Useful Astronomy

Just saw this story:

https://theconversation.com/what-is-below-earth-since-space-is-present-in-every-direction-245348

The answer was not really given. The author relied on explaining the ways to define the question - but did not follow through.

I am reframing in this video, which has me think through the parameters, which help define the final question - which I will now state:

TIMEFRAME going forward: The point in local time when the collision of the Milky Way with Andromeda changes the orbit of Sol within the Milky Way - 

OR

the point at which Terra is rendered uninhabitable through natural progression - rather something unexpected like a nuclear war or collision which ends all life.

WHICHEVER COMES FIRST.

SPATIAL BUBBLE: 

POSSIBLE ASSUMPTIONS - explain each

1. No travel at all - so radius of the bubble is the thickness of the galactic cloud from the point that is perpendicular to a plane at the center of the galaxy - but the bubble itself moves based on the current position of Sol. In other words, since we are not at the plane described above, some point outside the cloud will be within the bubble at certain times.

MOTION OPTIONS:

2a. Travel by plasma drive where the ejecta comes from some stored Uranium until the Uranium is gone - one way trip. Finesse the impossibilities and go with it. For this one, assume departure times after 2100. Assume acceleration to .5C, with travel at that velocity (no boost) until deceleration at the same rate until we hit something.

2b. Same assumptions, but assume 1G acceleration on each end of the trip with a .5C speed limit.

Question: Will travelers hit anything, ever, and if so what and when. Leave the end time indeterminate.

3. Instantaneous travel through either wormhole or astral means (assuming ascension starting at 3000 CE. Same end date with regard to collision with Andromeda.

PERCEPTION:

What exists inside that bubble from each of these POVs - both in terms of what will be seen with C being the limit AND what will actually be at each point of time if the old assumption on C (as being infinite) were used. Ignore objects outside the bubble's path.

DATA TARGETS:

What objects will be seen and/or be present for the entire period of the study and what events of note will happen during that time - particularly collisions with the solar system.

REWARD: I assume a Nobel Prize in Physics for publication of that model.

Is Degrowth the Only Answer?

Degrowth advocates call on policy makers and scientists to do something without offering options. They deal from values rather than making plans themselves. They like getting screen time but refuse to go beyond the egalitarian coalition, because the obvious solution to warming (and cooling Barents Sea) is to abandon gasoline fuel for cars and go to some kind of tethered electric vehicle powered by small modular reactors. That last bit is what they can't face.

Scientists: New 2026 Warp Drive Study Says Spacetime May Bend More Than ...

Nacelles circulating positrons in fields to attract negative energy? When you want to get beyond science, find a systems engineer.

Is it really just an engineering problem? | The Real Physics of Artifici...

It i not an engineering problem as much as a cost analysis problem - as is whether to go to Mars. Designing and testing an orbital station that allows us to calibrate the tradeoffs between radius, spin and the coriolis effect is probably cheaper than a massive ESA building doing incremental research. Doing a practical mock-up makes space tourism possible - so that the tourists can occupy the low G rings while staff live in higher G - so that they can stay longer and not be expensively re-boosted on a periodic basis. Also, actually going to the Martian surface is not optimal. Instead, an orbital station around Mars designed with families and social structures - kind of an orbiting JPL - is much more effective for doing science with less wait time between experiments. There can be some up-and down to retrieve samples - but alcohol fuel and oxygen can be produced for this given a large enough station.

Constant boost is no so hard if you do a broken washing machine drive. Rotate masses but don't let them get to perpendicular to the direction of rotation. With enough rotating mass (with at least two modules with counter-rotation to provide stability), the only issue is whether your fusion micro-reactor produces enough energy to move both crew and reactor at .38G - or whatever G the spinning experiment say is necessary. Sometimes, engineering requires testing a prototype rather than a model. 

The New System That Could ACTUALLY Replace Rockets

This system would be great at launching material into orbit with one system and for human transport with another, more gentle system. There should also be systems on the Moon pointed both to Mars and to Earth to send water or hydrogen and oxygen fuels to LOE. 

It or Starship could launch Lunar and Martian habitat modules (with equipment if weight permits) to be sent via some type of orbital maneuvering vehicle into an elliptical orbit to a lunar transfer orbit - without regard for when they land. Just fill the space until ready to install in mass. When ready, intercept modules when close to the Moon and circularize them and then, with fuel generated from Lunar soil (possibly with an autonomous system) land astronauts from the Gateway to transfer fuel modules to landing frames that they can ride up to modules and ride back down - one at a time, refueling on the surface. Also send up in a similar fashion a Lunar-mover to position individual modules into an interlocking habitat with another machine designed to bury habitat modules when linked up.

As you can see, job one is to land and install machinery to extract O2 and H2 and a frame to transfer what should be a whole collection of modules from orbit to the surface. The modules can be launched once designed with an assembly line ready to go. BTW - the same kind of assembly line should be developed to build both simple housing and housing with personal food production facilities (especially hydroponics, but possibly also mini-protein VATs.

