may have it, and the the sunlight somehow manages to hit the solar cells on its body to recharge the batteries, we may get that answer.
Click to expand...


----------



## Beaver101

carverman said:


> Those pictures were taken from OSIRIS which is a high resolution camera on the orbiter which still has power.
> 
> The actual science and mechanics of orbital behaviour is quite complex and involves several principals and laws.
> Earth's gravity is no longer in the picture...neither are the other planets, *except Rosetta did get a "kick" from Jupiter in its flyby on the way to rendezvous with 67P.*
> 
> Ok, *3 flybys of Earth to get into the right orbit for rendezvous with 67P*...a daunting task. It also visited a couple asteroids on the
> way for mathematical orbit corrections.
> 
> 
> *These "burns" would be retro rocket burns from it's onboard hydrazine thrusters to slow it down. *
> 
> 
> The science of orbiting around celestial bodies involves specific orbital kinetic energy.
> *The math is too complex for me to explain *because I don't understand it. ..maybe someone might be able to explain it? . It's all there in Wiki.
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperbolic_trajectory
> 
> Lots of questions, and that's what ESA wanted to find out.
> Possibly, but that depends on what's in the actual core of the planet. Philae's mission was to drill and analyse what kind of properties it has,.....since up to now..nobody has actually "harpooned" a comet to land on it.
> 
> If luck may have it, and the the sunlight somehow manages to hit the solar cells on its body to recharge the batteries, we may get that answer.


 ... your summarized explanation is perfect, thanks. It does make sense (alot more) because I heard from the "tv news" reporter saying the Philae's landing was possible due to some gravitational force coming from "earth". But the Rosetta orbiter and comet are thousand and thousand miles away from earth so how is that possible? So I wouldn't worry about any further explanations, especially on the math - indeed very complex. Besides I was never strong on physics in school. :cower: :biggrin:

I read on the ESA Rosetta's blog that they were "able" to drill 25cm into the comet (hard as hxll) before the Philae lost power ... not sure if they were successful in getting sample sediments though. Have to read over the blog.


----------



## Beaver101

So the Philae did get to drill and "sniff" for organic molecules on the comet 

*Philae probe ‘sniffed’ organic building blocks of life, scientists say *
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/technology/science/philae-probe-sniffed-organic-building-blocks-of-life-scientists-say/article21637153/



> European comet lander Philae “sniffed” organic molecules containing the carbon element that is the basis of life on Earth before its primary battery ran out and it shut down, German scientists said.
> 
> They said it was not yet clear whether they included the complex compounds that make up proteins. One of the key aims of the mission is to discover whether carbon-based compounds, and through them, ultimately, life, were brought to early Earth by comets.
> ...
> 
> *The COSAC gas analysing instrument on Philae was able to “sniff” the atmosphere and detect the first organic molecules after landing*, the DLR German Aerospace Center said.
> 
> The lander also drilled into the comet’s surface in its hunt for organic molecules, although it is unclear as yet whether Philae managed to deliver a sample to COSAC for analysis.
> 
> *Also onboard the lander was the MUPUS tool to measure the density and thermal and mechanical properties of the comet’s surface. It showed the comet’s surface was not as soft as previously believed. **A thermal sensor was supposed to be hammered around 40 centimetres into the surface but this did not occur, despite the hammer setting being cranked up to its highest level.
> 
> The DLR reckons that after passing through a 10- to 20-centimetre-thick layer of dust, the sensor hit a layer of material estimated to be as hard as ice.*
> 
> *“It’s a surprise. We didn’t expect such hard ice on the ground*,” Tilman Spohn, who leads the MUPUS team at the DLR, said in a statement on Tuesday
> ...


 ... the  and mysterious factors remain.


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> So the Philae did get to drill and "sniff" for organic molecules on the comet
> 
> *Philae probe ‘sniffed’ organic building blocks of life, scientists say *
> ... the  and mysterious factors remain.





> DLR reckons that after passing through a 10- to 20-centimetre-thick layer of dust, the sensor hit a layer of material estimated to be as hard as ice.* “It’s a surprise*. *We didn’t expect such hard ice on the ground*,


LOL! Comets are made of space debris, dust and ice...the ice forms on the comets as they gather water molecules or even heavy water molecules that seems to be present in the OORT cloud in outer space or perhaps in that "void" beyond Pluto... somewhere in the KUIPER belt, where most of the short period comets come from. 

Pluto appears to be a frozen sort of "near planet" with what appears to be a lot of ice from observation from the
Hubble space telescope, now that the optics have been upgraded by a previous space shuttle mission. 
The New Horizons probe when it encounters Pluto will hopefully unlock some of those mysteries.
That probe is using an RTG as a power source, because Pluto is too far from the sun for solar cells to work at all. 

So there appears to be water present (in some form) in space that can collect into a ball under the influence of gravitation pull from somewhere.
Some of the moons of the outer planets (Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune, Uranus) are known to have somewhat "liquid" surfaces or iced surfaces. 
Carbon dioxide (aka "dry ice") can be made as well at extremely cold temperatures. 

The earth is three fifths water...where did the on the earths' crust water come from? Certainly not from the inner core which is molten, as
observed from the lava streams of some volcanoes like the one erupting lava in Hawaii.

The biggest mystery to me is how our earth (third planet from our sun), was chosen to be THE planet with lots of water with an atmosphere with oxygen to be able to support life. It had to come from somewhere....or ..maybe... it was created to be that way. 

Water allows forms of life to start combined with the energy from the sun.


----------



## Beaver101

carverman said:


> LOL! Comets are made of space debris, dust and ice...the ice forms on the comets as they gather water molecules or even heavy water molecules that seems to be present in the OORT cloud in outer space or perhaps in that "void" beyond Pluto... somewhere in the KUIPER belt, where most of the short period comets come from.
> ...
> 
> The biggest mystery to me is how our earth (third planet from our sun), was chosen to be THE planet with lots of water with an atmosphere with oxygen to be able to support life. It had to come from somewhere....or ..maybe... it was created to be that way.
> 
> Water allows forms of life to start combined with the energy from the sun.


 ... maybe all that water came from a BIG comet that hit earth (and in the process wiped out the dinos)? My hypothesis is humans were brought to this planet (as an experiment?) and somehow survived under ideal conditions already present (water and O2).


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ... maybe all that water came from a BIG comet that hit earth (and in the process wiped out the dinos)? My hypothesis is humans were brought to this planet (as an experiment?) and somehow survived under ideal conditions already present (water and O2).


Natural Evolution-(Darwin's theory, or creationist theory? It is possible, as if man evolved from the apes as some theories propose, why are the great apes that share our DNA still not developed in the same way we are? 

Where did all this oil underground come from too?...surely not from just the dinosaurs? The undersea oil fields especially, unless this is all from marine plankton and mammals millions of years ago that roamed those areas of the oceans. 

Whether it was a huge asteroid or comet or a smaller versions, earth has had it fair share of meteors and asteroids hitting it over the last few billion years. 

The comet shoemaker-levy came too close to Jupiter's enormous gravitational field orbiting it , was torn apart and pieces of it crashed into Jupiter. The force of the explosions on the surface of the planet observed by astronomers..


> 21 distinct impacts were observed, with the largest coming on July 18 at 07:33 UTC when fragment G struck Jupiter. This impact created a giant dark spot over *12,000 km across, and was estimated to have released an energy equivalent to 6,000,000 megatons of TNT (600 times the world's nuclear arsenal)*. Two impacts 12 hours apart on July 19 created impact marks of similar size to that caused by fragment G, and impacts continued until July 22, when fragment W struck the planet.


That would certainly wipe out most of earth's living creatures.but I doubt it would create the oceans such as we have on earth. 

Comets crashing into it billions of years ago may have contributed some water but not in the quantities of water present now..
http://www.amnh.org/learn/ocean/Resource1


----------



## LBCfan

carverman said:


> The biggest mystery to me is how our earth (third planet from our sun), was chosen to be THE planet with lots of water with an atmosphere with oxygen to be able to support life. It had to come from somewhere....or ..maybe... it was created to be that way.


Surely you're not suggesting that some "sky guy" did it?


----------



## indexxx

carverman said:


> Natural Evolution-(Darwin's theory, or creationist theory? It is possible, as if man evolved from the apes as some theories propose, why are the great apes that share our DNA still not developed in the same way we are?
> 
> Where did all this oil underground come from too?...surely not from just the dinosaurs? The undersea oil fields especially, unless this is all from marine plankton and mammals millions of years ago that roamed those areas of the oceans.
> 
> Whether it was a huge asteroid or comet or a smaller versions, earth has had it fair share of meteors and asteroids hitting it over the last few billion years.
> 
> The comet shoemaker-levy came too close to Jupiter's enormous gravitational field orbiting it , was torn apart and pieces of it crashed into Jupiter. The force of the explosions on the surface of the planet observed by astronomers..
> 
> 
> That would certainly wipe out most of earth's living creatures.but I doubt it would create the oceans such as we have on earth.
> 
> Comets crashing into it billions of years ago may have contributed some water but not in the quantities of water present now..
> http://www.amnh.org/learn/ocean/Resource1


We did NOT 'evolve from the apes'. That is a much misunderstood interpretation of evolution. Humans and other current primates evolved from a common ancestor- we split into different species.

The oceans as they are now were not oceans in the past- and the land we are on was not always land. The seas and land have shifted numerous times since the planet formed- the fossil records and geology tell us this which is why you can find ancient seashells on inland cliffs for example. So the undersea oil that is referred to was probably once a jungle.

Interesting Wiki article on water-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_water_on_Earth

One of the best sources of scientific info- fascinating, entertaining, and highly educational for the lay person is in Carl Sagan's work- books like Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors, and The Demon-Haunted World.


----------



## Nemo2

indexxx said:


> why you can find ancient seashells on inland cliffs for example.


I've found fossilized fish, etc, on top of escarpments outside Riyadh.....high up and hundreds of miles from any (current) sea.


----------



## carverman

indexxx said:


> We did NOT 'evolve from the apes'. That is a much misunderstood interpretation of evolution. Humans and other current primates evolved from a common ancestor- we split into different species.
> 
> Yes, a couple hundred thousand years ago... **** erectus, neanderthals, cro-magnon man...evolution theories based on skulls discovered in caves.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> genus **** have migrated out of Africa at least three times (e.g. **** erectus, **** heidelbergensis and **** sapiens).
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The oceans as they are now were not oceans in the past- and the land we are on was not always land. The seas and land have shifted numerous times since the planet formed- the fossil records and geology tell us this which is why you can find ancient seashells on inland cliffs for example. So the undersea oil that is referred to was probably once a jungle.
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> Plate tectonics and continental drift ..bit that was before the evolution of the beginnings of the genus ****.
> 
> 
> 
> Interesting Wiki article on water-
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> I read that but I still believe these are still just theories... because some of all the other 7 planets in our solar system (not including Pluto)
> have found to have traces of water or even a lot of water on the surface of the planet or on some of it's moons, so water
> H20 or some molecular version of it does exist on most of the planets, comets and probably on other planets on other solar systems beyond our own solar system.
> Mercury: being the hottest planet and closest to the sun..still has frozen ice water at it's poles which are in shadow
> 
> Venus: detected traces of water in its very hot atmosphere
> Mars:
> 
> 
> 
> While scientists have concluded that Mars, like Earth, was once a watery planet, there is little evidence to support the existence of liquid water today. It is now a frozen, dry planet.
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> Jupiter: 92 moons...some have frozen ice surfaces
> 
> 
> 
> Saturn: The water ocean on Enceladus is about 6 miles (10 kilometers) deep and lies beneath a shell of ice 19 to 25 miles (30 to 40 km) thick, researchers said. Further, it's in direct contact with a rocky seafloor, theoretically making possible all kinds of complex chemical reactions — such as, perhaps, the kind that led to the rise of life on Earth.
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> Neptune/Uranus:
> 
> 
> 
> Smaller and cooler than the gas giants, Neptune and Uranus are classified as ice giants. It's a good name, since *they do have large quantities of water ice *mixed in with a largely hydrogen and helium atmosphere.
> 
> Click to expand...
Click to expand...


----------



## carverman

Nemo2 said:


> I've found fossilized fish, etc, on top of escarpments outside Riyadh.....high up and hundreds of miles from any (current) sea.


Maybe they existed before and plate tectonics moved the continents around? 
Another mystery to add to the growing list of mysteries...might take us another few hundred years to explain that.


----------



## Beaver101

No news on the Rosetta at the moment but on another comet:
http://globalnews.ca/news/1746504/comet-lovejoy-now-visible-from-canada-and-its-easy-to-find/



> *Comet Lovejoy now visible from Canada and it’s easy to find*
> 
> 
> TORONTO – It’s winter and it’s getting colder, but there are still good reasons to bundle up and enjoy the night sky. One reason is to catch a comet that is finally visible in Canada. ....
> 
> Comet Lovejoy (officially named C/2014 Q2) was discovered by amateur astronomer Terry Lovejoy on August 17, 2014 from Australia using just an eight-inch telescope (in comparison, Canada’s largest telescope, located at the David Dunlap Observatory in Richmond Hill, Ontario, is 74 inches). It’s a great illustration of how small telescopes can aid in the discovery of celestial objects. ...
> 
> If you’re in very dark skies, you might even be able to see it with the naked eye, as the comet has brightened over the past few days. However, as the full moon approaches on January 4, it will make seeing it harder.
> 
> It’s unknown how much brighter Comet Lovejoy may get. But it should remain visible with binoculars until about April.
> 
> *And this is your only chance to catch the comet: it isn’t expected to return to the inner solar system for another 8,000 years*.


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> No news on the Rosetta at the moment but on another comet:





> And this is your only chance to catch the comet: it isn’t expected to return to the inner solar system for another 8,000 years.


