Slashdot Mirror
Voyager 1 Reaches Interstellar Space
letxa2000 writes "CNN is reporting that Voyager 1, now some 8.4 billion miles (90 AUs) from the sun, has left the solar system and entered interstellar space by reaching the heliopause. However, whether the probe has reached the heliopause or is just coming close is the subject of two papers to be published in Thursday's Nature Magazine. The probe supposedly has enough nuclear fuel to last until 2020. Will it be able to find anything interesting outside the solar system in the next 17 years?"
What's the range of communications for the probe? When will we lose our connection (if we haven't already)?
What is this fuel used for? Just for communicating, or does it still need acceleration? If it's just for communication, couldn't they make it last longer by increasing the intervals between each time it communicates?
How small a thought it takes to fill a whole life
Detailed answer: Yes.
Questions that can still be investigated by Voyager include a number of questions about the interaction between the solar wind, solar magnetic field, and interstellar medium, direct measurements of the interstellar magnetic field, the actual composition of interstellar gas, where exactly the heliopause lies, and how it's affected by changes in solar activity. I'm sure there are even more questions that I haven't thought of.
"They redundantly repeated themselves over and over again incessantly without end ad infinitum" -- ibid.
That's how long it takes a signal to reach us from the probe. When you consider the galaxy is 100,000 light years across, 8.4 billion miles is nothing.
of how scientists do not take the next big leap. What frightens me the most is that we have not sent more probes after Voyager.
Coming up is a planetary alignment that would allow a route to Tau Ceti, one of the reasonably nearby stars that could have an inhabitable planet. Using modern high-velocity nuclear engines, a probe could be engineered to reach it in 100 years, roughly. And a craft could be engineered to actually survive the travel *and* send back useful data.
I want to see interstellar probes, engineered to travel to the nearest (12ly or less) stars and explore them.
Karma Whoring for Fun and Profit.
How did it get so fucking dusty in the vaccuum of space in the first place?
The whole thing sounds made up.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
I wonder if we'll ever see space technology advance enough so that, one day, we might be able to send a spacecraft past Voyager. Maybe we'll have some form of near-light-speed travel, or even faster-than-light travel, and manage to reach other stellar systems before Voyager does ?
In any case, I'll be more than satisfied if we establish a colony on Mars, tag me a conservative if you will, but I don't feel like leaving good old Sol just yet.
Maybe we deserve this world ?
It has nothing to do with "not caring".
Many, many homeless simply cannot be helped. The borderline mentally ill would have to be forced into homes - which would violate their rights under the constitution. Addicts would have to be forced into treatment, which again, barring the commission of a crime, would violate their rights.
If you were homeless, and wanted help, it's out there. Noones going to build you a 200,000 home and hand you the keys, but if you need a mailing address, a shower and shave, a hot meal, and clean clothes to get yourself a job - you could do so.
Did you know, however, that the average panhandler in NYC makes more than the average NYC police officer? "Homelessness" can be very lucrative. 45 k a year - tax free, and with very low overhead.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Yes... kinda feeling old (I just turned 36) but I remember when Voyager was launched. It was emotional then, and its emotional now. Think: back then, 640k was a *lot*, and the standard logic was 7xxx series TTL chips. Dunno what CPU, but I doubt it was anything so advanced as a Z-80. Dunno what firmware either, if any - coulda been hardwired. Can't remember shit here.
Now, if you ask me: That's a beautiful piece of engineering, that we're still getting some use from.
It's already had some sensor damage, etc; the main question is how long the remaining sensors hold up, IMHO.
*...sniff...*
C|N>K
From the band Warlord:
"Through Pioneer 10 and Voyager 1
We've launched our knowledge to other suns
Aspiring and reaching for the highest of beings
We've lost our search for the world's basic needs"
I hope it does find something, or something finds it. Earth could use some good news.
So rise up, all ye lost ones, as one, we'll claw the clouds.
Voyager has been moving through space in ways unexplainable by physics. There is a small acceleration that can't be accounted for using known laws. It's almost like gravity doesn't work quite the way we think it does.
Of course, there is always the possibility that we just can't see the source of the acceleration, and it'll turn out to be something simple. However so far, all proposals put forth to explain it have been shown to be incorrect.
There is a deeper connection to very important issues in physics. For decades we have been studying the fabled "dark matter" which is supposed to be the cause of the anomalous rotation of the galaxy. The galaxy does not move in ways predicted by the laws of gravity. It is as if there is a huge amount of hidden mass which is influencing its rotation. So far we have not found any of this "dark matter."
But imagine the possibility. What if dark matter doesn't really exist? What if it's our understanding of gravity that is wrong? This would have profound implications throughout physics. After all our only direct experience of gravity is what happens here on Earth and within the bounds of the solar system. Except that today, we have a probe that has crossed that limit.
Perhaps the anomalous motion of Voyager will shed light on the situation. I for one would be utterly elated if it turns out we have to rewrite our physics books.
Voyager isn't useless yet!
