Posted on 07/18/2016 10:38:40 AM PDT by Red Badger
X-O-Planet Ping!.........................
“Ironically, the bounty was made possible when the Kepler space telescope’s pointing system broke.
In its initial mission, Kepler surveyed a specific patch of sky in the northern hemisphere, measuring the frequency with which planets whose sizes and temperatures are similar to Earth occur around stars like our sun. But when it lost its ability to precisely stare at its original target area in 2013, engineers created a second life for the telescope that is proving remarkably fruitful. “
Awesome!
I always hated that it was designed to only point in one direction. It seemed like it was a potential waste to not just find as many as possible in other parts of the sky.
Anyone not surprised?
Me............................
cool
Shiny
Science has brought nothing but a series of demotions.
No reason to expect otherwise.
And tidy.
Unfortunately, the original problem still stands... how do we reach them?
To me this process seems pointless when we aren’t devoting enough time to space travel. The spirit of European explorers and American pioneers needs to be tapped into again so we can get people out there traveling to see what is really out there instead of just theorizing and making a best guess.
~~~~~~~
"Demotions"? Of whom? Ego-powered primitives who want to insist that they are the central (if not only) intelligent organisms in the universe?
Such hubris literally begs for "demotion"...
Those observatories look like they are filming Mystery Science Theatre 3000.
Freegards
The explorers had to plan over decades. To reach other stars we will have to plan over hundreds and maybe thousands of years minimum, multi generationally. Hard to imagine when you think about the changes that have only occurred in the last 200 years. Some think we will launch something to somewhere and 100 years in halfway to target it will be just passed or picked up by something newer and much faster that we just sent.
Freegards
Unless and until there is found a way around the Speed Limit of the Universe, AKA the Speed of Light, space travel will remain the stuff of Sci-Fi novels and movies.
Not saying is impossible, just difficult....................
Mystery Science Theater 2016........................
demotions from what?...................
This explains how the planets were arranged. Really........
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yo9eSzqn2yI
At one time we thought:
The world ended at the horizon.
The sun orbited our planet.
We had a monopoly on intelligence.
Planets only orbited the sun.
There is only one galaxy.
etc.
As for the speed of light:
There’s a proposal to use existing technology to send objects away at 0.3C So our children may get to see some of these planets up close.
However, if we want a desirable place to “raise” the kids, other than right here; we will have to build it ourselves, within this solar system.
If warp drive was invented tomorrow, by next week people would leave to get away from our crappy government...
The ones who could afford to leave mostly ARE our crappy government.
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