Not available in Canada for another 8000 years...PITY! :biggrin:

I'm more concerned with what is happening here on earth..lots of craziness going on these days.

Got a new book to read over Christmas..Stephen Hawking: Brief History of Time and as an added bonus "The Universe in a Nutshell".

that's about all the info I can absorb anyway...Very interesting reading..


----------



## Beaver101

carverman said:


> ...
> 
> I'm more concerned with what is happening here on earth..*lots of craziness going on these days*. ...


 ... no kidding ...:biggrin:



> Got a new book to read over Christmas..Stephen Hawking: Brief History of Time and as an added bonus "The Universe in a Nutshell".
> 
> *that's about all the info I can absorb anyway*...*Very interesting reading*


 ... maybe you read too fast ... I'm still working on Dr. SH's Brief History of Time. Indeed very interesting topic .. opens more questions.


----------



## cainvest

I'll go out for a look at C/2014 Q2 in a week of so when the moon is out of the picture and the comet is higher in the sky.


----------



## Guban

carverman said:


> Got a new book to read over Christmas..Stephen Hawking: Brief History of Time and as an added bonus "The Universe in a Nutshell".
> 
> that's about all the info I can absorb anyway...Very interesting reading..


A Brief History of Time is full of very difficult physics ideas. Hard to understand why it became a best seller. I bet it sits, unread, on a lot of coffee tables or gathering dust on bookshelves.


----------



## Toronto.gal

Guban said:


> *A Brief History of Time is full of very difficult physics ideas.* Hard to understand why it became a best seller. *I bet it sits, unread, on a lot of coffee tables* or gathering dust on bookshelves.


How did you guess?  

*'It was on the New York Times best-seller list for 147 weeks and on the London Times best-seller list for a record-breaking 237 weeks, has been translated into 40 languages, and has sold over 10 million copies world-wide....It also has been suggested that many people bought the book to display on their bookcase or coffee table, without having actually read it.'* 
http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424127887324577304579054903119099932

However, I know Beav & carverman like mathematical calculations. :saturn:


----------



## carverman

Toronto.gal said:


> However, I know Beav & carverman like mathematical calculations. :saturn:


Ya, I'm a sucker for those math calculations. :biggrin:
Actually, it doesn't have any math formulas. It does have a lot of diagrams and pictures to support what
he is describing in his theories though.


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ... no kidding ...:biggrin:
> 
> ... maybe you read too fast ... I'm still working on Dr. SH's Brief History of Time. Indeed very interesting topic .. opens more questions.


 Well maybe we can discuss some of those questions later, when I finished his book. 
It's a long winter after all, and I have lots of time to absorb every page..and maybe read some pages twice. 

Will get back with "Carverman's Brief Synopsis on the History of Time.

I can take questions, but I may have to charge you for the answers as Theoretical Physics requires a lot of research.:biggrin:


----------



## Guban

carverman said:


> Ya, I'm a sucker for those math calculations. :biggrin:
> Actually, it doesn't have any math formulas. It does have a lot of diagrams and pictures to support what
> he is describing in his theories though.


Ok. I am one of those with a copy of the book (in my defence, I picked it up for free!) but I seem to recall a lot of math. So, after blowing off the dust, I can confirm that Carverman is correct. Lots of words and some diagrams. I remember trying to read it many years ago, but not really finishing it. Maybe I'll have another go at it one of these years. Best of luck to anyone who actually tries, and a hearty congratulations to all that succeed.


----------



## Beaver101

> *cainvest: * I'll go out for a look at C/2014 Q2 in a week of so when the *moon is out of the picture and the comet is higher in the sky.*


 ... huh? the comet is always higher up in the sky. Lovejoy is supposedly to be visible with the naked eye but due to cold weather snap in TO, I'll view it from my laptop in the meantime as some of the pics taken are really spectacular already. Cheers,


----------



## Beaver101

carverman said:


> ...
> 
> Will get back with "*Carverman's Brief Synopsis on the History of Time*.
> 
> I can take questions,* but I may have to charge you for the answers* as Theoretical Physics requires a lot of research.:biggrin:


 ... oh, oh, we're in trouble. :biggrin:


----------



## Beaver101

Guban said:


> Ok. I am one of those with a copy of the book (in my defence, I picked it up for free!) but I seem to recall a lot of math. So, after blowing off the dust, I can confirm that Carverman is correct. Lots of words and some diagrams. I remember trying to read it many years ago, but not really finishing it. Maybe I'll have another go at it one of these years. * Best of luck to anyone who actually tries*, and a hearty congratulations to all that succeed.


 ... I got mine's for free too - from the library ... I think I'll need a year or 2 to complete reading it (provided I don't cheat!) so thanks for the luck, I'll need it. Very complicated stuff but very interesting though.


----------



## cainvest

Beaver101 said:


> ... huh? the comet is always higher up in the sky. Lovejoy is supposedly to be visible with the naked eye but due to cold weather snap in TO, I'll view it from my laptop in the meantime as some of the pics taken are really spectacular already. Cheers,


It'll be ~20 degress higher in the sky next week than it is this week, by the 19th it'll be pretty close to the Pleiades, about 8 degrees away.


----------



## Beaver101

carverman said:


> Back to more serious discussion on this space project.
> 
> ...
> 
> The Kuiper disk/belt is far beyond the orbit of planet Neptune..what is beyond that?
> Why does Pluto which is no longer regarded as the 9th planet by the astronomers since 2006 have an ellpitical
> orbit, around the sun compared to the other 8 planets revolving around our sun.
> 
> What is beyond deep interstellar space? Beyond intergalatic space? Is space still expanding?
> 
> *Soon we will hear some news of another interplanetary space probe to Pluto..."New Horizons" in January 2015.
> 
> It will be 8 years since it's launch in 2006. Not too many knew about the launch 8 years ago*. With that length of time to get there from earth, I wouldn't expect too many volunteers as in possible manned missions to Mars someday.
> http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/news_center/news/20141113.php


 ... quick news update on New Horizons:
_*
NASA spacecraft nears Pluto after nine-year journey
On Sunday, NASA's New Horizons spacecraft begins photographing the mysterious, unexplored, icy world once deemed a planet.*
_http://www.thestar.com/news/world/2015/01/23/nasa-spacecraft-nears-pluto-after-nine-year-journey.html


*Or directly from NASA: *

http://www.nasa.gov/press/2015/january/nasa-s-new-horizons-spacecraft-begins-first-stages-of-pluto-encounter/



> *January 15, 2015
> 
> RELEASE 15-011
> NASA’s New Horizons Spacecraft Begins First Stages of Pluto Encounter *
> NASA's New Horizons spacecraft recently began its long-awaited, historic encounter with Pluto. The spacecraft is entering the first of several approach phases that culminate July 14 with the first close-up flyby of the dwarf planet, 4.67 billion miles (7.5 billion kilometers) from Earth.
> 
> “NASA first mission to distant Pluto will also be humankind’s first close up view of this cold, unexplored world in our solar system,” said Jim Green, director of NASA’s Planetary Science Division at the agency’s Headquarters in Washington. “The New Horizons team worked very hard to prepare for this first phase, and they did it flawlessly.” ...


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## carverman

It took 9 years to get there at our current space probe speeds of 50,000 mph. Until it's closest approach in July, it's still a fuzzy plutoid, which is probably closer to an huge asteroid caught in some strange elliptical orbit around the sun.



> A plutoid or ice dwarf is a trans-Neptunian dwarf planet: that is a body orbiting beyond Neptune that is large enough to be rounded in shape.





> On average, Pluto is more than 3.6 billion miles (5.8 billion kilometers) away from the sun. That is about 40 times as far from the sun as Earth. Pluto orbits the sun in an oval like a racetrack. Because of its oval orbit, Pluto is sometimes closer to the sun than at other times. At its closest point to the sun Pluto is still billions of miles away


Funny that our astronomical terminolgy changes over the years. When I went to school, it was still considered the "ninth" planet back then. 


> Pluto is only 1,400 miles (2,300 kilometers) wide. That's about half the width of the United States. Pluto is slightly smaller than Earth's moon. *It takes Pluto 248 years to go around the sun. One day on Pluto is about 6 1/2 days on Earth. *


Now taking a hyper space link to my other thread.."A brief history of time"....Our years on this earth are based on the earth's day and orbit around the sun. 

Let's take a hypothetical supposition here..if a baby managed to get to Pluto and survive in that hostile environment to grow to the size of a one year on earth,.(assuming some kind of normal lifespan here)...that person would be 248 years old on Pluto.

If the same person could survive for a normal earth lifespan of 80 years, (assuming it would be possible), that person would be 19,840 years old in earth years.


----------



## Beaver101

^


> *carverman:* ... If the same person could survive for a normal earth lifespan of 80 years, (assuming it would be possible), that person would be 19,840 years old in earth years.


 ... hey, wouldn't that be the planet for youth? :biggrin:


----------



## Beaver101

A reminder: * Asteroid 2004 BL86 to 'narrowly' miss Earth Monday*

http://news.nationalpost.com/2015/01/26/asteroid-to-narrowly-miss-earth-as-the-550-metre-wide-rock-hurtles-through-space-at-56000-kph/

I'm checking it out at lunch. ... it's a BIG rock.


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> A reminder: * Asteroid 2004 BL86 to 'narrowly' miss Earth Monday*
> 
> http://news.nationalpost.com/2015/01/26/asteroid-to-narrowly-miss-earth-as-the-550-metre-wide-rock-hurtles-through-space-at-56000-kph/
> 
> I'm checking it out at lunch. ... it's a BIG rock.


Let's hope it's a case of "we've dodged another bullet"...but there are enough of them flying by that someday, somewhere....


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ ... hey, wouldn't that be the planet for youth? :biggrin:


It is relative, since time is relative to some fixed point. 

To live longer or be "immortal' I think we would need a drastic redesign of our DNA that is introspectively linked our evolution on this earth. 

Right now, if we manage to travel to anywhere in the outer planets safely, our DNA no matter where we are, still based on the breakdown cycle as if we were still on the earth. Nothing can change that, no matter how fast we can travel in the future into space or where we go.

Example:
If a baby is born on a space ship the size of small city sized "Battlestar Galactica"..and the baby's DNA still has the fundamental building blocks of its biological parents (even if it's a test tube cultured human baby), it's life span is still dictated by it's DNA within it's cells, and when that DNA starts to break down at a certain point in it's
lifespan, (even if that lifespan is not measured in earth time-years), the breakdown will prevent NORMAL cell reproduction within the body, as well as the onslaught of diseases such as cancer growth where the cells mutate. 
Lack of gravity will speed up that process as well. 

That is our biological "time clock", once it expires....we expire as well.


----------



## carverman

Astroroid 2004 BL86 is running late according to NASA. 
Latest prediction today is: 


> Early reports had it passing by in the late morning, but NASA updated things on Monday morning to say it would appear between 9 and 11 p.m. EST.


Still time to count yer "gold".:biggrin:


----------



## Beaver101

^ Good, time to catch my breath and get a drink first - latté.


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ Good, time to catch my breath and get a drink first - latté.


Everyone can relax now (until the next one comes along) ..
Asteroid 2004 BL86 has come and gone...it's current mission.. "to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no asteroid has gone before"..rather than " I am death, destroyer of worlds". 

someone once said, "we have nothing to fear but fear itself"

ok..as of this morning..it's business as usual...squabbling, fighting, cheating, stealing, lying, deceit, etc, etc, all the human traits that we have grown accustomed to.....:biggrin:


----------



## Beaver101

carverman said:


> ...
> 
> ok..as of this morning..it's business as usual...squabbling, fighting, cheating, stealing, lying, deceit, etc, etc, all the human traits that we have grown accustomed to.....:biggrin:


 .. particularly amateur astronomers on CMF. :biggrin:


For those who missed action of the fly-by last night, here's a clip right from NASA:

http://www.nasa.gov/jpl/asteroid-that-flew-past-earth-today-has-moon/index.html ... a surprise .. this asteroid has a mini-moon?


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> .. particularly amateur astronomers on CMF. :biggrin:
> 
> 
> For those who missed action of the fly-by last night, here's a clip right from NASA:
> 
> . a surprise .. this asteroid has a mini-moon?


Or maybe a part of it that got dislodged in a collision with another asteroid, other wise the gravitational impact of a collision
impact with a planet would have eliminated it a long time ago. Since it has an orbital period of 1.84 years..it will come around
again in Jan 27/2016 +.84 years (306.days) ...or around the end of October/early November 2017. 2016 is a leap year,so
that throws the next flyby date off a bit. 



> The trajectory of asteroid 2004 BL86 is well understood. Monday's flyby was the closest approach the asteroid will make to Earth for at least the next two centuries. It is also the closest a known asteroid this size will come to Earth until asteroid 1999 AN10 flies past our planet in 2027.





> On Feb. 15, 2013, an asteroid slammed into the atmosphere over the Russian city of Chelyabinsk, creating a shock wave that injured 1,200 people. The space rock is thought to have measured about* 65 feet (20 meters) wide* when it entered Earth's atmosphere.





> *In 2016, NASA will launch a robotic probe to one of the most potentially hazardous of the known NEOs.* The OSIRIS-REx mission to *asteroid (101955) Bennu will be a pathfinder for future spacecraft designed to perform reconnaissance on any newly discovered threatening objects*. Aside from monitoring potential threats, the study of asteroids and comets enables a valuable opportunity to learn more about the origins of our solar system, the source of water on Earth, and even the origin of organic molecules that led to the development of life.


NEO (Near Earth Orbit) 
Now the reality.