Space Station modules (again with or without equipment) can be launched either by screw drive or by Starship - either inflatables or solids - for transfer to LOE and then boosted to a factory orbit for integration and boosting or placement for Earth or Mars Orbit (after we model and test rotational gravity systems). An orbital Mars colony would be crewed in Earth orbit and then boosted. It will take a ridiculous amount of fuel sent up from either the oceans or the Lunar surface, whichever is cheaper. Volume is infinite - meaning we don't have to worry about the size of the ship, just the mass. Inflatable bladders can hold reaction mass for an ionic engine system for the colony tug - which would then refuel from Martian soil (the habitat will remain in orbit) for return to Earth to tug another colony to either Mars, the Belt or one of the gas giants.

Early Mars equipment can be sent from a screw drive catapult from the Moon, with multiple launches in various orbits that can arrive at various curves to intercept Mars on either simultaneous or staggered schedules. Another option is to use Martian moons as a loading dock. With ion engines that worry about mass but not volume, we can build in flexibility.

Cultural Theory Today - 9 Sept 25

Two stories for today.

1. HHS released a report on childhood health that affirmed the Secretary's biases on diet and exercise and his vaccine skepticism - calling for a study on the negative effects of vaccination. A better path would be a study on the actual causes of autism - which will point to genetics rather than impurities in the environment or vaccines. RFK is making decisions based on values - which is part of the job of one appointed by an elected official who shares these values - or has a constituency that does. The problem is that the Secretary has control of scientific decisions. We need to wall that off or put research in a department that requires credentials to head. Such a department should also study climate change without political interference.

2. Not so cultural - we hit an Unidentified Arial Body with a reaper drone. We connected and the UAB, after taking the hit and destroying the drone, righted itself and kept going. Essentially, we fired on tech that is out of this world. Hopefully, this does not show the rest of the galaxy that we are dangerous, although the fact that we believe in the existence of evil, rather than seeing it as a human invention means that we are still primitive and dangerous, which means we will be isolated from the rest of any galactic civilization. If we were to develop socially, we would not need advanced tech - we could have access to it just by joining the rest of sentient life. That this is the case is what makes this a cultural story. 

Othering people by calling them evil is a values decision, not a reasonable one, and it is a group intuition, not a sensory reaction. Although some initial racism is an evolutionary adaptation regarding danger - why can go beyond it with effort. Our efforts have largely been going the other way.

Note to the U.S. Navy - don't shoot at alien tech.

How Close Are We To Building A Practical Skyhook?

The problem with space elevators is artificial satellites crashing into them. You could not have a depot at low earth orbit unless you could lift a booster with the payload, which is also why an air launch is impractical for an orbital vehicle. For example, the Falcon 9 (the lower stage) gets to Mach 8 at 40 miles in altitude. We cannot go that fast (let alone Mach 25, which is orbital velocity which takes an upper stage to reach - which is how fast a sky hook to LEO would go. Could an air drop ship - with SRBs attached to it - be able to get to Mach 8 and carry something as big as Falcon upper? There is very little Oxygen at 40 miles up - and 2 miles up is hard for humans to breath without O2. The only way a ship dropper would work is if it did not have to carry oxygen for its whole journey and not use SRBs. Until a broken washing machine anti-grav engine is built, we are stuck with something like Falcon.

A broken washing machine would contain a spinning weight that wants to be perpendicular to its axis of motion but is prevented from getting there with no friction (such as with magnetic repulsion - and with the field not collapsing). Then the spinning mass must have greater force than the mass of the rest of the ship (or maybe including the throw weights). To not spin out of control, you would have to have counter-rotating masses - so two turbines from one or two reactors - and now things get heavy - however the need to create a heavy enough throw weight may be the necessity for an improvement in reactor technology. You can see posts with these systems laid out at spaceconsortium.blogspot.com - with the anti-grav posted in the earliest set in 2004. A post from that time on space exploration was given to a friend who worked at Goddard in 1995, which was used as a resource for both ULA and the current civil space paradigm - although there was also internal Goddard management initiative that predated this resource. 

The going to Mars post, as with all the earliest posts, actually went up in 2002 on Geocities until the platform was taken down - where John Wayne Smith of 1000 Planets - who is known for wanting to use shuttle fuel tanks as space hab modules - hired me as director of colony planning. We discussed launch options and he dropped the fuel tank option, while I dropped air drop. We settled on trying to contact Elon to see if Falcon heavy or the Starship booster might be able to lift modules. The modules we were thinking of were bigger than ship - having 3 levels - but ships may be workable for smaller modules for an orbiting station, as well as a cradle ship to get modules down to the surface of Mars. If they are fully tricked out that would have to be damn heavy cradle to get itself to orbit and then decelerate from orbital velocity with such a load and travel to the service safely. Of course, an anti-grav ship would make that task easier. Modules would be tricked out in LOE or on the Moon. From LOE would like require lunar materiel, as it takes less delta v to get from the moon to LOE than from the earth's gravity well. The fuel to get from LOE to the Moon, if that were the assembly point, would still have to come from the moon unless a catapult or cannon could launch hydrogen and oxygen (or jet fuel) - or more likely ice - but encased in metal - as well as smaller equipment. Any catapult or gun would have to have a small booster and be able to get payload (with booster) to 40 miles and Mach 8.

