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NASA's More Obscure Lunar Research
MickDownUnder writes "Ever wondered what the moon smells like (and no it's not like wensleydale) ?
Or how good the skiing is there?
If you do decide to hit the lunar slopes you may want to take a torch with you in case you run into your own shadow."
gunpowder.
Is it fascism yet?
but the Low Gravity would be fun.
Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.
...that was one of the things they used on the set when they filmed the moon landing. ;-)
You are in a maze of little twisting passages, all different.
It's extremely interesting how the Apollo 15 astronauts went skiing on the moon. It might suggest a better mode of transport than the buggy they used. Instead of bothering with four wheels, perhaps they really need a Snowmobile? (Or would that be a lunarmobile? Perhaps a dustmobile?) Skiing along like that might allow them to expend less battery power on locomotion, and move from place to place much faster. Having retractable treads so that they can glide might not be such a bad idea either.
:-P
I'll have to patent this now and then charge megabucks for the idea when Moonbase Alpha goes in. At least I'll be able to collect up until the moon gets blown out of orbit.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
No message here
I can't believe how TFA goes on about the moon dust being "formed by violence." This is not not proven fact; it is opinion. It is not NASA's place, nor should it be to make a declaration such as this about the nature of moon dust that discounts intelligent design by a creator. And a benevolent creator would certainly not form anything by violence!
This is more than a science issue, it is a religious issue. And I would hate to think that young people would only be getting one-half of this debate from NASA. That would mean we had failed to properly educate the very people who rely on us for factual information the most.
Since the weather on the moon will not replenish the "powder" upslope in anything resembling a useful timeframe on the scale of human lives (or even human civilizations), that will be the end of that. No more "powder" on the slope and no more "skiing."
Which, I suppose, is by way of wondering what other unwitting long-term effects the presence of people on the moon may wind up causing.
Is it fascism yet?
Some of NASA's most obscure research has been in the area of what to do about human waste products (including and especially the resulting methane gas) in a spacecraft environment. There still isn't a good solution, AFAIK.
This sig is a test. If this had been an actual sig, you would be reading something quite a bit wittier than this now.
Think of it as dredging a lake to restore the beaches. Just push all the powder back up to the top of the hill. Of course, push too hard and it'll go into orbit...
I would presume that the moon smelled like moldy cheese.
But if shadows are so dark, why is the back-lit capsule not dark in the first picture?
I think the superfine stuff on Earth gets picked up by our ubiquitous flowing water and turned into mud, which over geological time gets turned into shale, sandstone, and other sedimentary rock. That is, what we call "sand" on Earth consists of grains too large to be suspended in water. There's a lower limit on the size of "sand" on Earth that doesn't apply to "sand" on the Moon.
The same reason everything tastes like chicken. The designers of the Matrix did not expect Humans to go sniffing moon dust so there was no pre-determined smell for it and some agent panicked and smacked the "spent gunpowder" smell instead of the "it's just a rock" smell.
Government's view of the economy: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving,regulate it. If it stops moving, subsidize it.
Can anyone confirm or deny whether carl sagan really was hired to figure out how big a nuclear blast we'd need on the moon to get a mushroom cloud visible from earth? i'm pretty sure its an urban legend, but its a pretty good story otherwise.
The Moon has "electrically charged dust". Is the net charge of the lunar surface zero, like the ground of the Earth? Is the charge positive or negative, and where did the extra electrons come from (or where did they go)?
--
make install -not war
Well, we will never know if Project A119 was indeed fact or fiction, but it remains a good story nonetheless...
It's so simple, yet the grandparent poster's question had me scratching my head for a second, too.
Many people in my surroundings tell me I'm mad when I tell them that we msut certainly send people to the moon and to Mars, just because it's cool and we can do it. They tell me that it is risky and costs a lot of money. Sure they are right, but we wouldn't be where we are now if we didn't undertake expensive and risky projects now and then. In my opinion going to the moon is the coolest thing humans have ever done, and I can't wait until people will travel to Mars, or back to the moon. Apart from the coolness factor, maybe it's good to have an event that will be followed worldwide by people of all religions and backgrounds, just to bring us a bit closer together again. The world needs that.
-- Cheers!
That was one of the more interesting articles I've ever seen featured on Slashdot. Too bad it was relegated to the back burner.
Proverbs 21:19
This is one of the stories where this isn't a troll:
The Moon: A Ridiulous Liberal Myth.
<DISCLAIMER>
I am not claiming authorship of this, and as such, am only posting a link to the first version of it I found.
Self-moderated down with No Karma Bonus.
</DISCLAIMER>
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
When I was little I liked to break little rocks into dust with a hammer. The resulting dust often smelled like spent gunpowder.
-John Fenley
The net charge of the lunar surface is zero, relative to the moon. Relative to the Earth, it may be and probably is something different. The problem is that the net charge of the Earth being zero is only relative to the Earth. What if we compare the net charge of the Earth's surface to another planet's surface net charge? Will it be zero? Why or why not? Basically, a charge of 0V means there is no potential for eletrical charge to migrate from one location to another. If we put the Earth and the moon close enough to each other we would probably see a lightning bolt as the electrical difference settled the score so the voltage difference between the two bodies was zero. This would probably happen over and over again because there is a lot of activity under the Earth's surface and probably not so much under the moon's surface. That might cause the Earth's surface to keep recharging and shooting lightning at the moon.
Basically, I think it's safe to assume that building a colony on the moon would mean that on the moon, the moon's surface would have a net charge of zero relative to the electrical devices running on it. It would be an interesting question to ask if a space craft from Earth would have to go through a discharge zone before approaching a lunar colony or risk damaging the electronics of either one because it's net charge of zero relative to the Earth's surface would no be 0V on the moon's surface. I assume lightning rods on the moon would perform as well as they do here on Earth, though.
Interesting question and one that could spawn a nice little short story if one was so inclined.
But "it turned out [the ground] was real flat," rejoined Conrad."
Good news, no need to find yourself a job at Apple Computer anymore to experience the Reality Distortion Field, you just gotta go to the moon
You just got troll'd!
While you are correct that water will preferentially suspend finer grains, sand is commonly suspended in any flow that's fast or deep enough. Sand blows through river systems pretty quickly on geologic timescales.
Your are right to point out, though, that this eventually ends up in rock again in some form or another. And this rock gets exhumed and eroded into big particles, some of which may break further down to sand, silt, clay...
So the answer lies in the fact that on earth, additional large debris is generated along with fine debris. On the Moon, it's the same stuff sitting around getting hammered over and over by meteorites. It ends up very fine and very pointy.