> With a girth of about 1,600 feet (0.5 km) Bennu’s a larger than average Earth-approaching asteroid. *It orbits around the sun every 436 days (1.2 years) and passes close to the Earth every six years.*
> 
> Why should you care about this hunk of rock? During those close approaches, *Bennu comes within 278,867 miles (448,794 km) of our blue orb. Calculation of its future orbits indicate that Bennu has one of the highest impact probabilities in the next few centuries of any known asteroid*.


- See more at: http://astrobob.areavoices.com/2013...t-asteroid-101955-bennu/#sthash.6RDY0Jgp.dpuf



> Scientists point out that if an asteroid is found to be on a collision course with Earth 30 or 40 years down the road, there is time to react. Though the technology would have to be developed, possibilities include exploding the object or diverting it


Life imitating the movies? ie: Deep Impact.


----------



## Toronto.gal

carverman said:


> 1. *Everyone can relax now* (until the next one comes along)....
> 2. ok..as of this morning..it's *business as usual*...squabbling, fighting, cheating, stealing, lying, deceit, etc, etc, all the human traits that we have grown accustomed to.....:biggrin:


*1.* Thank you! I actually try to be pretty relaxed most times, especially as I read that most PHAs [*p*otentially *h*azardous *a*steroids of a certain size] won't be whizzing by for another 100 years or so. :encouragement:

There is so much going on right here on Earth, that low frequency events from PHAs don't really keep me up at night, so not really waiting for another Chicxulub asteroid or Tunguska event. Fascinating to learn/read all about our neighbouring planets, however!

*2.* Isn't that exactly what you awoke to the morning of Dec.22nd/2012? :biggrin: 

*Beav:* It was business as usual for me, hence I missed it, so thanks for the clip!


----------



## carverman

Another minor "protoplanet/asteroid CERES, (950km in diameter); discovered in the asteroid belt MANY YEARS AGO, 
will be visited by NASA's DAWN spacecraft; which has also visited asteroid VESTA (about 500km in diameter).

The unique thing about this deep space probe is the first use of ION PROPULSION, which may be the next 
big leap in outer space exploration probes. 


> The Dawn spacecraft is propelled by three xenon ion thrusters that inherited NSTAR engineering technology from the Deep Space 1 spacecraft.
> They have a specific impulse of 3,100 s and produce a thrust of 90 mN. The whole spacecraft, including the ion propulsion thrusters, is powered by a 10 kW (at 1 au) triple-junction gallium arsenide photovoltaic solar array manufactured by Dutch Space.





> To get to Vesta, Dawn was allocated 275 kg (606 lb) of xenon*, with another 110 kg (243 lb) to reach Ceres,] out of a total capacity of 425 kg (937 pounds) of on-board propellant. With the propellant it carries, Dawn can perform a velocity change of more than 10 km/s over the course of its mission, far more than any previous spacecraft achieved with onboard propellant after separation from its launch rocket*.
> 
> *Dawn is NASA's first purely exploratory mission to use ion propulsion engines.*]
> The spacecraft also has 12 0.9N hydrazine thrusters for attitude control, which can assist in orbital insertion.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dawn_(spacecraft)

http://o.canada.com/technology/ceres-or-bust-nasas-dawn-spacecraft-departs-vesta



> Ceres, the largest body between Mars and Jupiter in the main asteroid belt, has a diameter of about 590 miles (950 kilometers). Some scientists believe the dwarf planet harbored a subsurface ocean in the past and liquid water may still be lurking under its icy mantle.


http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=4461
Years, ago, the only onboard fuel for attitude adjustment of spacecraft and satellites was hydrazine fuel....now we may be on the verge of finding new propulsion methods for future spacecraft.


----------



## Beaver101

carverman said:


> Another minor "protoplanet/asteroid CERES, (950km in diameter); discovered in the asteroid belt MANY YEARS AGO,
> will be visited by NASA's DAWN spacecraft; which has also visited asteroid VESTA (about 500km in diameter).
> 
> ...


 ... where do you find all these asteroid, protoplanets, and plutoids, etc.? Do you have some little black book list of hazardous rocks? :biggrin: 

But seriously, all very interesting ... learning something new everyday ... new propulsion, hydrazine fuel ... I can't keep up!


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ... where do you find all these asteroid, protoplanets, and plutoids, etc.? Do you have some little black book list of hazardous rocks? :biggrin:
> 
> But seriously, all very interesting ... learning something new everyday ... new propulsion, hydrazine fuel ... I can't keep up!


Just naturally interested in our universe; Beav. it's all there on the internet.
Ion propulsion was talked about about 30 years ago..and experimented by Robert Goddard, the father of
rocketry in 1906. 


> However, the first documented instance where the possibility of electric propulsion is considered is found in Robert H. Goddard's handwritten notebook in an entry dated 6 September 1906.





> An ion thruster is a form of electric propulsion used for spacecraft propulsion that creates thrust by accelerating ions





> The Deep Space 1 spacecraft, powered by an ion thruster, changed velocity by 4.3 km/s while consuming less than 74 kilograms of xenon. The Dawn spacecraft has surpassed the record with 10 km/s.





> Various ion thrusters have been designed and they all generally fit under two categories. The thrusters are categorized as either electrostatic or electromagnetic. The main difference is how the ions are accelerated.
> 
> Electrostatic ion thrusters use the Coulomb force and are categorized as accelerating the ions in the direction of the electric field.
> Electromagnetic ion thrusters use the Lorentz force to accelerate the ions.



Someday into the future, deep space probes will need a different propulsion system..plasma engines...such as in the Star Trek Enterprise.



> As shown on the series, the streams of matter and antimatter directed into crystallized dilithium are unbalanced: there is usually much more matter in the stream than antimatter. The energy generated in the annihilation reaction heats up the excess deuterium gas, producing a plasma that is used to power the warp drives that allow starships to travel faster than light.


----------



## carverman

Looks like NASA is planning another deep space mission in the next few years..



> NASA is gearing up to send a spacecraft to Europa, a moon of Jupiter that some scientists think is more likely to host extraterrestrial life than anywhere else in the solar system.





> It won't be an easy mission — it will likely cost billions and the instruments will need a lot of testing before they can be sent on their long journey through space.





> Fortunately, scientists will have access to a great testing ground — a unique yellow glacier on Ellesmere Island in Nunavut that is more like Europa than any other known place on Earth.


Good to know that you don't have to spend billions looking for extraterrestrials...
you can find them here on earth,....if you know where to look.


----------



## Beaver101

> Fortunately, scientists will have access to a great testing ground — a unique yellow glacier on Ellesmere Island in Nunavut that is more like Europa than any other known place on Earth.





> *carverman:* Good to know that you don't have to spend billions looking for extraterrestrials...
> you can find them here on earth,....if you know where to look.


 ...and so we're the extraterrestrials on this planet?

Here's the link for anyone interested in the Search for Other Life Outside Earth:

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/blogs/geekquinox/jupiter-moon-next-target-for-search-for-life-220419909.html


----------



## Toronto.gal

Beaver101 said:


> and so *we're the extraterrestrials* on this planet?


I'm not an ET, but can't be sure about you.  

There are still places [land/oceans] so remote and not yet accessible/discovered by men, that who knows, some ETs may have landed already in one of these; in fact, I read some arrived last year. 

Didn't I say there is plenty on Earth to keep everyone busy?


----------



## Beaver101

^ so busy, so :emmersed: :highly_amused:


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ...and so we're the extraterrestrials on this planet?


Yes, and they are living amongst us. Just watch the "Unsealed Alien Files", lots of witnesses on UFO sightings and
conspiracy theories and gov't coverups. 

The alien life forms in the Jupiter moon case (EUROPA) may be tiny little yellow evolved creatures living in the presumed watery cover, below a crust of ice. 
Now isn't this an interesting case? Water/ice discovered on a moon with just the current optical probes we have. So water can exist on other planets besides earth. 
Jupiter has 63 moons. Ganymede is the largest, then Io, Europa, and Callisto are the largest of them.
The rest are smaller and may even be just asteroids captured into Jupiter's gravity. 
Who knows what discoveries lie ahead.



> What makes Europa exceptional is that it has had a global ocean probably for the last 4 billion years," Vance said. "And that ocean could be under just a few kilometers of ice."





> Europa's ocean could be as much as two to three times larger than all of Earth's oceans combined and reach up to 62 miles deep — 10 times deeper than the deepest oceanic regions on Earth. A real water world!


Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/types-of-alien-life-on-europa-2015-2#ixzz3R4Asic9Q


----------



## Beaver101

carverman said:


> Yes, and they are living amongst us. Just watch the "Unsealed Alien Files", lots of witnesses on UFO sightings and
> conspiracy theories and gov't coverups.


 ... and they have a forum on there too. :biggrin: The amount of info on these sites is mind-blogging. 



> The alien life forms in the Jupiter moon case (EUROPA) may be tiny little yellow evolved creatures living in the presumed watery cover, below a crust of ice.
> *Now isn't this an interesting case? Water/ice discovered on a moon with just the current optical probes we have. So water can exist on other planets besides earth.
> *Jupiter has 63 moons. Ganymede is the largest, then Io, Europa, and Callisto are the largest of them.
> The rest are smaller and may even be just asteroids captured into Jupiter's gravity.
> Who knows what discoveries lie ahead.


 ... very interesting but just amazing as to what our probes and telescope can detect. Especially, this part read from the link below,



> ... In 2013, the *Hubble Space Telescope saw water vapor above the moon's south pole*, which scientists suspect came from an erupting plume beneath the icy crust. ...


Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/types-of-alien-life-on-europa-2015-2#ixzz3R4Asic9Q 

... thanks! And who would thunk a "business" website would be interested in space stuff?


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> Referenced quote:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> In 2013, the Hubble Space Telescope saw water vapor above the moon's south pole, which scientists suspect came from an erupting plume beneath the icy crust. ...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Hydrogen is more plentiful than any other element, making up about 3/4 the mass of the universe. . Helium is second, making up almost all of the remaining 25%. Oxygen is a distant third. On earth, oxygen is the most common element, making up about 47% of the earth's mass.
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> So there is no reason, for H20 (or what we call water) can't be somewhere else in our planetary system or on other galaxies within the universe.
> 
> Water vapour or ice as we know it; is just the two most common elements in the Universe combining together under tremendous energy to form water.. H20.
> 
> Two atoms of Hydrogen and one atoms of Oxygen combine to form a "liquid state" (here on our earth) at temperatures above freezing , and vapour at temperatures above boiling (100C) at X atmospheres at sea level.
> Sounds simple enough..but why can't we create water ourselves then?.*.it's the energy required to conjoin the atoms of both elements..Hydrogen and Oxygen.*
> 
> We all should be familiar with the tremendous energy released from the splitting of the Uranium 235 atom...the atomic bomb.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> To create water, oxygen and hydrogen atoms must be present. Mixing them together doesn't help; you're still left with just separate hydrogen and oxygen atoms. *The orbits of each atom's electrons must become linked, and to do that we must have a sudden burst of energy to get these shy things to hook up*.
> Since hydrogen is extremely flammable and oxygen supports combustion, it wouldn't take much to create this force. Pretty much all we need is a spark -- not even a flame -- and boom! We've got water. The hydrogen and oxygen atoms' electrons' orbits have been conjoined.
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> In the Stephen Hawkings' book (Brief History of Time), Chapter 5: Elementary Particles and forces of Nature, he explains the reasons for this in elementary physics..and the fact that matter cannot be created, nor destroyed...it just changes state.
Click to expand...


----------



## Beaver101

^ All the Hs and Os above make scientific sense ...and so we have a treat today for talking so much about space,

*‘Smiley face’ spotted in space

Hubble telescope captures celestial emoji*

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/smiley-face-space-galaxy-hubble-nasa-image-184729006.html



> *It looks like the galaxy is smiling down on us.*
> 
> An image taken with NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope of galaxy cluster SDSS J1038+4849 appears to show a “happy face,” replete with two orange eyes, a white button nose and a smiling expression ...


 ... even it's an illusion, it's a pleasant one. :cheerful:

PS: You have to click on the link to see the  for yourself.


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ All the Hs and Os above make scientific sense ...and so we have a treat today for talking so much about space,
> 
> *‘Smiley face’ spotted in space
> 
> Hubble telescope captures celestial emoji*
> 
> ... even it's an illusion, it's a pleasant one. :cheerful:
> 
> PS: You have to click on the link to see the  for yourself.


Maybe it's the face of God smiling? :biggrin: Somehow I doubt that. it's amazing how we get conditioned to "seeing things"
because of social media. Before computers and the internet..keystroke emoticons did not exist...and maybe GOD too..but we won't go there.  ;-( :-> :-O ;-)


----------



## Beaver101

Update to "Is it there yet, is it?": 

*NASA shows colorful glimpse of Pluto ahead of July rendevous.*

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/technology/science/nasa-shows-colourful-glimpse-of-pluto-ahead-of-july-rendezvous/article23968666/



> Almost there.
> 
> As NASA’s New Horizons mission approaches a historic rendezvous with Pluto on July 14, the U.S. space agency has released its first colour image of the frozen world and its largest moon, Charon.
> 
> The image is little more than an orange-tinged splotch with a smaller and dimmer splotch beside it, yet it represents a watershed moment for the spacecraft. New Horizons has been en route to Pluto since January, 2006, and is now just three months away from its destination, which lies some 7.5 billion kilometres from Earth.
> 
> “Pluto seems to be very bright. It seems to be redder,” said James Green, director of NASA’s Planetary Division at a news briefing Tuesday in Washington, D.C. “These are already tantalizing glimpses of this system.”
> 
> At this stage, New Horizons is able to see Pluto at higher resolution than the Hubble Space Telescope, though its images will need significant processing and analysis to be more revealing.
> 
> *When the spacecraft whizzes by Pluto in three months, it is expected that it will reveal the distant world’s frozen surface in stunning detail.*
> 
> Pluto may be small but for planetary scientist it’s become something of a Mount Everest. It’s the last unexplored planet (now called a dwarf planet) in the solar system whose existence was known before the invention of spaceflight. It is also the most distant, and therefore the “highest” pinnacle to explore in the sense that getting there means climbing up and out of the sun’s gravity well.
> 
> “It’s the farther shore of exploration ever reached by humankind,” said Alan Stern, the mission’s principal investigator.
> 
> 
> ....


