About Space Exploration

Anyone interested in Space Exploration here?

Anyone passionate about and interested in the big projects?

Anyone interested in a journey through the Universe?

  • when it goes over my house i'll take a screenshot

  • https://www.astroviewer.net/iss/en/

    (This is another link I just found: --- Apparently it shows what & where, the ISS (International Space Station) is 'currently' above & looking down at. So, is this like, be careful not to drop any Litter Anyone, or They might come down and tell You off for it.)

    Slight smile

  • Thank you for replying to my thread!

    Thank you for sharing the article!

  • Someimes I thik you're from a different planet from the rest of us here Slight smile

    Heart

  • https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/news/nasa-explorers-bonus-20-years-aboard-space-station

    (...I am replying to Myself to sort of make an online note of this WWW Address, and this is the only Thread I could remember in recent times that is about "Space"/OffWorld stuff.)

  • Exactly.  The arms reduction is fairly sensible - there are less and less targets around the world where you can justfiy turning them to glass.   It seems that most future 'wars' are going to be small-scale conventional terrorist-squashing activities around the world or economic wars where countries are starved out of their position. 

    I don't really understand the whole Mars-mission hype - I think it's currently beyond human endurance to sit in a tin can for months on a probable suicide mission waiting to be splattered all over a distant rock with no real chance of success.  They seem to be deliberately dragging their heels on it like they know they can't really do it yet.

  • Also Governments/politicians are mostly motivated by the election cycle, what they can do to make themselves look good, get themselves their next cushy well-paying board membership or get something for their constituency so that they can continue to be re-elected.

    The early "space-race" was motivated by the need to develop nuclear missiles etc. for defence/offence.  The "civilian" space programmes were all about sending the message "if our 'civilian programme' can put a manned space-vehicle here, then you better be damned sure I can put a megaton+ plus ICBM wherever I like on the planet as well.

    This sort of defence is no longer the vote winner that it was.  Even the cost of renewing the UK "independent" Trident nuclear deterrent is no longer the cut-and-dried shoe-in that it used to be - even with proposed cost-savings such as reducing the SSBN fleet from 4 to 3 and we've already been slowly cutting the number of launch vehicles per boat and re-entry vehicles per launch vehicle since the end of the cold war.

  • I DO wonder why the sudden renewed curiosity about the Moon/Mars/Asteroids Landings, after something like a Forty-Year break before, Hmmmm?

    Because the technology that only governments could afford all those years ago is now cheap and available off the shelf.  You've probably got more processing power in your washing machine than a Saturn V.

    Governments are also too risk-averse to get involved with these risky projects now - it's all about the publicity.  Even Richard Branson's project has killed someone and he's only making a toy plane.

  • Greetings "California"! It is nice to see you reviving this Thread!  ... FYI: Mr. Cassandro does not Post so much of late, and I myself am somewhat restricted at times... but it is nice to see this Thread again anyway!

    Myself, I too have indeed noticed a lot in the News lately about 'So-and-So, launching a Rocket/Drone, to So-and-So'... it is all quite interesting, nYes...

    ...Most of us here are still more interested in Astronomy/Stargazing. But, I post to support this Ol' Thread again, and I DO wonder why the sudden renewed curiosity about the Moon/Mars/Asteroids Landings, after something like a Forty-Year break before, Hmmmm?

    Good Fortune to Yourself always, in any case. (Sorry if I am wrong or if I confused you.)

  • Ok - I'm a science nerd and I've worked on some pretty strange and secret technologies but the whole UFO thing rates as complete and utter BS. I occasionally dip my toe into some of those conspiracy websites & tv shows to see how far known events can be twisted into a mystery by people trying to make a buck from the gullible.

  • I blame a lot of this on Whitley Strieber

    He wrote a novel called Wolfen, which I enjoyed.  The film with Albert Finney was also not bad.

  • I don't see any evidence for alien visitations

    But then, of course, you wouldn't! 

    I've often thought to myself 'Why would they come here in the first place if they're not intent on staying?  What are they looking for?  If they're so massively technologically advanced, why don't they just take over?'