Dragon upper stage would need landing legs and SRBs for a first trip to the Moon - then fuel up on material from there (or maybe a set of upper stages) to get materiel from the moon as well as being fueled up enough to get payloads to translunar injection orbits. Or they could ferry ship modules (with landing legs of their own or could have a system that land horizontally with engines at both ends). The question is whether to integrate Ships into space station, lunar habitat or Martian habitat is easier in LOE or on the Moon - or maybe both. It depends, ultimately on the welfare of the workforce - which means that some type of artificial gravity for LOE work (and stations) is practical from the point of view of human anatomy. 

A better way to go to Mars is with large space stations that serve as JPL in orbit - with families and support crew to keep the station running - both technically and as a social system. The size of such a crew for any exploration station - or construction station with family - could be planned out in a "table top" exercise with NASA staff from JPL and Goddard doing a conceptual design - with a facilitator who knows something about Colony Planning and Systems Engineering. I know a guy. I see him in the bathroom mirror a few times a day.

Unfalsifiable Astrophysics: 3 Kinds of Research with Nothing to (Dis)prove

In empiricist science, falsification means that you can only get it wrong once. In exploratory science, you only need to get it right once (and then repeat). The question is, when do we cross the line into engineering?  Also, did Rheinberger falsify Popper?😉🤣Of course, now I have to read Popper for my own research. I need to check on how Patreon works - and see my own page to see if I have any.

My work on the philosophy of science uses the tools of Jungian personality theory and of Mary Douglas work on grid-group cultural theory (which she originally came up with in studying the sociology of religion).  From what I have noticed from these is that science can be lots of things. Social science brings values (feelings) - rather than just reason - into the mix (making it more feminine). The harder sciences put reason (Jungian thinking) above whether it engages in sensory (individual) versus intuitive (communal) perception. Academy, as a rule, attempts to lionize shared intuition and reason - those being the key factors in what Mary Douglas called Hierarchism. Relying more on values than reason, but still using intuition is sectarianism (which some call egalitarianism - although reactionaries use the same methodology).  On all of these polarities, everyone does everything. One polarity is about 80-90 v 10-20, with the second being more like 60-40 - so that one can go either way on the second polarity. For example, I am an extraverted thinker - so I gather in lots of information, not concentrating one thing (introverted thinking) - and can go toward either organizing (sensory/individual) or consensus building (intuitive/group). Let's talk more.

On God and Aliens. In the world of exploratory science, if one person can be proved to have known something while in an NDE that he or she could not have otherwise known (such as someone dying or something happening that he could not have known), then that has to only happen once - which it has. Or we can think of this as falsifying the hypothesis that there is no God. Six on one, half dozen of the other.  My point is that, if NDEs are real, then the God question is pretty much solved - the only question is now how to deal with religious counterprogramming that cannot handle the concept that there is no Hell, which has led to lying in the space by injecting stories - probably lies - that claim only Jesus saves - which Jesus would have found abhorrent - as well as those of us who, using reason - cannot accept a personally vengeful God. In the Old Testament, God punished nations who turned a blind eye to the poor and abused the alien. (Comment on Gaza implied).

I mention Aliens because one way we know they are there is the reporting back of NDE survivors who say that this is not the only civilization in the galaxy - indeed, we are the primitives in a time out because of how we view sin as an opportunity to hate. The original sin is not eating the apple, it is blaming God for keeping the knowledge of the good and evil of others from us. In other words, we invented evil, rather than calling things unfortunate or dangerous. Until we stop doing this and calling it free will, we are unfit for galactic civilization. Finding faster than life travel is not the metric. Finding peace with ourselves is. Of course, once hooked into the galaxy, a whole lot of technological advancement will be technology transfer rather than a need for new science - until the youth of that period can catch up to the state of the art in the galaxy - then we can do science again.

Face facts! Starship will never get humans to the Moon! BUT it can do ...

No Starship or Falcon upper stage should ever deorbit. Find a nice place in space to orbit them and put an Axiom station there as well to manage the gathering inventory until used to build stations (with ship) and boosters (with Falcon). At some point, put up the now theoretical automated fuel factories - then move a load of fuel to earth and use it to start ferrying boosters to the Moon to fuel up and free return to Earth to boost lunar missions. Anything is possible in orbit with enough fuel.