----------



## carverman

And even with the space probe sending out pictures of closeups of dwarf planet Pluto and it's equally dwarf moon..Charon...there is still more of the unexplored that awaits us.



> There may possibly be at least two planets belonging to our solar system that are hidden beyond Pluto.
> 
> The analysis is based on calculations of the orbits of cosmic bodies found in the regions well beyond Neptune, which include the Kuiper Belt, the Oort cloud and the scattered disk.
> 
> These bodies, also known as *extreme trans-Neptunian objects* (ETNOs), may include *two planets that are bigger than the Earth*, and are only waiting to be discovered.
> The existence of these planets could likewise help explain the orbital behavior of ETNOs.





> A number of astronomers, most notably Alan Stern, the head of NASA's New Horizons mission to Pluto, contend that the IAU's definition is flawed, and that Pluto and Eris, and all large trans-Neptunian objects, such as Makemake, Sedna, Quaoar, Varuna and Haumea, should be considered planets in their own right.[49] However the discovery of Eris did not rehabilitate the Planet X theory as it is far too small to have significant effects on the outer planets' orbits.[





> Additionally, speculation of a possible trans-Neptunian planet has revolved around the so-called "Kuiper cliff". The Kuiper belt terminates suddenly at a distance of 48 AU from the Sun. Some have speculated that this sudden drop-off may be attributed to the presence of an object with a mass between that of Mars and Earth located beyond 48 AU.[61] The presence of a Mars-like planet in a circular orbit at 60 AU leads to a trans-Neptunian object population incompatible with observations. For instance, it would severely deplete the plutino population.[62] Astronomers have not excluded the possibility of a more massive Earth-like planet located further than 100 AU with an eccentric and inclined orbit


.

trans-vesitite planets falling off the kuiper cliff..who would have thunk! ..ETNOS....maybe there is life out there after all?:listening_headphone

Third rock from the sun... "the one with the transmitter in his head," Harry (French Stewart) 




> Harry Solomon; Communication was usually initiated without warning, *either from the Big Giant Head himself, or his office*. Upon contact, Harry is "taken over" entirely. The first signs are always physical - he immediately shudders violently, garbles incoherently, then adopts a stance with bent knees and upraised arms, palms forward. The message itself is always preceded with "Incoming message from the Big Giant Head!" or "Transmission incoming from the Big Giant Head!", followed by the message, spoken in a voice unlike his usual one.





> When the message is completed, the exit statement is always "Resume normal functions in three ... two ... one ...", or later "transmission ending in three ... two ... one ...", after which he shudders, performs a dance-like movement, belches, or sneezes. Returning to normal he usually inquires "So what did I miss?...", indicating that he doesn't know what he had said.



Ok...quiet now..I'm listening to the "Big Head"...from Varuna...."yes boss..I now living with them!'

What do these earthlings do all day? Nothing too important, they just talks about money and their problems.

What is money? It's this plastic form of credits that stick together that their "Big Head" issues in exchange for some form of activity..mostly called work.


Could I get some of that "money" to bring back to you?:biggrin:


----------



## Beaver101

^ I'm just focusing on NASA's New Horizon getting close to Pluto to get pictures and you're already onto ETNOs, dang.


> ... These bodies, also known as extreme trans-Neptunian objects (ETNOs), may include two planets that are bigger than the Earth, and are only waiting to be discovered.





> Could I get some of that "money" to bring back to you?


 ... so the Big Head from Varuna has the same ideas as our Big Head from Earth? We're not alone after all! :biggrin:


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ I'm just focusing on NASA's New Horizon getting close to Pluto to get pictures and you're already onto ETNOs, dang.


Well life is too short to wait around for these outer planet probes, Beav. Pluto is just a big frozen asteroid, with a moon hanging off it.
What is more exciting is what else is out there beyond the Kuiper belt and the Oort cloud..and the "Trans-Newtonian-parabolic =jump to hyper space. 

We gots to find faster form of propulsion...at this rate, it will take light years to get to the next distant planet..and there has to be more out there.



> ... so the Big Head from Varuna has the same ideas as our Big Head from Earth? We're not alone after all! :biggrin:


http://www.thelivingmoon.com/43ancients/02files/Varuna-20000.html

Sure why not..after all we are ALL cosmic dust...or do you subscribe to the *passage in Genesis* about creation?:highly_amused:
OTOH..Varuna could also be a secret alien base...:biggrin:


----------



## Beaver101

^


> Pluto is just a big frozen asteroid, with a moon hanging off it.


 ... how can you be sure without even seeing the official pics from NASA? :distrust:



> OTOH..Varuna could also be a secret alien base...


 .. sounds like it. :biggrin:


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ ... how can you be sure without even seeing the official pics from NASA? :distrust:


Yes, we should not come to hasty conclusions.. but OTOH...there could be an abundant supply of PLUTO-NIUM (238).....if an evil empire capable of
outer space exploration ever discover that...it could be armageddon fer sure. :biggrin:



> Plutonium-238 (abbreviated as Pu-238) was selected as the heat source to power these missions by the Department of Energy (DOE), which develops and
> provides RPS to NASA for use in space exploration.
> 
> This unique material has been used to create electricity for a wide variety of spacecraft and hardware, from the science experiments deployed on the Moon by the
> Apollo astronauts to durable robotic explorers, such as the Curiosity Mars rover and the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft, which are at the edge of the solar system.
> 
> In many cases, the heat from this radioisotope has also been used to keep spacecraft electronics and other components warm enough to be able to operate
> effectively in the frigid environments often found in deep space and on planetary surfaces like Mars.


----------



## carverman

Comet probe lander Philae is ALIVE! 

With the comet now in position around the sun so that it is no longer in shadow, it's solar cells have charged up again and it is "talking" to it's creators..the ESA.

http://blogs.esa.int/rosetta/2015/06/14/rosettas-lander-philae-wakes-up-from-hibernation/


----------



## Beaver101

^ Yes, exciting news to follow for a lazy summer on earth, Ontario. 

I hope Philae gets to accomplish what it was set out to do - in particular this major goal, 


> ... Philae is designed to analyse the ice and rocky fragments that make up the comet. ...
> 
> "What we're trying to find out is whether the building blocks of life, in terms of water and carbon-bearing molecules, were actually delivered to Earth from comets." ....


from http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-33126885 with more news descript, and pictures. :satellite:


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ Yes, exciting news to follow for a lazy summer on earth, Ontario.
> 
> I hope Philae gets to accomplish what it was set out to do - in particular this major goal,



Right now..if Philae had some artificial intelligence it would be sending out an SOS...."M-A-M-A! Where are you? Why did you leave me all alone on this rock?
The appropriate music that the ESA could be playing was a song by Sting and the Police...sending out an SOS
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jClKlJ3iKuc

Philae is singing:
"Seven months have gone since my last
But that's all behind me in the past
Only one thing in this universe can keep us together
Here comes the sun.. here comes the sun,
and my solar wings are getting better.

I'll send an S.O.S. to the world 
Yea, I'll send this S.O.S. to the world
I hope that someone gets my,
Yea, I hope that someone out there gets
I hope that someone gets my message.... encrypted... in a "bottle"


----------



## Beaver101

^


> I hope that someone gets my message....* encrypted... in a "bottle"*


 ... e in a "bottle"?.... thanks for the :highly_amused: especially for a (drabby) Monday.. ROFL....


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ ... e in a "bottle"?.... thanks for the :highly_amused: especially for a (drabby) Monday.. ROFL....


Your welcome. 

If you want a up to date calculation of where Rosetta is... or will be by 2015-06-16 (Tuesday) GMT or Zulu time..go to this site and
wait until the astronomical data calculators are downloaded. *You can slide the date increment pointer to 2015-06-16 *and see how far Rosetta is
from Earth as of tomorrow..about 302,771-351km. (16.832 minutes to reach earth from ROSETTA. 
Pilae having a smaller transponder/weaker power transmitter/receiver will relay it's signals to it's mother ship Rosetta. 
http://sci.esa.int/where_is_rosetta/

If light waves and electrical transmission travel at the same speed in the vacumn of space it will take the radio transmission from Rosetta/Pilae about
*16.832 minutes to reach the observatory collecting the signal at earth*. This will be a digitally encoded transmission at a specific frequency on a very narrow directional antenna point. 
The antennas used are very large dish isotrophic hig gain antennas with coarse and fine tracking down to a 1/1000 of a degree.
Much like a laser beam..move the antenna off the ever changing azmiuth/elevation co-ordinates in degrees and you've lost the signal.


----------



## Beaver101

^ :cool2: .. will check it out tonight, thanks!


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ :cool2: .. will check it out tonight, thanks!


Worth a look. 

You will see the celestial map representing the sun, mercury, venus, earth and mars. The comet will look like a cloud and Rosetta will be this little dot
with 'wings" on it to represent its solar collection wings.
I can talk aerospace all day..and guitar music...but I'll leave it to you.:biggrin:

BTW..there is a new space telescope that NASA is sending up soon to replace the dated Hubble...the James Webb Space Telescope..which will have very powerful
optics to see farther into how galaxies and other inter Galactic phenomena are born and die.




> The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), previously known as Next Generation Space Telescope (NGST), is a space observatory under construction and *scheduled to launch in October 2018.* The JWST will offer unprecedented resolution and sensitivity from long-wavelength visible to the mid-infrared, and is a successor instrument to the Hubble Space Telescope and the Spitzer Space Telescope. The telescope features a segmented 6.5-meter (21 ft) diameter primary mirror and will be located near the Earth–Sun L2 point. A large sunshield will keep its mirror and four science instruments below 50 K (−220 °C; −370 °F).





> A new type of orbiting telescope could take images more than *1,000 times sharper than those snapped by NASA's famous Hubble Space Telescope*, the technology's developers say.



Exciting news in 2018!

http://www.jwst.nasa.gov/


----------



## carverman

Coming up in July 15...the New Horizons interplanetary exploration robotic craft's flyby of Pluto....our farthest most planet (planetoid) in our solar system that we know of ...so far.
It left the confines of earth's gravity in January 19, 2006 and now is around 20 MILLION MILES AWAY from earth.

I'm sure that NASA and John Hopkins Applied Physics Lab will be ecstatic when the first pictures arrive. 


> Pluto's distance also causes a (one-way) latency of about 4.5 hours.





> The goal of the mission is to understand the formation of the Pluto system, the Kuiper Belt, and the transformation of the early Solar System.] The spacecraft will study the atmospheres, surfaces, interiors and environments of Pluto and its moons. It will also study other objects in the Kuiper Belt.


*Noteworthy to mention on this historic encounter:*


> About an ounce of Clyde Tombaugh's ashes are aboard the spacecraft, to commemorate his discovery of Pluto in 1930.
> A Florida-state quarter coin, whose design commemorates human exploration, is included, officially as a trim weight.
> One of the science packages (a dust counter) is named after Venetia Burney, who, as a child, suggested the name "Pluto" after the planet's discovery.


Wow..Clyde Tombaugh will have managed to reach the planet he discovered 85 years ago..before the first rocket launch, before instrumentation to
make it possible to launch, before digital communications to make it even possible to send pictures back. 


Reminds me of the song by the Carpenters years ago....
"Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft" 

" In your mind you have capacities you know

"To telepath messages through the vast unknown
Please close your eyes and concentrate
With every thought you think
Upon the recitation we're about to sing

Calling occupants of interplanetary craft
Calling occupants of interplanetary, most extraordinary craft'

http://www.space.com/16533-pluto-new-horizons-spacecraft-pictures.html

Read earthlings and count yer gold..you are so insignificant when it comes to the universe..


----------



## Beaver101

carverman said:


> Worth a look. ...


... the ESA link provided is so cool ... got it bookmarked to re-view but the video drops off around Dec. 31, 2016... the demise/deactivation of Philae is that predictable? 



> BTW..there is a new space telescope that NASA is sending up soon to replace the dated Hubble...the* James Webb Space Telescope..which will have very powerful*optics to see farther into how galaxies and other inter Galactic phenomena are born and die.
> 
> *Exciting news in 2018!*


 ... indeed! 

The precisions on the make-up of the telescope really fascinates me at the moment .. in particular NASA can make the instrument(s) to withstand such a range of extreme temperatures based on current materials/elements found on earth? 



> _The telescope features a segmented 6.5-meter (21 ft) diameter primary mirror and will be located near the Earth–Sun L2 point. A large sunshield will keep its mirror and *four science instruments below 50 K (−220 °C; −370 °F). * _


----------



## Beaver101

carverman said:


> Coming up in July 15...the New Horizons interplanetary exploration robotic craft's flyby of Pluto....our farthest most planet (planetoid) in our solar system that we know of ...so far.
> It left the confines of earth's gravity in January 19, 2006 and now is around 20 MILLION MILES AWAY from earth.
> 
> I'm sure that NASA and John Hopkins Applied Physics Lab will be ecstatic when the first pictures arrive. ..


 .. thanks for the update... I'm tuning in on the site early on July 1st! 



> *Noteworthy to mention on this historic encounter:*
> 
> 
> 
> About an ounce of Clyde Tombaugh's ashes are aboard the spacecraft, to commemorate his discovery of Pluto in 1930.
Click to expand...