Hmmm... Last time I checked we lived in a Market Economy.
What makes our society different than many others on this rock, is that market economies put the responsibility of decision on the individual, not the government.
If I choose not to work, I starve, unless someone has pity and gives me a meal. The bigger question is is society responsible for my inaction? If people continue to give me handouts, what incentive is there for me to better my situation? In fact, given enough time and enough free meals, wouldn't I expect and demand that people give me a free meal?
Poverty happens, whether by birth or by circumstance. Our responsibility as a society is to teach those in poverty skills which will allow them to escape it. Once we've given that opportunity, society owes the poor nothing more. It is up to each individual to pull themselve up by their own effort, not by leeching off the kindness, whether mandated or not, of others!
Is this "average" also "typical"? I.e., what's the median and mode, and the stddev?
Not trying to flame, just really curious where stats like this come from, how they're verified, and what the rest of the data look like.
"The real problem is that society, as a whole, just doesn't care enough about the unfortunates enough to do anything."
Funny, when I read this, a memory bubbled to the surface. I was at a fast food joint one night. A homeless woman tapped my shoulder and asked for money to buy food. Thinking "hey, we're in a restaraunt, she'll actually use the money to buy food!" I gave her $5. She turned right around, wandered outside, and headed in the direction of a nearby shopping center complete with liquor store. The woman next to me in line was astonished. I wasn't terribly happy about that.
Can't entirely blame society here. The whole 'teach a man to fish he can eat for a life time' story comes to mind. It's hard to buy a homeless guy a meal and let him go off to bum a meal off of somebody else the next day. I can give him my money, but what will he do to help himself?
Society's not generally being cold hearted here. They are, however, closing themselves off from being taken advantage of. I don't have a solution to the homeless problem, but I'm reasonably confident that feeding them isn't the answer. They need to be made independent. Show me a way I can contribute to that, and I'm all ears.
Don't assume people don't care. They do care. The problem is the solution isn't there.
"Derp de derp."
For those interested in scientific accuracy, there is a little bit of misinformation in the statement:
What scientists are speculating is that Voyager 1 has reached termination shock, which is the where the solar wind first meets interstellar plasma.
Heliopause is the outer boundary of the solar wind. This Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD) from June 24, 2002 provides a nice graphically illustrated explanation of Heliopause and Terminal Shock.
It will take a number of years more for Voyager 1 to reach heliopause. Voyager 1 is currently about 90 AUs away. Heliopause is speculated to exist at 110 to 150 AUs.
And that's the real reason why Schrodinger's cat is both alive and dead until you peek in the box - it saves space when nobody's looking anyway. And you thought quantum mechanics was complicated.
--
Power to the Peaceful
Actually, it's my understanding that the Oort Cloud extends several thousand AU's outside the solar system. Those are the objects that come in for a pass near the sun ever million years or so... I'm not sure how far out they've been detected so far, but I'm pretty sure they're way out there.
I only have one problem with the whole dyson sphere idea. Assuming you are trying to walk around inside it, what is going to keep you on the ground? Not gravity.
One of the problems we had to deal with in my college physics courses was figuring out the effect of gravity on an object inside a shell, resultant from that shell. And you know the answer we came up with? Zero, Zilch, the gravity from the shell counteracts itself no matter where you are in the shell. Simply put, even though you are might be closer to one spot on the shell, the fact that most of the mass of the shell is now on the other side of you, cancels out the effect of the distance.
Here is a reference, for those that don't trust me.
So my point is, why would anyone build a dyson sphere in the first place, unless its just a collector and the people live elsewhere?
Necessity is the mother of invention.
Laziness is the father.
You could spin the shell for apparent gravity and live on the inside equator. There's a ton of lebensraum in a 1AU radius sphere.
Vino, gyno, and techno -Bruce Sterling
Inpatient treatment for alcoholics costs a good $20,000, only $12,000 of which is paid by insurance. It's estimated that 10% of the North American populace is alcoholic, though most aren't far gone at any moment. Do you have $30 billion to treat them all? And indeed, far more, because currently only a few are treated, and facilities are limited. To treat them all, we'd have to build vastly more.
STDs, diabetes, cancer... these are all things you have to deal with once the starving people aren't dying. Once they're healthy and thriving, new things like heart disease and anorexia start to be major problems.
Charity is a never-ending well. The world doesn't have the resources to fix all the problems, no matter how many studies say we can cure world hunger, because world hunger is just a dam on the river of woes that mankind can suffer. If the world can't solve them, no man can. Not even Bill Gates, with his measly $40 billion.
So try this old maxim, admittedly a bit tarnished from use by the Soviets: "Take according to need, give according to ability." If your ability is sending up rockets, fine. If your ability is healing the sores of lepers, great! The world will lurch forward and evolve on it's own. It's far too big for you to about-face.
And anyway, the most useful things in moving man forward in the past have been what others have considered a waste, like art, literature, and philosophy. Newton saved more lives being a self-absorbed man, in the long run, than ever Mother Teresa did.