    I keep an open mind - though on this, it's perhaps just ajar.  I absolutely believe that we're not alone.  Our planet - our solar system - is just a tiny grain of sand.  Greer believes that alien civilisations aren't as far away from us as we think.  He also thinks a lot of stuff is staged to breed fear.  But he's convinced that the evidence is there, in truckloads.  And that he has a bullet with his name on it because he's getting closer to the truth.  Or maybe that's where he's being deliberately led. 

    Who knows what goes on?

    I suppose it comes down to a familiar human desire to believe things in spite of lack of evidence.  We want there to be a bigger picture.  That's the pull of religion.

  • ...and now I read that and my first reaction is 'What nonsense!'

    Ah, but that's only because Bill Gates flashed up a little subliminal message on your screen to stop you thinking about The Truth.

    Afraid that even though I used to read Fortean Times regularly, I don't see any evidence for alien visitations, specifically to the US Government, unless you count Trump himself. I blame a lot of this on Whitley Strieber, a rather bad SF writer who realised he could sell more books if he put 'non-fiction' on the cover.

    That our reliance of fossil fuels should long have passed into history.

    Well, I can go with that one...

  • ...and now I read that and my first reaction is 'What nonsense!'

  • I don't know how you feel about conspiracy theories....

    It's about the whole UFO thing.  Area 51.  The X Files.  Suppressed information.

    Steven Greer has been at the forefront of investigations into this for years.  Declassified documents, some obviously heavily redacted, seem to point to a top-level conspiracy of silence.  Even US presidents have been and are denied access to the information.   There's an idea, based on documentary evidence, that the Kennedy assassination was connected to stuff he was investigating himself.  The suggestion, too, is that other deaths and suicides - such as Marilyn Monroe and Bobby Kennedy - were connected to stuff Kennedy had discovered and passed on. 

    Still with me? 

    People are coming out of the woodwork now - not backwoods anti-government conspiracy theorists and such like, but people who worked on secret military programmes in the 40s through to the 60s -  and saying that certain things were going on... or saying as much as they dare to say. There are two strands to the whole thing now:

    1.  Yes, we have been visited - most often at times of nuclear testing, or when global tensions have been high.  We've even shot down craft.  There are, apparently, bunkers full of evidence.  And we continue to be visited.

    2.  The military-industrial complex is also covertly (obviously) involved in producing 'alien' techonologies and craft based on the research.  These will be used to launch phoney attacks in order to induce fear in a population already sold on the 'threats' of, in order, Russia, terrorism, Isis, etc. 

    Claims are made that global technology is actually 100 years behind what it should actually be now.  That our reliance of fossil fuels should long have passed into history.  That technology exists, but it isn't used because it wouldn't serve the best interests of too many powerful people.  That manipulation - through the media and governments - is happening at very high levels.  9/11, plus many other atrocities, are roped in here.

    Okay... I'll end it there.  That's really quite a basic summary.  Maybe 'salient' wasn't the best word to use.  'Persuasive' might be better.  With all of this kind of stuff, I always reach the stage of never actually knowing what to believe.  Some of it, though, would not surprise me in the least.  I'll watch it again this afternoon, which might help me to get a more cohesive grasp of it.

  • What's with the bombastic music? I don't see this 'space force' doing any exploration or science. The Parker solar probe (successfully launched this morning) is interesting though, both the practicalities of radiative cooling and to stop us complaining to WebPM that the internet's been fried by a solar storm..

    But I think the general premise is salient.

    Unacknowledged (2017)

    I doubt I'd ever see it. What is the premise?

  • I am Thanking You as well for that Post, Mr. Cassandro...

    (...I did wonder why this Thread (Re-titled) had moved up again a little... and also slightly wondered why in London, the Clouds and Rain had come back again... (!) (Just two-and-a-half weeks more heating to go after this, I would wager, before September brings proper cooling again.)  ...)

  • I thought I'd draw this to people's attention, in case you haven't seen it.  I watched it last night, more out of curiosity than conviction.  Not over-impressed with the production - especially the annoying background 'dramatic' music, which I found very distracting.  It started off a bit unconvincingly.  But I think the general premise is salient.

    Unacknowledged (2017)