> Wow..Clyde Tombaugh will have managed to reach the planet he discovered 85 years ago..before the first rocket launch, before instrumentation to
> make it possible to launch, before digital communications to make it even possible to send pictures back.


... yeah, wow too ... and they kept an ounce of his ashes from 85 years ago just for this moment?!



> Reminds me of the song by the Carpenters years ago....
> "Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft" ...
> 
> Read earthlings and count yer gold..you are so insignificant when it comes to the universe..


 ... lol ... and you can recall a song for every situation? amazing too ... :rugby:



Quick question - do you think the universe is infinite?


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> .
> 
> 
> Quick question - do you think the universe is infinite?


I am a peabrain in the science of astrophysics...but I would like to play an astro-physicist on TV someday. :biggrin:

According to knowledgeable people such as Dr. Stephen Hawking, the universe is STILL EXPANDING. Astronomer Edwin Hubble (for which the Hubble space telescope is named after( worked out the distances to only* 9 different galaxies* . Our solar system is just one of (PROBABLY HUNDREDS OF THOUSAND MILLION galaxies, and their respective solar systems in the Milky Way Galaxy).
Each galaxy in turn could be containing a hundred million stars. 

Our galaxy is (Estimated) to be about 100 Million LIGHT YEARS across and is slowly rotating the stars in it's spiral arms orbit around its center about every several HUNDRED MILLION YEARS! Light travels at 186,000 miles PER SECOND..so calculating that distance in our earthly measurement of miles/kms
is a formidable task.

So in our theoretical physics explanations (ie; Planck's constant and the Uncertainty Principle), we have to employ the principles of economy to understand what little we know of the universe so far .. we can use OCCAMS RAZOR, cutting out features of theory that cannot be observed.



> The most useful statement of the principle for scientists is
> "when you have two competing theories that make exactly the same predictions, the simpler one is the better."


In physics we use the razor to shave away metaphysical concepts.

Certainly if we believe the "Big Bang Theory" as it is commonly known, that the universe started with a single singularity event, it is still expanding and will be LONG AFTER WE ARE GONE....so to answer your question...
I have to ask a question..

Do you believe that the universe is infinite?


----------



## KaeJS

I believe the universe is infinite.
I also believe that the universe always was, and always will be.

A difficult thing to wrap your mind around, but it seems to make the most sense. It's just hard for the human brain to comprehend "always" and "infinite".


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## mrPPincer

dunno if it always was, or if it's infinite in space right now, or time (forward + backwards), but my thinking is that there are probably infinite universes out there, so, yeah if we include them, there could be some infinity going on 
That said, I'm no Stephen Hawking, I shovel **** for a living, so whado I know


----------



## Beaver101

carverman said:


> ... Do you believe that the universe is infinite?


 ... no, I do not believe the universe is infinite on the simple premise that there is a beginning (eg. BIG BANG), there must be an end (BIG BOOM?) (whenever that might be ... a gazillion years or so). :biggrin:


----------



## Beaver101

mrPPincer said:


> dunno if it always was, or if it's infinite in space right now, or time (forward + backwards), but my thinking is that there are probably infinite universes out there, so, yeah if we include them, there could be some infinity going on


 ... how about flipping a coin to help you decide here? Heads = infinite, Tail =finite :biggrin:

Btw, you mentioned once you would eat road-kill (if you had to) and I keep forgetting to ask ... I don't suppose you would eat any kind of road-kill like a raccoon or worst yet, a beaver? :eek2:


----------



## Beaver101

KaeJS said:


> I believe the universe is infinite.
> I also believe that the universe always was, and always will be.
> 
> A difficult thing to wrap your mind around, but it seems to make the most sense. *It's just hard for the human brain to comprehend "always" and "infinite*".


 ... no, it's not hard to comprehend ... you're sound pretty convinced the universe is infinite here. :wink:


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ... no, I do not believe the universe is infinite on the simple premise that there is a beginning (eg. BIG BANG), there must be an end (BIG BOOM?) (whenever that might be ... a gazillion years or so). :biggrin:


Eventually, far into the distant future, it will all collapse into a perhaps a big black hole, under it's own gravity. 

Stephen Hawking does touch on that as a possible reality, but this is scientific conjecture, since we will never be around to observe that. 

Even the thought that our own sun,with its' controlled hydrogen atomic reaction using up it's own hydrogen fuel, will eventually grow to a red giant, then a supergiant, then then expand so much that certainly the close planets will be attracted to it and turn into crisps in the next 
5 Thousand Million years, before it starts collapsing into neutron star, and then into a black hole.

If you add zeroes to that 5,000,000,000..that's a long time into the future. Humanity as we know it has only been around for about 10,000 years..and humanity such as it is now will be lucky to last 1/10 of that. We are using up the earth's resources and polluting it with careless abandon, add to that overpopulation that even the normal human life cycle and wars cannot thin out us out fast enough..we will be in trouble in far less than 1,000 years....
never mind a wayward Asteroid heading for earth... too big to deflect with rockets carrying nuclear warheads.....
...but don't tell the politicians that!

Taking this thought to the scriptures as reference to this event... Old Testament King James version; Genesis (creation of the earth and "heavens" and Revelation (the last book in the old testament Bible, if you are a believer)

Revelation 21 says:

*The New Heaven and the New Earth*


> 21 *And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea.* 2 And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 3 And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away. 5 And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And he said unto me, Write: for these words are true and faithful. And he said unto me, It is done. *I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end*.


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ... *how about flipping a coin to help you decide here? Heads = infinite, Tail =finite * :biggrin:
> 
> Btw, you mentioned once you would eat road-kill (if you had to) and I keep forgetting to ask ... I don't suppose you would eat any kind of road-kill like a raccoon or worst yet, a beaver? :eek2:


What about a dead skunk lying in the middle of the road? No contest here to decide if to eat the head first or the tail first...or even persuasion to flip a coin?
You would have to be starving, blind, and no sense of smell to eat that! How many ways can you eat a road kill skunk?:biggrin:

*Reminds me of a song I once heard.*

Crossing the highway late last night
He shoulda looked left and he shoulda looked right
He didn't see the station wagon car
The skunk got squashed and there you are

You got your dead skunk in the middle of the road
Dead skunk in the middle of the road
Dead skunk in the middle of the road
Stinking to high heaven

Take a whiff on me, that ain't no rose
Roll up your window and hold your nose
You don't have to look and you don't have to see
'Cause you can feel it in your olfactory

You got your dead skunk in the middle of the road
Dead skunk in the middle of the road
Dead skunk in the middle of the road
And it's stinking to high heaven

Ah! They just don't write songs these days like they used to! :biggrin:


----------



## mrPPincer

^ love those classic old songs, you're right, they don't write them like they used to 

Speaking of classics, remember this quote?
"To live off the land... to eat things that would make a billy goat puke."

http://movie-sounds.org/action-movi...-eat-things-that-would-make-a-billy-goat-puke
(Troutman in Rambo First Blood)


----------



## mrPPincer

Beaver101 said:


> Btw, you mentioned once you would eat road-kill (if you had to) and I keep forgetting to ask ... I don't suppose you would eat any kind of road-kill like a raccoon or worst yet, a beaver? :eek2:


Bit off topic lol but since you ask..
I used to harvest road-kill venison if it was fresh and reasonably undamaged, still have some salted and smoked in the freezer actually, but I'm cutting down on the red meat in my diet for health reasons so I don't bother any more.

Not something I'd pick up off the road but in the past yes I have eaten raccoon, possum, groundhog, squirrel, you name it, a little bbq sauce can work wonders, maybe even skunk if the scent gland isn't ruptured, not sure, & our dam building little friends, wouldn't wanna leave them out, I'm sure they're very tasty too cooked slow with some bbq sauce


----------



## Beaver101

^ I have no problem with veering off topic in a thread I started and sharing since we'll get back on track... wow to that list - takes lot of guts (no pun intended) to eat a skunk, and certainly a survivor in any wilderness ... this menu is not me though. :kiwi-fruit:


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ I have no problem with veering off topic in a thread I started and sharing since we'll get back on track... wow to that list - takes lot of guts (no pun intended) to eat a skunk, and certainly a survivor in any wilderness ... this menu is not me though. :kiwi-fruit:


Enough of roadkill..lets get back on topic to Rosetta, New Horizons (outer planet mission) and other related spacey topics.

Have you ever given thought on how the 9 planets discovered ( so far) happen to just revolve around our sun? 
Was it the work of the divine creator, 
or just circumstance 
or just magic?

Did you know that we are made of the same materials as stars..
...we are stardust.."we are golden and we got to get ourselves back to the..gar-den-n-n."


----------



## Beaver101

^


> Enough of roadkill ...


 .. that's a pretty unique topic, you know that. 



And my quick answers to your 4 questions,
*
Have you ever given thought on how the 9 planets discovered ( so far) happen to just revolve around our sun? * ... yes
*Was it the work of the divine creator,* ... no, define creator first
*or just circumstance ... *most likely but define circumstance also
*or just magic? *... no, wouldn't this be like circumstance too?

Now add another question for your list - did the egg or chicken come first? :biggrin:

*Did you know that we are made of the same materials as stars.. *... yes as read from the Internet or the experts. :biggrin:

*...we are stardust.."we are golden and we got to get ourselves back to the..gar-den-n-n."* ... and that's why we get buried too? 

Another question - where does the soul goes or is there such a thing?


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> Now add another question for your list - did the egg or chicken come first? :biggrin:
> 
> 
> 
> Pshaw! Too easy for a scientific mind..of course the chicken came first..it had to lay the egg in the first place.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Another question - where does the soul goes or is there such a thing?
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> Depends on whether you believe the scientific or religious theories.
> 
> Scientific: There is no soul as such, the "life force" controlled by the brain stops when the brain activity (brain stem) stops all involuntary functions..heart beat and breathing.
> Once a person is dead physically (or pronounced dead) that is it...you cannot restart the life process..it is a one way street. Only the memory of one being alive remains. and the markings on a headstone, if there is one.
> 
> Religious: Depending on religion, there is something called a soul which can be manifested by ghosts if the person died an un-natural death.
> 
> In the Muslim religion:
> 
> 
> 
> The religion of Islam beliefs about the afterlife are very important. Muslims believe in the continued existence of the soul and a transformed physical existence after death. Islam teaches that there will be a day of judgment when all humans will be divided between the eternal destinations of Paradise and Hell.
> Then there is the martyrs for the cause that go 'directly" to Heaven where there are as many 72 virgins awaiting for each martyr?
> 
> 
> 
> The difficulty in determining what the Koran has to say about virgins and such is establishing what the Koran says, period. Translators vary widely in their rendering of the spare and often opaque text
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> In the Catholic religion: the "soul" does not go to heaven nor hell directly but to purgatory?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Purgatory is understood by Catholics as a place of cleansing in preparation for heaven because they do not recognize that because of Jesus’ sacrifice, we are already cleansed, declared righteous, forgiven, redeemed, reconciled, and sanctified.
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> And what happens to those that are so vile in their deeds while alive that they cannot be "purified"?
> 
> The Buddists believe:
> 
> 
> 
> If you define reincarnation as the transmigration of a soul into a new body after the old body dies, then no, the Buddha did not teach a doctrine of reincarnation. For one thing, he taught there was no soul to transmigrate.
> 
> However, there is a Buddhist doctrine of rebirth. According to this doctrine, it is the energy or conditioning created by one life that is reborn into another, not a soul. "*The person who dies here and is reborn elsewhere is neither the same person, nor another*,"
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> 
> It's all so confusing to say the least....just be happy and then say your goodbyes when the time comes.
> As someone once said...
> "Do not take life too seriously – you will never get out of it alive."
> 
> Click to expand...
Click to expand...


----------



## Beaver101

*Comet sinkholes generate jets*

http://blogs.esa.int/rosetta/2015/07/01/comet-sinkholes-generate-jets/



> A number of the dust jets emerging from Rosetta’s comet can be traced back to active pits that were likely formed by a sudden collapse of the surface. These ‘sinkholes’ are providing a glimpse at the chaotic and diverse interior of the comet. ...


Who would have thunk sinkholes exist on a comet?


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> *Comet sinkholes generate jets*
> 
> http://blogs.esa.int/rosetta/2015/07/01/comet-sinkholes-generate-jets/
> 
> 
> 
> Who would have thunk sinkholes exist on a comet?


Natural phenomena, not exclusive to earth. 
Good thing that that the explorers of comets don't have to drive cars on them.:biggrin:


----------



## Beaver101

carverman said:


> Natural phenomena, not exclusive to earth.
> Good thing that that the explorers of comets don't have to drive cars on them.:biggrin:


... or the Phillae craft landed on (or close to) that bulleye's. 

Can't wait to see what else they find in the upcoming days. :wink:


----------



## Beaver101

*Scientists skeptical about claim of alien life on Rosetta comet: report*

*Scientists dispute recent claim by U.K. astronomers* that microscopic alien life is responsible for unique features of Rosetta mission comet, 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko

http://www.thestar.com/life/2015/07/07/scientists-skeptical-about-claim-of-alien-life-on-rosetta-comet-report.html 

bummer, ... who do we believe?


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> *Scientists skeptical about claim of alien life on Rosetta comet: report*
> 
> *Scientists dispute recent claim by U.K. astronomers* that microscopic alien life is responsible for unique features of Rosetta mission comet, 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko
> 
> bummer, ... who do we believe?


