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NASA's LLCD Tests Confirm Laser Communication Capabilities In Space
An anonymous reader writes "This week, NASA released the results of its Lunar Laser Communication Demonstration's (LLCD) 30-day test carried out by its Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE) that is currently in orbit around the Moon. According to the space agency, the LLCD mission proved that laser communications are practical at a distance of a quarter of a million miles and that such a system could perform as well, if not better, than any NASA radio system."
Does this make what SETI is looking for pointless? Should they instead be looking for lasers if they work better for communication.
So, when are they sending the first batch of sharks with frick'in lasers attached to their heads to the moon? And will China and India send their own sharks too?
Why don't we have a space program any more? Let's have a space program again, then this stuff will matter.
Lack of a space program is further evidence of America's ongoing loss of the ability to do anything useful. We already outsourced all our manufacturing. We can't build a web site for $600 million and the space program has been reduced to six guys trying to earn a merit badge.
Bring the space program back.
gates referring to his home nt installation said; 'i could not get it to turn off so i threw a blanket over it'. i thought he was daft..... smarter than he lets on?
SETI is about detecting ambient electromagentic waves that may be of an "intelligent" origin. Lasers, however, are a specific form of electromagnetic wave. So in some sense, SETI is already looking for them.
Now, lasers used for communications like this are of the utmost quality. Their dispersion (that is, how much the beam of light separates over time and distance) is very minimal. While a flashlight may have a large dispersion measured in meters a few centimeters from the light source, lasers used for communications usually have a dispersion of less than a tenth of a millimeter over hundreds of thousands of kilometers. This means that we're looking at dispersion of only a few millimeters after millions of kilometers. Even after traveling billions upon billions of kilometers, the dispersion is still measured in only a handful of meters.
Since there's so little dispersion of our modern-day high-quality laser beams, and it's likely that any other "intelligence" could very well have lasers far superior to ours, trying to detect them would be very, very difficult unless you're at the specific location you were targeted at. It's very unlikely that the laserbeam, given its relatively small size, would directly it a SETI detection device.
To put things in perspective, imagine that you're standing at one end of a football field. Then imagine your friend is at the other end. Your friend has a sewing needle, and is somehow able to throw it at you over that distance. The likelihood of SETI successfully capturing an arbitrary laser-based communication signal is still far, far less probable than you catching the sewing needle thrown by your friend from 100 meters away directly in your penis' urethra. I hope that puts it in perspective.
SETI should keep doing what they're doing, because while it's similar in nature to what'd be needed to detect laser-based signals, there's still the probability that any "intelligence" out there may have discovered radio technology first, and they are transmissions that are far easier and much more likely to be detected by non-target receivers.
...dealing with telepathic cats.
The Sun is 1 AU from the Earth, or over 90 million miles away. 1/4 of a million miles is not very far at all in space.
I remember 1961 fondly. I was 31 then. You need to understand that those were very different times. That was pre-Boomer America, which I can assure you was much better than the post-Boomer America we have to deal with now. I'm not looking back through rose-colored glasses, either. The people and accomplishments speak for themselves.
Back then, America was a meritocracy. Those who were were good, regardless of origin or background, succeeded. Those who were great excelled. Those who couldn't were rightfully shunned. Resources were funneled to those who could accomplish great things. And as would be expected, great things were accomplished. July 20, 1969 is a perfect example of this.
But then the Baby Boomers came onto the scene in the mid-1960s. It's safe to say that, as a generation, they have managed to destroy America. Coming from unearned privilege, they did not realize the importance of merit and hard work. Everything was just handed to them. They extended that mentality to everything they got involved with.
As time progressed, Boomers got involved with government and business. Rather than being a limited tool to help society achieve initiatives where the direct financial profit may be small or nonexistent, but the social benefits still large nevertheless, the Boomers converted government into a vehicle for handouts.
Just look where we are today, thanks to the Boomers. Their ruination of government now results in huge sums of money going toward poor, useless, dumb-as-dirt Southerners who waste it on junk food. Then there's the so-called "corporate welfare" going to inefficient, uncompetitive private enterprises. Meanwhile, the budgets of NASA and other actually useful organizations have been slashed to nearly nothing.
Baby Boomers do not know how to properly allocate resources, and that's why so much of America's economy is in turmoil, and its scientific research capabilities severely compromised. Baby Boomers, in a single generation, managed to destroy what was the most productive and capable society that has ever existed. It's one of the greatest shames of history.
By golly if we can put a laser for communicating in space we should be able to put a laser for communicating on a cell phone!
I give you: http://theplayzer.com/
So now NASA employs, through it's politically correct programs of recruitment, people so THICK, they are SURPRISED that light travels excellently through the (mostly) vacuum of space). How America has fallen. Let me guess, all of NASA's toilet facilities are gender 'neutral' too, and the word "Christmas" is banned from all NASA facilities.
This reminds me of the worst US/NATO humiliation ever, when a clearly retarded woman, promoted by NASA to be chief 'scientist' on one of their teams, declared to the world that she had discovered a new form of life on Earth that used different elements in its DNA. Now while well-educated people believe it MAY be possible for DNA-like structures to use certain other elements in place of those found on Earth, in very different chemical/physical conditions on other planets, this woman left her audience gob-smacked when she claimed this 'new' DNA was identical to 'ordinary' DNA, save for arsenic replacing the phosphorous atoms.
Very dim children have the periodic table explained to them by EMPHASISING that elements in a column share similar properties. Dim children latch on to this very simplistic idea as a fundamental principle of chemistry, which it most certainly is not. The NASA woman based her 'theory' on what 11-year-olds are taught about the periodic table. It is as if a watchmaker suggested you might open up your (mechanical) watch, and find a water-wheel replacing one of the usual cogs, because in some (very vague) sense, watch cogs and water-wheels are the same 'class' of object.
NASA's claim, given in a massively promoted press-conference, showed how NASA now employs no real scientists at all at the top of the organisation- explaining why NASA can be used, for political purposes, to push Tony Blair's agenda of man-made climate change. A 'scientist' that can honestly believe ordinary DNA can simply swap one of its constituent elements with another from the same column of the periodic table and function just as well (or actually at all), will prove ANY propaganda based on pseudo-science that Team Blair feels useful to condition ordinary Humans to increasing back the war mongering agenda of Western nations.
NASA is, after all, the space arm of the US armed services. In the days of the TV sitcom, "I dream of genie", when the average American was far better educated, the TV show had ZERO problem making it clear that the two astronauts were members of two branches of the US armed services (Navy and Air-force). Today, the owners of Slashdot think you so stupid, they can push the idea that NASA is but a 'harmless' civilian operation.
after I destroy Washington D.C... I will destroy another major city every hour on the hour. That is, unless, of course, you pay me... one million dollars
A lot of technology is demonstrated, but doesn't find a home,because nobody actually needs it. No scientist is going to risk their $100M science mission on something like laser com, when they can spend $1-2M and get a box-stock radio communications system that works with all the existing ground systems, etc. Sure, they might be limited in data rate, but they also don't have to worry about anything else. There's a huge ground systems infrastructure in radio: deep space network, near earth network, ESA stations, commercial stations, etc. All will happily work with your standard radio for about $1000/hr, delivering your bits to you in the format of your choice.
The laser com folks (who have been working on this for literally decades) are waiting for the customer who absolutely positively MUST have that high data rate that *cannot* be done with conventional safe radio, and who has the money to do their mission.
...porn will be readily available on the Moon and beyond and we can always take a troll through deep space.
What happens when you have to replace the gbic-equivalent on the moon???
Circle the wagons and fire inward. Entropy increases without bounds.