Sci-fi and Heroic Fantasy discussion

NASA has a cool picture of Tethys & Enceladus aligned over Saturn's rings, courtesy of the Cassini probe.

I like!

Excellent!

That would make a great poster.

I love the surrealness of all the Saturn pictures. They always look like models to me. Or even cut-and-paste collages.
There are tons more on the CICLOPS.org site. It's definitely worth checking out.

John wrote: "I love the surrealness of all the Saturn pictures. They always look like models to me. Or even cut-and-paste collages. "

Indeed, Arthur C Clarke commented that while his novel 2001: A Space Odyssey used Saturn as its destination, Kubik used Jupiter for the film because he found it impossible to create images of Saturn that didn't look like models.

Beautiful! Thanks.

That looks so unreal, but so cool!

RIP Cassini Spacecraft, 1997-2017

The Cassini spacecraft committed assisted suicide this morning after two decades studying Saturn.

NPR has a nice photo album & video with many of its 400,000 photos.

G33z3r wrote: "RIP Cassini Spacecraft, 1997-2017

The Cassini spacecraft committed assisted suicide this morning after two decades studying Saturn.

NPR has a nice photo album & video with many of its 400,000 pho..."

Those pictures... Wow, just wow!

Wow those rings!

Bye, Cassini...

Alien probe enters solar system, paves way for invasion...

Alien Probe or Galactic Driftwood? SETI Tunes In to 'Oumuamua'

Rendezvous with Rama, anyone?

Pretty cool.

Saw it on TV, maybe it's the 2001 Space Odyssey obelisk?

Well, we managed to litter Mars with yet another lander.


first pictures from Insight
It found rocks and sand!

Insight's mission is geology in depth: it's planting a couple of seismometers and drilling into the crust (well, 15 feet into the crust) to measure temperature differential. NASA Mission description

NASA brought my name engraved on a chip with Insight so I have landed on Mars.

That's cool, Clare!

I'm so happy to see all the coverage of this in the mainstream media even though it makes me despair for the state I live in.

Great picture.

A couple of interesting space events last week...

New Horizon Fly-By
The New Horizon spacecraft, originally tasked to fly by Pluto and take some cool pics, continued on and was re-directed to a rock out in the Ort Cloud, nicknamed Ultima Thule.



Kind of looks like Phil's theory of the Earth & Moon in The Fifth Season discussion.

This is the most distant object ever observed by fly-by. (It's not the most distant spacecraft; that's still the Voyager.)

By the way, US PBS's NOVA did a 1-hour show on the New Horizon mission that aired just this week (fresh from the actual landing.) You can watch the program online at http://pbs.org/nova .

Look like two pancakes. 😊

Also last week,

Jade Rabbit Rover lands on Far Side of Moon
The Chinese spacecraft Chang'e 4 touched down on the back side of the moon and its rover, Yutu 2, sent back its first pictures.



The (now stationary) lander has its own camera, so it took the above picture of rover Yutu 2 heading off on its trip.

Because it's on the far side of the moon, it uses its own relay satellite, Queqiao, to talk to Earth.

Not Queen quality, but Brian May's new song & video about New Horizon & the Ultima Thule flyby is pretty cool.
https://www.space.com/42875-brian-may...

We have to admire the Chinese for a steady, no fuss, on target space programme. They will of course be looking for valuable meteoritic minerals on the far side. A supermagnet should detect quite a lot of them. The Moon has protected Earth from asteroid crashes which is why the far side is so pocked.

R.I.P. Opportunity Mars Rover



Came for 90 days, stayed for 14 years & 26 miles.
Technically, the rover Opportunity died last summer; NASA just officially called it dead and ended resuscitation efforts yesterday.

NASA Concludes Mars Rover Opportunity 15-Year Mission

Bye...

RIP Mars Rover

It had made me oddly happy that what was meant to last such a short time just kept on going and going and going. It would die now and then when it's solar panels would get covered with dust, then a handy windstorm would blow by and clean it off again. I'm strangely attached to the little guy!