Nobody... until we see those green men landing, pointing their ray guns at us and telling us "Take us to your leaders!":biggrin:

What is more worrisome is these asteroids coming so close...sooner or later...
http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/100m-wide-asteroid-have-near-miss-earth-july-1505849


----------



## Beaver101

carverman said:


> Nobody... until we see those green men landing, pointing their ray guns at us and telling us "Take us to your *leaders*!":biggrin:


 ... and who may that/those "leader(s)" be? Who's volunteering? :biggrin:




> What is more worrisome is these asteroids coming so close...sooner or later...


 .. that article said we don't have to worry yet ... I think we earthlings wouldn't know what struck us "whenever" it does happen.


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ... and who may that/those "leader(s)" be? Who's volunteering? :biggrin:
> 
> 
> .. that article said we don't have to worry yet ... I think we earthlings wouldn't know what struck us "whenever" it does happen.


Next asteroid flyby is in September 23 or 24th.

Already the religious-science prognosticators are saying.."this could be the big one", but NASA is saying, "nothing to worry about with this one..if it is..we will let you know".


----------



## carverman

Tomorrow IS the day! 
Historic encounter with planetoid Pluto by space probe New Horizons.



> After three years of construction, and several delays on the launch site, New Horizons was launched on January 19, 2006, from Cape Canaveral, directly into an Earth-and-solar-escape trajectory with an Earth-relative speed of about 16.26 kilometers per second (58,536 km/h; 36,373 mph); it set the record for the highest launch speed of a human-made object from Earth.





> The craft is expected to zip past Pluto at 30,800 miles an hour on Tuesday at 7.49am EDT


.
It has taken 9 years + 6 months approximately to reach this distant planet at the fastest speed that a space probe has ever been able to attain so far.

*Some interesting trivia*:
Two of the instruments on board are name Alice and Ralph (Cramden), the characters from the 1960s TV series "The Honeymooners" where
Ralph was played by actor Jackie Gleason and Alice was played by actress Audrey Meadows. 
This was years before PC was more apparent on TV...When Alice would do something that displeased Ralph...he would say..
"Someday Alice..Someday.."Pow!..to the moon Alice..to the moon!"


> Ralph was named after Alice's husband on The Honeymooners, and was designed after Alice.e is an ultraviolet imaging spectrometer that is one (of two) photographic instruments comprising New Horizons* '​ Pluto Exploration Remote Sensing Investigation (PERSI); the other being the Ralph telescope.


What is missing is the instrument called Norton (which was Ralph's best buddy)...I'm sure it was an oversight. :biggrin:

Another interesting factoid about this deep space probe is that it is the first to have DNA of a human on board. An honour that no other human has achieved so far.


> About 30 grams (1 oz) of Clyde Tombaugh's ashes are aboard the spacecraft, to commemorate his discovery of Pluto in 1930


 We should see clearer pictures of this strange planet (about the size of our moon), going around the sun in an eccentric orbit, 
not like the rest of the other eight planets...begging the question..what else is out there that is disturbing this planet's orbit?


----------



## Beaver101

^ can't wait ... ~ 21+ hours from now!



> The craft is expected to zip past Pluto at 30,800 miles an hour on Tuesday *at 7.49am EDT *


 ... but this doesn't mean we'll see the "pics" at that time as it takes about 4 hours for the data to reach earth, I read. Hoping we get to see "much" clearer pics of how Pluto actually looks other than a grainy orange currently. 




> What is missing is the instrument called Norton.


 .. what was the function of Norton? ... I didn't see that as read from this list of instruments aboard the probe:



> How large is the spacecraft and what types of instruments will it carry?
> The New Horizons spacecraft is roughly 8 feet (2.5 meters) across and weighed approximately 1,050 pounds(480 kilograms) – about half a ton – when first fueled. It's about the size (and shape) of a baby grand piano.
> 
> It carries seven scientific instruments:
> 1.	*Alice* is an ultraviolet spectrometer used for measuring gas composition
> 2.	*Ralph* combines an infrared spectrometer (LEISA) for mapping surface composition with a color optical imager (MVIC) for mapping surface structure and composition
> 3.	*REX *is a radio experiment for measuring atmospheric composition and temperature
> 4.	*LORRI* is an optical telescope that provides the highest resolution imaging of the surface
> 5.	*PEPSSI* is a plasma-sensing instrument for measuring particles escaping from Pluto's atmosphere
> 6.	*SWAP* is a plasma-sensing instrument for measuring the properties of the solar wind at Pluto, Pluto's atmospheric escape rate, and for searching for a magnetosphere around Pluto. The "solar wind" is a stream of charged particles streaming away from the Sun at high speed.
> 7.	*SDC*, an instrument used to measure dust impacts at the New Horizons spacecraft during its entire trajectory, *was built by students at the University of Colorado*!


 ... it will be super-cool if the "SDC" built performs perfectly as it was built for - imagine the accomplishment acheived by a team of "student" scientists. They would do their professor(s) proud. 



> Another interesting factoid about this deep space probe is that it is the first to have DNA of a human on board. *An honour that no other human has achieved so far*.


 ... indeed, I don't suppose any of Thomgaugh's ashes will be ejected out of space but still an appropriate commemoration.



> We should see clearer pictures of this strange planet (about the size of our moon), going around the sun in an *eccentric* orbit,
> not like the rest of the other eight planets...begging the question..*what else is out there that is disturbing this planet's orbit*?


 ... what's so eccentric about its orbit? i'm taking a guess of what is disturbing its orbit - the fact is it is furthest from our sun/galaxy ... unstableness? maybe another galaxay is pulling on it? a very amateur guess here.


----------



## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^
> 
> .. what was the function of Norton? ... I didn't see that as read from this list of instruments aboard the probe:


I just mentioned "Norton" as a joke, He played the somewhat "dumb" comic sidekick to Ralph on the Honeymooners. 
His claim to fame then was that he worked in the sewers.
In real life he was a comic. 
I suppose they didn't have an instrument onboard that had the acronym "N-O-R-T-O-N" as they don't expect to find any sewers on Pluto. :biggrin:


A-L-I-C-E (A Large ION Collider Experiment) existed before being incorporated into the New Horizons probe, and before that, both in CERN and in Rosetta
probe. 
"Ralph" doesn't appear to stand for anything other than someone's idea of calling the onboard infrared spectometer/colour imaging camera, that.
Maybe they used to watch the Honeymooners TV show? 



> The seven scientific instruments chosen for New Horizons were the Long-Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI); the Pluto Exploration Remote Sensing Investigation (PERSI) platform, consisting of two instruments: the Ralph telescope and Alice; the Plasma and High-Energy Particles Spectrometer Suite (PAM), consisting of two instrument: SWAP (Solar Wind At Pluto) and PEPSSI (Pluto Energetic Particle Spectrometer Science Investigation); the Radio Science Experiment (REX); and the Venetia Burney Student Dust Counter (VBSDC).


http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2015/01/new-horizons-pluto-observations-july-flyby/


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## carverman

First images of Pluto...
http://www.theguardian.com/science/...es-pluto-flyby-nine-years-after-leaving-earth

New Horizons has now gone where no man has gone before..



> Space: The final frontier
> These are the voyages of the Starship, Enterprise (New Horizons)
> Its 15 year mission
> To explore strange new worlds
> To seek out new life and new civilizations
> To boldly go where no man has gone before





> Scientists now face an agonising wait for news from the spacecraft, which is due to call home at 2am BST Wednesday (9pm ET Tuesday).
> Only when that 15 minute-long signal is received will Nasa officials know whether New Horizons survived the flyby.


It takes 9 hrs for the radio signal to go out from earth to the spacecraft and back again.. 4.5hrs each way...at 186,000 miles per sec....Pluto is a long ways away. 
Between 7.78 billion km to 5.9 billion km from the sun (elliptical and inclined orbit)
Distance from Earth that New Horizons has travelled 5.0 billion km 

NH.."call Home!"....



> New Horizons is expected to continue its mission into the Kuiper belt. The spacecraft is powered by a nuclear generator that runs on plutonium, a substance named after the dwarf planet.
> The generator should run until the 2030s, when New Horizons will be 100 times further away than Earth is from the sun.


Hmm..2030..I guess I may not be around to see any pictures then and it will take a couple of days to receive them.
I wonder where Voyageur 1 and 2 are by now?


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## Beaver101

^ Looks like a dirty styrofoam ball and amazingly spherical ... nevertheless a wonderful achievement by NASA, congrats! 

Can't wait for other images and results of those scientific instruments on board.


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## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ Looks like a dirty styrofoam ball and amazingly spherical ... nevertheless a wonderful achievement by NASA, congrats!
> 
> Can't wait for other images and results of those scientific instruments on board.


Apparently because of the distance the radio signals have to travel...it will take 16 months to transmit all the data the instruments on board will capture in the flyby.
It only has one shot at it, so all the data saved will be hopefully transmitted from it's onboard memories over the next 16 months..provided it doesn't get hit by
any debris out there. 

Just think man was not able to fly until 1903
The jet age started in 1945
The first rockets experimental rockets were launched in the 50s,
The first satellite was launched in 1957 (sputnik) 
The first moon landing was in 1969 
Voyageur 1 (first flyby space probe , Jupiter, Neptune in 1977 (stilll going in deep outer space, but functionality will be reduced by 2016...RTG nuclear generator will cease to function by 2025) 
Voyageur 2 (second flyby space probe Neptune, Uranus in 1977 (still going in deep outer space....same scenario as V-1, but it will continue silent into deep outer space for eons)
First shuttle launch in 1981
ISS launch in 1998
New Horizons launch in 2006....one hundred years later...

science has achieved a lot...but on the ground..it's still the same old-same old..wars..floods-fires-pestilence


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## carverman

Technology is a wonderful thing..for the first time since 1930 when Pluto was first discovered...we actually have a closeup now!
it has mountains (of ice?) as high as the rockies..

http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-33543383

Something else of a trivial nature..Pluto has a formation at the bottom that could remind us of the Disney (Mickey Mouse) dog cartoon character Pluto

http://theinspirationroom.com/daily/2015/pluto-flyby-brands/


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## Beaver101

carverman said:


> *Technology is a wonderful thing*..for the first time since 1930 when Pluto was first discovered...we actually have a closeup now!
> it has mountains (of ice?) as high as the rockies..


...+1! And to be able to see the planet Pluto in this life-time ... what a bonus! each:




> Something else of a trivial nature..Pluto has a formation at the bottom that could remind us of the Disney (Mickey Mouse) dog cartoon character Pluto


...


----------



## carverman

Well the spacecraft is millions of kilometers beyond Pluto, but the information captured on this obscure planet is priceless and keep the space scientists and astronomers
occupied for the next 16 months.



> This is a mission of delayed gratification,” said Randy Gladstone, a co-investigator focusing on the atmospheric data. “We’ll get the main part of our data back in September.”





> *The limited pipeline for data means scientists have had to plan out which images they want to receive first*. Those seen this week are all reconstructed from data files that were highly compressed to speed their transmission. Sharper, more detailed versions of these and other images will eventually arrive, stretched over a long period that will make it seem as though New Horizons is still at Pluto even though it’s already millions of kilometres beyond it.


The next question. What has been planned for New Horizons beyond Pluto? The Oort Cloud?



> In 1950, Dutch astronomer Jan Oort proposed that certain comets come from a vast, extremely distant, spherical shell of icy bodies surrounding the solar system. This giant swarm of objects is now named the Oort Cloud, occupying space at a distance between 5,000 and 100,000 astronomical units. (One astronomical unit, or AU, is the mean distance of Earth from the sun: about 150 million km or 93 million miles.) The outer extent of the Oort Cloud is believed to be in the region of space where the sun's gravitational influence is weaker than the influence of nearby stars.
> 
> The Oort Cloud probably contains *0.1 to 2 trillion* icy bodies in solar orbit


That's more objects than anybody on earth ( or the RTG on New Horizons, expected to stop functioning in 2025), will have time to examine. 



> The Kuiper Belt extends from about 30 to 55 AU and is probably populated with hundreds of thousands of icy bodies larger than 100 km (62 miles) across and an estimated trillion or more comets.


 I'm not sure that any of these celestial debris will have the same impact on scientists..but the burning question is now...What else is there beyond Pluto? Another planet maybe?
These objects are referred in astronomic-scientific circles as KBO (Kuiper Belt Objects). 


> The discovery of Eris -- orbiting the sun and similar in size to Pluto (which was then designated the ninth planet) -- forced astronomers to consider whether Eris should be classified as the tenth planet. Instead, in 2006, the International Astronomical Union created a new class of objects called dwarf planets, and placed Pluto, Eris and the asteroid Ceres in this category.



If it is discovered eventually, hopefully it will not be named after "Kanye":biggrin:


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## Beaver101

^


> ... "Kanye"?


 Yeesuz, the heavenly bodies forbid! Unqualifed to be given named as one ... maybe as a piece of star-dirt named: "Kanye no give a sh1t. rappo. :bull_head:"? 

On a serious note, it will be super interesting to find out the answer to your/the question:_ What else is there beyond Pluto? _... but what I find more amazing is that there was no news that the New Horizons' probe had encounter any kind of debris in the solar-systems during its 9 years journey to Pluto ... not that we would wanted any operational hiccups ... super lucky or ?


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## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ Yeesuz, the heavenly bodies forbid! Unqualifed to be given named as one ... maybe as a piece of star-dirt named: "Kanye no give a sh1t. rappo. :bull_head:"?
> 
> On a serious note, it will be super interesting to find out the answer to your/the question:_ What else is there beyond Pluto? _... but what I find more amazing is that there was no news that the* New Horizons' probe had encounter any kind of debris in the solar-systems during its 9 years journey to Pluto *... not that we would wanted any operational hiccups ... super lucky or ?


We are lucky in that respect. AFAIK, no space probe has been hit by anything on its way to discover the outer planets and that is a miracle, considering the asteroid belt is a 
veritable minefield,,and they want to send explorers to MARS One?

