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Deep in the Core
meehawl writes "A video of what is currently thought to be the closest star to the supermassive black hole at the centre of our galaxy. The star orbits the black hole in a highly elliptical orbit with a period of 15 years or so, but at its closest approach it swings within 17 light hours of the black hole (around three times the distance between the Sun and Pluto). In the video, you can see the star ricochet past its closest approach to the black hole. This slingshot effect enabled astronomers to further pinpoint the mass of the black hole, which is confidently estimated at 2 million suns or so. The mass observation, coupled with the size constraints observed, indicates the object at the centre of the galaxy is definitely composed of some exotically dense form of matter."
really is pretty awesome. I had no idea that this "slingshot effect" was so 'graphic'...wrong word, okay, 'extreme'. Quite amazing.
It's only 500kb. With all the bloat these days, maybe webpages are approaching that size, easily, if you count the size of the images.
TODO: Something witty here...
Killing each other comes much more naturally, and a large percentage of our technological advances revolve around finding ways to kill each other more efficiently.
While true, there is also a lot devoted to keeping soldiers alive. Penicillin didn't come into widespread use until after a method was devised to mass produce it. It wasn't until during WWII that efficient mass production was developed. Then you have various spin off technologies that have come from it. My hiking boots have shoe laces with teflon in them to make them stronger. A lot of medical monitoring technology has come from NASA and the DoD. I wouldn't be surprised if Medical Filters used in embergency rooms are based off of gas masks. Lightweight wheelchairs came about from needing a lighter wheel chair to get the first astronauts off the space ships (when they could barely walk). How many alloys came about from the need of stronger armor and braces? Think about how useful radar is to us today. The microwave was invented/discovered by a military radar technician who realized his choclate bar melted when he walked past the radar array. Oh the list goes on and on on both sides of the equation.
While some of this may have been discovered sooner or later during peacefull reasearch, it wouldn't have been discovered as soon.
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
What are you talking about? This is a 3D space, not a 2D plane. That star's just crossing in front of it.
Esoteric reference.
True, but also keep in mind that there are things that might have been even better that we still haven't discovered for lack of funding. Research, particularly basic (non goal-oriented) research, pays enormous dividends. Even if it's defense-based, the ROI is so enormous that the discoveries routinely affect everyone. Yes, we get many knock-off products from defense research, but that does not mean that this is the best possible way to allocate research dollars.
If the real goal is the advancement of knowledge and the human condition, then researching how to build things rather than destroy them would probably be a better solution. We'll still get the side effects (hey, this new roofing material is superb for boot soles!), but the original intended effects will be more broadly beneficial.
> > Killing each other comes much more naturally, and a large percentage of our technological advances revolve around finding ways to kill each other more efficiently.
> While true, there is also a lot devoted to keeping soldiers alive.
But only because dead soldiers can't kill people.
mod parent down
mod parent up
mod parent a little to the left.
(Don't you wish you could do that now and then?)
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