Space Exploration

[SteyrAUG]

I thought this is a good thread to throw this little nugget.

Im taking a low level Astrobiology class at ASU Space and earth sciences school.

The most intensive greenhouse gas is.......... Water vapor. By an exponential factor. We have a simulator where you can build out a planets atmosphere and adjust different factors of the inorganic carbon cycle. You can add literal shit loads of methane and carbon dioxide to an atmosphere and barely affect the surface temperature on a planet. However add some water vapor and you have an inevitable run away green house affect. Apparently the 'science' doesn't actually work out in Al Gore's favor. For a perfect example we just have to look at venus. They think Venus actually had oceans on its surface at one point, and based on its proximity to the sun, the oceans went into the atmosphere and had a runaway green house affect. It wasn't ruined by some master race of idiots burning fossil fuels like the liberals want you to think.

Yep and number TWO is carbon dioxide. So if everything living would simply stop BREATHING we'd be just fine. The fact that most of the global warming crowd ignore number one and two is always interesting to me. Thankfully both recycle back to the planet in the form of rain and plant absorption of CO2 or we'd really be screwed.

[Diamondback]

Didn't exactly live up to it's full potential though. I'm waiting for the technology to come along that will make a space elevator a "real world" thing. That will be a game changer. Lots of "details" to get it beyond the idea stage however.

Didn't exactly have a chance once the tards on Crapitol Hill and the Beancounters got their hooks into it... the Shuttle we got was nothing more than a proof-of-concept vehicle made BARELY useful with none of the added safety features you'd expect to see on a full production-standard airframe, every single one was basically built to the looser and cheaper standards of an expendable prototype. And somebody at NASA should stand trial on 14 counts of Criminally Negligent Homicide for that decision.

[WillBrink]

Actually more true than you know. Seeing what is on the other side of the mountain has been a trait that is more successfully passed on over the last 10,000 years than the "lets just stay here and exhaust limited resources" mentality. If we never left Africa, we'd have probably gone extinct a long time ago.

There's nothing that defines humanity more, perhaps a primary trait for our success the need to know what's on the other side of that hill, the ocean, or the other planet.

Humanity actually did get close to going extinct:

https://www.npr.org/sections/krulwic...-in-70-000-b-c

[SteyrAUG]

Didn't exactly have a chance once the tards on Crapitol Hill and the Beancounters got their hooks into it... the Shuttle we got was nothing more than a proof-of-concept vehicle made BARELY useful with none of the added safety features you'd expect to see on a full production-standard airframe, every single one was basically built to the looser and cheaper standards of an expendable prototype. And somebody at NASA should stand trial on 14 counts of Criminally Negligent Homicide for that decision.

Agreed. I was commenting on what we got, not what it was supposed to be.

There's nothing that defines humanity more, perhaps a primary trait for our success the need to know what's on the other side of that hill, the ocean, or the other planet.

Humanity actually did get close to going extinct:

https://www.npr.org/sections/krulwic...-in-70-000-b-c

And had we not dispersed that could have been a very real thing. I'd say we also came close in 1962 and 1983.

[Grand58742]

Perseverance rover landed safely on Mars!

[rushca01]

Just watched the stream from NASA.

[Grand58742]

Color me shocked that Boeing is yet again delayed...

https://www.space.com/boeing-starlin...d-indefinitely

We may have to wait a while to see Boeing's Starliner astronaut taxi take flight again.

Starliner was originally supposed to launch last Friday (July 30) from Florida's Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on a crucial uncrewed mission to the International Space Station for NASA called Orbital Flight Test 2 (OFT-2). Unplanned thruster firings of Russia's recently arrived Nauka module tilted the orbiting lab significantly on Thursday (July 29), however, and OFT-2's liftoff was pushed to Tuesday (Aug. 3) to give station managers time to assess the situation.

But in the hours before launch on Tuesday, Boeing announced that the Starliner team had discovered "unexpected valve position indications" in the capsule's propulsion system. Boeing and NASA stood down from that day's attempt to investigate the issue, stating that a liftoff on Wednesday (Aug. 4) remained a possibility.

But that's no longer the case. On Tuesday evening, Boeing representatives said that Starliner won't fly on Wednesday, and they didn't give a new target launch date.

Okay, Boeing brought this on themselves honestly since it's an engineering and manufacturing company run by accountants, but I do feel for the Astronauts that were selected to fly on it waiting, waiting and waiting and waiting...

One of these days, they'll do an interview and be like:

[Allen]

Meanwhile in Boca SpaceX has the lower half of the BFR headed to the launch pad:
https://www.space.com/spacex-super-h...ut-launch-site
They may get the damn thing into space before Boeing gets OFT-2 off the ground.

[Diamondback]

As a member of a Heritage Boeing family from Before The Dark Times, I hope Musk eats both Bezos and the McDonnell Crime Family's lunches.

Root for the stoner, guys, it's important.

[Grand58742]

First of a three part series of a guided tour through Starbase in Texas hosted by Tim Dodd (Everyday Astronaut) and given by Elon Musk himself. As a Sci-fi nerd, I love how the entry building is named "Stargate."

***WARNING***

It's over two hours just for the first two segments.