The distances in space are so huge between these spinning debris particles that (so far-touch wood) there has been no collisions..but if there was the probe would be destroyed considering the energy it has (its mass x its speed at 50,000km per hour) and the celestial debris probably at several times that speed.

Even a small spec of space rock or maybe frozen ice particles could cause considerable damage to the RTG or the antenna.

We'll keep our fingers crossed that 'somebody out there' wants us to "look around our universe" to see what lies beyond planet earth.


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## Beaver101

^


> *We'll keep our fingers crossed* that 'somebody out there' wants us to "look around our universe" to see what lies beyond planet earth.


 ... most definitely and we might find the answer to the question - is the universe infinite or finite? and are there any green men beyond our galaxy - this is provided the probe doesn't encounter a black hole first? or maybe some other cosmic phenomenon like space/time warp ... stretching my imagination here of course. :mushroom:


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## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ ... most definitely and we might find the answer to the question - is the universe infinite or finite? and are there any green men beyond our galaxy - this is provided the probe doesn't encounter a black hole first? or maybe some other cosmic phenomenon like space/time warp ... stretching my imagination here of course. :mushroom:


Herein lies one of the greatest mysteries known to mankind...who (or what) created the universe, how large is it (infinite or finite), how did life on earth originate and under what rules did we develop to where we are today?

These fundamental mysteries are separated by two schools of thought..science and religion. Direct polar opposites in thinking in some ways. Who are we and
how did we get created in the first place? 

I feel that of the two, science is still the best, because unlike religion, science cannot be perverted to fit into mankind's selfish purposes...unlike religion, 
that inspires the worse of mankind to kill and destroy in it's name. Science deals with the truth and discovering the truth..although mankind can still twist some of it for good or bad...ie: splitting or fusion of the atom...the fundamental building block of everything on earth. 

Mankind continues to exist (at least for now)... on this earth inspite of flaws in our DNA .

(And who designed DNA, so that every species, every molecule, and every unique individual or animal has it's own DNA?) Is this part of the "master plan" of the "creator"
of the entire universe? 
What else is there in outer outer space? Perhaps just another dimension so huge, that it is inconceivable to even think that our universe is just a part of a
even a bigger entity that we will probably never see...or is the universe still expanding as Dr. Hawking theorizes, *somewhere in the Alpha of its creation.*

Energy, which cannot be created or destroyed, it just changes from one form to another. 

Eventually Eons from now, the universe will stop expanding, stars will collapse, as our sun will as well, and the universe will begin to shrink or condense
into one large heavier mass entity.... so dense that even light cannot escape from it's gravitational effect...*that will be the end..the Omega.* 

This to me is one of the inner mysteries, although much progress has been made by science, we have only scratched the surface of DNA in the last 50 years of our existence on this planet , and we still have a long, long way to go to discover more about the human genome.

One thing has been proven, although science and invention continues to evolve, the basic human traits don't always evolve for the greater good of mankind.
ie: the seven deadly sins as mentioned in the Bible;

Wrath, Greed, Pride, Lust, Envy, Gluttony, Sloth, and the modern variations of this; Corruption, Thievery, Fraud, Avarice, Inconsideration, and Lies, are continuing to evolve in new ways, especially that we are now all connected via the internet these days.


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## Beaver101

^


> One thing has been proven, although science and invention continues to evolve, *the basic human traits don't always evolve for the greater good of mankind.
> * ie: the seven deadly sins as mentioned in the Bible;
> 
> Wrath, Greed, Pride, Lust, Envy, Gluttony, Sloth, and the modern variations of this; Corruption, Thievery, Fraud, Avarice, Inconsideration, and Lies,* are continuing to evolve in new ways*,* especially that we are now all connected via the internet *these days.


 ... can't be any truer. Amen.



In the meantime, (dwarf) planet Pluto continues to amaze.... a quickie post:

*'Beautiful eye candy': Frozen plains spotted near peaks in Pluto's heart, named after Sputnik*
https://ca.news.yahoo.com/beautiful-eye-candy-frozen-plains-spotted-near-peaks-185458031.html


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## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ ... can't be any truer. Amen.
> 
> 
> 
> In the meantime, (dwarf) planet Pluto continues to amaze.... a quickie post:
> 
> *'Beautiful eye candy': Frozen plains spotted near peaks in Pluto's heart, named after Sputnik*





> "I'm a little biased, but I think the solar system saved the best for last," Stern, a Southwest Research Institute planetary scientist, told reporters.


LoL!.and beautiful eye candy to the astronomers and scientists, it will remain for centuries to come. It is so far away that getting there is a journey in itself. 

If the fastest speed we can attain in outer space is approx 50,000 km right now...it will be inaccessible for anything other than this flyby to satisfy everyone's curiosity.
Maybe that's a good thing. Who in their right mind would want to spend nearly 10 years on a space ship going to an outer planet. Planet earth is not alone, it has 
siblings that appear to be part of our solar family.

Referring to what Dr. Hawking mentioned in his book, space travel for us (other than our moon landings at enormous expense) requires tremendous technological achievements and high risk to anyone that dare to travels in conventional space craft. NASA has experienced several tragedies in the last 45 years, including loss of life on the launch pads, because riding in a rocket in an "controlled explosion" can result in an uncontrolled explosion if something should go wrong.

What we need to develop someday is a faster and more efficient way of escaping earth's gravity and gaining acceleration to higher speeds or even warp speed drive...if that is even possible.
Accelerating to *nearly* the speed of light can shave years off any manned outer planet exploration..but visiting any unknown worlds prevents huge hazards and risks that would be insurmountable. When celestial objects in outer space are measured in AU and light years....it is basically science fiction rather than reality. 

We are born, grow, and die within the confines of earth's gravity. Being subjected to the weightlessness of outer space or the tremendous gravitational forces of other planets...well ...imagine someone who weighs 90kg on earth suddenly being confronted weighing 10 times that or even more on Jupiter or Neptune? We would collapse from within because our bodies could not adapt to these kinds of gravitational forces...so visiting other planets (even Mars), for this century, will be a pipe dream.


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## Beaver101

^ ( ...*so visiting other planets *(even Mars), for this century, will be a pipe dream.) ... not unless we're being invited and given a free ride (aka abducted) by other worldly visitors. 

Maybe off topic but ... *'We are being visited:' over 2,000 UFO sightings in Manitoba in 200 years* https://ca.news.yahoo.com/meteor-globular-form-report-ufo-sightings-manitoba-over-160127760.html ...  :cower:



Back to topic - a little trivia (that I didn't know) - a 11 year old girl gave the planet name of Pluto: 



> NASA - Transcript: *The Girl Who Named Pluto
> *Interview With *Venetia Burney Phair
> *
> 
> 
> 
> http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/podcasting/transcript_pluto_naming_podcast.html
Click to expand...

 ... :cool-new:


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## Beaver101

^ Guess there is no shortage of activities going on this summer ... and this one has a £30trillion sign in front of it. :biggrin:

*Watch a fortune fly by! £30trillion asteroid to pass close to Earth on Sunday night*

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/watch-fortune-fly-30trillion-asteroid-131549328.html ... I wonder how they can determine there is actually platinum on that comet, never mind the value "if harnessed"? Or maybe it's just tantalizing news ...


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## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ ( ...*so visiting other planets *(even Mars), for this century, will be a pipe dream.) ... not unless we're being invited and given a free ride (aka abducted) by other worldly visitors.
> 
> Maybe off topic but ... *'We are being visited:' over 2,000 UFO sightings in Manitoba in 200 years* https://ca.news.yahoo.com/meteor-globular-form-report-ufo-sightings-manitoba-over-160127760.html ...  :cower:
> 
> 
> 
> Back to topic - a little trivia (that I didn't know) - a 11 year old girl gave the planet name of Pluto:
> 
> ... :cool-new:


It seems that people have this fascination with gods of the underworld...



> Wonderful. Now I understand your great uncle Henry Madan named the moons of Mars Phobos and Deimos. So you come from a family of people who name heavenly bodies?


Phobos and Deimos



> PHOBOS AND DEIMOS. (moons of Mars) Mars has two small moons: Phobos and Deimos. Phobos (fear) and Deimos (panic) were named after the horses that pulled the chariot of the Greek war god Ares, the counterpart to the Roman war god Mars.





> Latinized form of Greek Πλουτων (Plouton), derived from πλουτος (ploutos) meaning "wealth". This was an alternate name of Hades, the god of the underworld. This is also the name of a dwarf planet (formerly designated the ninth planet) in the solar system.


The only reason we are receiving pictures of Pluto is that the RTG on board (the power generator for the instruments and transmitter/receiver) has plutonium..
an element found on earth and enriched for things like reactors and ..bombs!



> When it was blasted away from Earth in 2006, the New Horizons spacecraft contained roughly 10.9 kilograms (24 pounds) of plutonium-238 oxide pellets, a radioactive isotope that decays naturally with a half-life of 87.7 years.


Don't you find that strange..a coincidence..or "somebody" has a a greater purpose for all this exploration? 
now..what if Pluto just happens to be made of mostly plutonium..which is a natural element here on earth? 

I think I'm starting to have a demonic phobia about this plutonium. :biggrin:


----------



## Beaver101

^


> ...*Don't you find that strange..a coincidence*..or "somebody" has a a greater purpose for all this exploration?
> now..what if Pluto just happens to be made of mostly plutonium..which is a natural element here on earth?


 ... hard to think of this as merely a coincidence when all the elements/factors fall into place ... but we'll (mankind) eventually find out! 



> I think I'm starting to have a demonic phobia about this plutonium.


 ... indeed a scary thought if it gets in the wrong hands and used for the wrong purpose ... hopefully WW3 doesn't start in our lifetime. But in the meantime, we'll just enjoy the lovely views of baby-planet Pluto.


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## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ ... hard to think of this as merely a coincidence when all the elements/factors fall into place ... but we'll (mankind) eventually find out!
> 
> ... indeed a scary thought if it gets in the wrong hands and used for the wrong purpose ... hopefully WW3 doesn't start in our lifetime. But in the meantime, we'll just enjoy the lovely views of baby-planet Pluto.





> The majority of plutonium isotopes are short-lived on a geological timescale, though it has been argued that some* natural plutonium, like the long-lived 244Pu isotope, can be found in nature*. *This isotope has been found in lunar soil, meteorites,* and in the Oklo natural reactor.
> Oklo is a region near the town of Franceville, in the Haut-Ogooué province of the Central African state of Gabon. Several natural nuclear fission reactors were discovered in the uranium mines in the region during 1972.


If plutonium in its' natural state occurs on earth, there is a some probability it may exist on other planets.
Fortunately for mankind these planets are too far away to be able to be mined and transport it back. 
Plutonium-244 (244Pu) is an isotope of plutonium that has a *half-life of 80 million years*.



> S*ince World War II, more than 1,200 metric tons of plutonium have been produced in nuclear reactors. Of those 1,200 metric tons, *approximately 260 are weapon-grade plutonium, defined as containing less than 7 percent (typically 5-6 percent) plutonium 240, an isotope with a high rate of spontaneous fission. Commercial-grade inventories presumably are composed of a combination of fuel-grade plutonium (7 to 18 percent 240) and reactor-grade (more than 19 percent 240). Despite its high plutonium 240 content, nuclear weapons can be made with reactor-grade plutonium.


Back to topic...apparently scientists and astronomers were completely wrong about Pluto up to now..it is not a frozen world of ice...read the latest.



> Extraordinary photographs from the mission have shown vast plains, 3,000-metre mountains, possible volcanoes, rift valleys and other features suggesting it has a molten core and shifting tectonic plates.


http://www.independent.co.uk/news/s...pletely-wrong-about-inert-pluto-10400272.html


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## Beaver101

^ From your link: 



> ... So far, New Horizons has sent a gigabit of information but another 49 gigabits are expected. “*What we have now is scratching the surface. The best is yet to come*,” Mr Stern said....


... ho, ho, ho! each:


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## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ From your link:
> 
> ... ho, ho, ho! each:


Hard to believe..and there is probably other planets further out..10..11... because the sun's gravitation doesn't reach that far out in space , there are laws that govern the orbits
of the planets and our sun which orbits inside our "Milky way galaxy" composed of many stars which are the suns for other solar systems. Our galaxy is so huge that it spans
many many light years across, and we will never be able to see it all, let alone the center of our galaxie, which is a flat plane.

We are not alone.


----------



## Beaver101

carverman said:


> Hard to believe..and there is probably other planets further out..10..11... because the sun's gravitation doesn't reach that far out in space , there are laws that govern the orbits
> of the planets and our sun which orbits inside our "Milky way galaxy" composed of many stars which are the suns for other solar systems. Our galaxy is so huge that it spans
> many many light years across, and *we will never be able to see it all*, let alone the center of our galaxie, which is a flat plane.
> 
> We are not alone.


 ... we may if we can achieve immortality or, 

From your post #128:


> What we need to develop someday is a faster and more efficient way of escaping earth's gravity and gaining acceleration to higher speeds or* even warp speed drive*...if that is even possible. Accelerating to nearly the speed of light can shave years off any manned outer planet exploration


or maybe time compressions of some sort or a combination of these ideas/methods?


Or possibly hitch a ride (aka cheating) if we're truly not alone which is becoming more evident. Check out the Ancient Aliens dvd series from History ... mind boggling, starts with the building/presence of the "pyramids structures (not just Egypt)" scattered all over the world. :suspicion:


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## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> .
> 
> From your post #128: or maybe time compressions of some sort or a combination of these ideas/methods?


You must mean "wormholes" in space, but so far these are only theories..but as you and I know...TIME as we know it is based on a 24hr clock based on the rotation of the earth and it's nearly circular orbit around our sun, determined as 365.25 days (with a second error that has to be added every few years..2015 being one). 