Andrea wrote: "It had made me oddly happy that what was meant to last such a short time just kept on going and going and going. ... I'm strangely attached to the little guy!"

I think many people feel the same Andrea - it became a kind of little robotic hero.

G33z3r wrote: "R.I.P. Opportunity Mars Rover

Great black and white pic of Opportunity's footsteps on the barrens of Mars.

First in human history: A cotton seed brought to the moon by China's Chang'e 4 probe has sprouted, the latest test photo has shown, marking the completion of humankind's first biological experiment on the moon

I have to admit that picture looks more like some kind of alien ooze than it does sprouting cotton, but I suppose the cotton is actually underneath the platstic grid? :)

Andrea wrote: "I have to admit that picture looks more like some kind of alien ooze than it does sprouting cotton, but I suppose the cotton is actually underneath the platstic grid? :)"

Yes. If you look closely you can see a tiny leaf (I think). 😊🌸

Unfortunately they all died when night fell.
:(

Jim wrote: "Unfortunately they all died when night fell.
:("

Yes that's sad. But it's a start!

Andrea wrote: "I have to admit that picture looks more like some kind of alien ooze than it does sprouting cotton,...? :)"

Alien protomolecule analyzing Earth DNA in preparation for triffid invasion.

They should have tried a Sweetgum tree. You can toss a seed onto a pinch of soil on concrete and it'll spout in a couple weeks. Then the roots will bust up the concrete.

And now we know what a black hole looks like... or at least the dust around one.


From Galaxy Messier 87. (Event Horizon Telescope Collaboration, via National Science Foundation)

Black Hole Image Revealed for First Time Ever

Great picture! 😎💙👍

AKA Sauron visits the optometrist

Stanley wrote: "AKA Sauron visits the optometrist"

LOL!

Stanley wrote: "AKA Sauron visits the optometrist"

*applause*

Well done.

We should be getting more now. Tomorrow is the big day when Virgin Galactic is launching Richard Branson to space. That should open up space to paying customers pretty soon, especially since Jeff Bezos will also be taking off on 20July. A spot on Branson's flight already has 200 people in line at over $200K each, so I won't get to go, but I still find this super exciting. I grew up reading about rocketships & was 10 when Armstrong first stepped onto the moon. I thought we'd be further along by now, but I'm still happy that we're really getting out there.
https://www.cnet.com/how-to/virgin-ga...

I just worry about the effects on the environment, those rockets use a LOT of fuel. We're already being told to cut back on our cars or switch to electric (and where does electricity come from...oh yeah, often burning fossil fuels, and how do you make those batteries, oh yeah opening toxic mines and burning more fossil fuels...electric cars won't solve all our problems...) but now we're going to start giving rich people joy rides in space which will undo any incremental improvements we might have made. The cost vs benefit just doesn't work for me.

At the same time, I don't see the appeal. I get sick on little kid roller coasters and regular airplanes so space rockets were never an option for me :D

It's a difficult balancing act. As a huge SF fan, I am in favour of anything that advances man's steps towards being out there, but as an environmentalist, I realise that each rocket launch does some environmental damage - and that the money spent could be used for solving problems closer to home.

The good thing is that so much of the hardware and technology used by Space X and Virgin Space is reusable, so it is less of a drain on the environment. While a rocket launch does put a lot of crap in the atmosphere, overall the amount of damage done by rocket launches is very small compared to the damage done by cars around the world.

Also, I am concerned that if we delayed space exploration until such time as an environmentally acceptable solution is found - such as manipulation of the magnetic field - humans would lose the desire to go "out there".

I think the environmental damage is minimal & we need to get out there. The Earth is too small a basket for us to put all our eggs in it. Besides we learn a LOT with each different rocket & launch. It's a technology still in its infancy. Look at how much carbon the early trains spewed compared to what they do now. Compare the old Saturn V with all the new private rockets. Big difference getting more efficient all the time.