Once we leave the confines of earths gravity and it's only moon..Time really has very little meaning in outer space, even in our own solar system...its all RELATIVE and hence
the theory of Relativity as Albert Einstein proposed , and is now accepted by everyone..E=MC(squared).

There are other supposition theories on how intergalactic space travel could be achieved..but these are only theories until PROVEN. . 



> Or possibly hitch a ride (aka cheating) if we're truly not alone which is becoming more evident. Check out the Ancient Aliens dvd series from History ... mind boggling, starts with the building/presence of the "pyramids structures (not just Egypt)" scattered all over the world. :suspicion:


Based on the sheer vastness of the cosmos, there are thousands of other solar systems and in those , thousands that can support alien lifeforms that visit us from time to time in what we call UFOs.

There have been many sightings..(I'm currently watching a Netflix movie called SIRIUS it's produced by CETI (Communication with ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence).
In it Dr. Greer examines a minature alien life form.



> Sirius is a 2013 documentary directed by Amardeep Kaleka, based upon *ufologist Steven M. Greer's book Hidden Truth, Forbidden Knowledge*. Partially funded by a successful Kickstarter campaign, the movie is narrated by Thomas Jane and follows Greer's efforts to *reveal what he claims is information about top secret energy projects and propulsion techniques*.
> 
> Sirius features interviews from former officials from the government and military as well as images and a *DNA analysis of the six-inch human skeleton* known as Ata that was found in the Atacama desert in northern Chile in 2003.


I haven't read the book, but it may be fascinating reading. There was a reported and covered up alien craft and occupants that crashed in the NM (Roswell( in 1947 and although
the US Airforce has denied it all along..there may be some evidence stored in AREA 51 there.

One thing for sure, to achieve hyper space travel, we need a completely different form of propulsion over just basically rocket power based on Newtons Third Law of Motion...
"For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction"..if we are to every achieve any kind of efficient space travel within the confines of human life..median 80 years
+ or minus a few years.


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## carverman

Two major challenges to intergalatic space travel, even to our outer planets is the aging process which would need to be slowed down, somehow and finding a more
efficient method of propulsion. Antigravity doesn't work if there is no gravity..the energy has to be generated onboard or derived somehow from the vacumn of space.

Obviously these UFOs have discovered that method of propulsion, because from an observer on earth, these UFO sightings are perceived as effortless darting about, right
hand turns and then disappearing from view almost immediately. This would take speeds of possibly hundreds of thousands of km/hr..not thousands as we can currently achieve. 
At those speeds the Gforces acting on us would be tremendous on earth, but in outerspace where there is no gravity, we wouldn't even feel it...would a person that
is totally weightless in outerspace feel any Gforce?...I don't think so.

Speed of light has been calculated to be: 299, 792, 458 metres per second, light travels about 300000 kilometres (186000 mi) in one second.
In terms of km/hr it's about 300K x 60 = around 18 Million KM per hour. 

Recently New Horizons was able to achieve around 50,000 km/hr speeds due to gravitational kick from one of the planets..Jupiter, I believe...but that is a far cry from 18 million kms per hour.


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## Beaver101

^ Those numbers made my head spin ... and now we have a footage from a passenger on a plane:

*Airline passenger films apparent UFO over the Alps*

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/video/airline-passenger-films-apparent-ufo-202006202.html ... note how the UFO changes shape too. To believe or not to believe?


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## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ Those numbers made my head spin ... and now we have a footage from a passenger on a plane:
> 
> *Airline passenger films apparent UFO over the Alps*
> 
> https://ca.news.yahoo.com/video/airline-passenger-films-apparent-ufo-202006202.html ... note how the UFO changes shape too. To believe or not to believe?


Hmmm? Certainly resembles a UFO shape and it's over the Alps, a place that humans would not be flying a minature saucer shaped drone..or whatever they call it.

Seeing is believing..or is it?

Certainly there is enough evidence that alien civilization has visited earth on numerous occasions. But they are smart enough not to land because they would
have curiiosity seeking press hounds flocking to take pictures..and the town police would arrest them and turn them over to the military, who will deny that they
were sighted and landed.


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## Beaver101

carverman said:


> Hmmm? Certainly resembles a UFO shape and it's over the Alps, a place that humans would not be flying a minature saucer shaped drone..or whatever they call it..


 ... at the beginning of the video, it resembles a flying disk/saucer/orb ... but a second playing in slow motion shows the craft morphing into something else ... triangular. So it's not believing first before seeing here ... provided there is no tampering with that video.




> Certainly there is enough evidence that alien civilization has visited earth on numerous occasions. *But they are smart enough not to land because they would
> have curiiosity seeking press hounds flocking to take pictures.*.and the town police would arrest them and turn them over to the military, who will deny that they
> were sighted and landed.


 ... or maybe it's a good thing that they don't land ... for the police and our safety, that is. :biggrin:

Remember what Dr. Stephen Hawking said (something along this line): "You wouldn't want to mess around with them should you encounter them (or even one of them)"

More space (or possible alien) news: 

*NASA discovers Earth-like planet orbiting Sun-like star

Discovery of Kepler 452b ‘brings us one step closer to finding an Earth 2.0,’ NASA says*

http://www.thestar.com/news/world/2015/07/23/nasa-discovers-earth-like-planet-orbiting-sun-like-star.html ... I wonder how many space probes have NASA launched over the past decade? It's beginning to sound like a dozen.


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## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> *NASA discovers Earth-like planet orbiting Sun-like star
> 
> Discovery of Kepler 452b ‘brings us one step closer to finding an Earth 2.0,’ NASA says*
> 
> I wonder how many space probes have NASA launched over the past decade? It's beginning to sound like a dozen.


Not surprised on NASA finding another planet similar to Earth. In the cosmos there are probably many more solar systems with planets revolving around them.
If advanced civilizations exist on say 10 percent of the 1000 or so possible planetary systems similar to ours, then we are not alone..just too far away to be able
to contact them with our primitive space exploration technology...however, from numerous sightings of extra terrestrial craft (saucers) they certainly appear to be
able to visit us.

At the rate we are polluting our planet and using up it's resources, we need to find some kind of propulsion system to get us to another planet to start over again..but
even if that could be possible, who's to say that the alien life forms living on that selected planet may have something to say about our invasion.


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## Beaver101

^


> Not surprised on NASA finding another planet similar to Earth. In the cosmos there are probably many more solar systems with planets revolving around them....


 ... then why did Pluto take 9 years or so to reach? When the Kepler probe was launched only in 2009 and reach the exoplanets beyond our solar system???

From above Toronto Star link/article:


> *Kepler was launched in 2009 and has nearly 5,000 potential exoplanets to its credit* — worlds beyond our solar system. It is helping to address such fundamental questions as where do we come from and where are we headed, and arguably the biggest question of all: Are we alone in the universe?


 ... is the Kepler technology different? or are these exoplanets closer to our solar systems than Pluto???




> At the rate we are polluting our planet and using up it's resources, we need to find some kind of propulsion system to get us to another planet to start over again..but
> even if that could be possible, *who's to say that the alien life forms living on that selected planet may have something to say about our invasion.*


 ... possibly ... and tell us to get lost.


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## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ ... then why did Pluto take 9 years or so to reach? When the Kepler probe was launched only in 2009 and reach the exoplanets beyond our solar system???


Keplar is a space observatory, not a flyby outer planet probe like New Horizons. 

The onboard propulsion systems are similar on all space probes and satellites out there. Hydrazine pulse jets to speed up or slow down the speed based on computerized calculations transmitted from an earth station run by NASA (or the ESA), and because only a limited amount of this reactive fuel is carried onboard, these spacecraft to
reduce weight.... (weight at liftoff is a consideration).... is a tradeoff between attitude control and trajectory control.

Most of the outer planet probes (Mariner 1 & 2, Viking 1 & 2 and Voyageur 1 & 2 deep space probes rely on the gravitational "kick" of the outer planets, (Jupiter/Saturn/Neptune) to give their speed a boost from their nominal speed to much higher speeds in their flybys.

This is NOT the case with the Keplar deep space observatory that is designed to orbit the sun, much like earth, and peer into the cosmos with giant telescope.



> Kepler orbits the Sun, which avoids Earth occultations, stray light, and gravitational perturbations and torques inherent in an Earth orbit. The photometer points to a field in the northern constellations of Cygnus, Lyra and Draco, which is well out of the ecliptic plane, so that sunlight never enters the photometer as the spacecraft orbits.
> 
> This is also the direction of the Solar System's motion around the center of the galaxy. Thus, *the stars which Kepler observes are roughly the same distance from the galactic center as the Solar System,* and* also close to the galactic plane*. This fact is important if position in the *galaxy is related to habitability, as suggested by the Rare Earth hypothesis.*
> 
> NASA has characterised Kepler's orbit as "Earth-trailing". With an orbital period of 372.5 days, Kepler slowly falls further behind Earth.


Kepler's orbit is similar to earth but farther out, so instead of 365.25 EARTH days it takes for one complete orbit around the sun, Keplar takes 7.25 days longer to complete it's orbit.

BTW...There will be a test at noon...:biggrin:



> From above Toronto Star link/article:
> ... is the Kepler technology different? or are these exoplanets closer to our solar systems than Pluto???


No, they are much farther out...it's an optical illusion because Keplar is looking at them from a different perspective. Out towards the center of OUR MILKY WAY GALAXY...
and there are many galaxies out there, not just ours...so the probability of alien life forms is quite high I would think.

Why do we think that we are the only ones that evolved into intelligent life forms?


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## carverman

More on Keplar's mission...
*



The scientific objective of Kepler is to explore the structure and diversity of planetary systems. This spacecraft observes a large sample of stars to achieve several key goals:

Click to expand...

*


> 1. To determine how many Earth-size and larger planets there are in or near the habitable zone (often called "Goldilocks planets") of a wide variety of spectral types of stars.
> 
> 2. To determine the range of size and shape of the orbits of these planets.
> 
> 3. To *estimate how many planets there are in multiple-star systems*.
> 
> 4. To determine the range of orbit size, brightness, size, mass and density of short-period giant planets.
> 
> 5. To identify additional members of each discovered planetary system using other techniques.
> Determine the properties of those stars that harbor planetary systems.
> 
> The photometer's field of view in the *constellations Cygnus, Lyra and Draco*
> 
> Most of the extrasolar planets previously detected by other projects were giant planets, mostly the size of Jupiter and bigger.
> 
> Kepler is designed to look for planets 30 to 600 times less massive, closer to the order of Earth's mass (Jupiter is 318 times more massive than Earth). The method used, the transit method, involves observing repeated transit of planets in front of their stars, which causes a slight reduction in the star's apparent magnitude, on the order of 0.01% for an Earth-size planet. The degree of this reduction in brightness can be used to deduce the diameter of the planet, and the interval between transits can be used to deduce the planet's orbital period, from which estimates of its orbital semi-major axis (using Kepler's laws) and its temperature (using models of stellar radiation) can be calculated.


Added note here: the "goldilocks planets" being referred to are planets where conditions are "just right" for life to evolve. As in the Goldilocks story, where the beds of the 3 bears were
either too hard or too soft..and only baby bear's bed was "just right'...so it is with the planets, where the surface temperature can't be too hot or too cold and for some alien life forms, water, and a breathing atmosphere is absolute necessity for life to start.


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## carverman

Keplar's laws...for which the earth observatory was named..

http://www.physicsclassroom.com/class/circles/Lesson-4/Kepler-s-Three-Laws


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## Beaver101

^ Noon is over so no need for the test :biggrin: ... but thanks for sharing / write up above and the Physics Classroom link ... now I see what the Keplar's probe and its law are all about. Astro-amateur here. :monkey:


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## carverman

Beaver101 said:


> ^ Noon is over so no need for the test :biggrin: ... but thanks for sharing / write up above and the Physics Classroom link ... now I see what the Keplar's probe and its law are all about. Astro-amateur here. :monkey:


here is a diagram of the field of vision for the Keplar probe *Schmidt telescope), the largest telescope to date in outer space.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kepler_(spacecraft)#/media/File:LombergA1024.jpg


Unfortunately, as often the case, in some of the outer space exploration projects, on the Keplar, ONE of the 4 reaction wheels for precision pointing the telescope has failed and so far, in spite of attempting to recover it, they are not serviceable, one of the others has increased friction (bad bearings?) and is still operating. 

The Keplar came equipped with FOUR reaction wheels (basically gyroscopes spinning at high speed and each controlled by a microcomputer) to accurately point the telescope..
and probably down to 1/1000 of a degree accuracy. 



> On July 14, 2012, *one of the four reaction wheels *used for fine pointing of the spacecraft* failed*





> On January 17, 2013, NASA announced that *one of the three remaining reaction wheels showed increased friction*, and that Kepler would discontinue operation for ten days as a possible way of solving the problem. *If this second wheel should also fail, the Kepler mission would be over.*





> While Kepler requires only three reaction wheels to accurately aim the telescope, another failure would leave the spacecraft unable to continue in its mission. This is a potential threat to the extended mission


So this probe is just hanging in there (for now) and some data is still usable, but not in tracking the exoplanets like the probe was designed to do. 

Disappointing considering the expense and effort, and time, to get this project operational where it is now..but it is not the first or the last of outer space exploration failures. 

The Hubble was sent up with faulty ground reflecting mirrors that made images out of focus, so over the course of several Shuttle launches and EVA space walks, the original focusing was corrected by new electronics that were designed to provide the corrective lens.

Unfortunately, Keplar is too far away.. and even if it was in LEO (Low Earth Orbit, like the Hubble), the shuttle program is now NO longer operational.


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