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Dawn Spacecraft Gets a Better Look At Ceres' Bizarre 'White Spots'
StartsWithABang writes: Since its discovery as the first asteroid more than 200 years ago, Ceres has been one of the most poorly understood objects in the Solar System as even imagery from the Hubble Space Telescope is unable to resolve very much. But NASA's Dawn mission, since moving on from Vesta, has begun to map Ceres, constructing the highest resolution global map ever, with better data to come. The greatest mystery so far are two bright white spots at the bottom of a deep crater, brighter and more reflective than anything else on the planet's surface. Right now, three leading possibilities for the origin of these features exist, with Dawn possessing the capabilities to teach us which one (if any) is correct, hopefully by the end of the year!
Don't solar panels specifically not reflect light? It's obviously an alien hotspring spa destination.
Don't solar panels specifically not reflect light?
That could be why they're abandoned...
For the love of all science fiction be aliens!!! How many Sci-fi stories have we all read where an asteroid/comet/artefact is floating around our Solar system and it turns out to be some uber cool alien thing that has warp drive or a stargate or whatever and off we go adventuring around the galaxy?
In fact I could even narrow the question down to how many sci-fi stories have we all read where the artefact involved Ceres?
So while if I had to bet I would go with ice, soil disturbance, tectonic, or maybe even something a little cool like magnetic. But I want aliens!
There is always a soft spot under one of the black round circles on a coconut.. its where the straw goes! Perhaps this is where we are supposed tap into the interstellar fuel source!
Time for a new Political party in the US (or two!) One is off the rails Other cant pony up a leader.
No need to click - the "three leading possibilities" are exactly what you guessed:
- Ice
- Dry Ice
- Different rocks that have a different albedo
If you only guessed "ice" and "different rocks" you still get full credit.
Interesting question. The explanation for ice skates I was taught as a kid (weight of skater forces surface of ice to melt, making it slippery) appears to be discredited. Still, I'd expect any loosely-bonded water molecules between skates and the ice would boil away instantly in near vacuum. Has anybody ever tried skating at very high altitude?
I figure by 2030 or so my 6-digit UID will be something to brag about.
Bonobos are pretty smart, and a rough estimate might put them about 5 million years behind us on the evolutionary scale.
They are not behind, they are right next to us on another path, and we have no way of telling where they'll go.
> Having a diamond the size of Texas would certainly create a new space race
Diamonds are not a compelling reason to go to other planets. The difference in economic scale is staggering. Diamonds are an artificially constrained resource. De beers and friends have conspired to keep cheap artificial diamonds (not fake zirconium) out of the luxury market, somewhat successfully. This doesn't mean it's work spending billions of dollars to get more. We can manufacture them here, cheaper than going out into orbit, much less another planet.
Often wrong but never in doubt.
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Everyone knows me.
This doesn't mean it's work spending billions of dollars to get more. We can manufacture them here, cheaper than going out into orbit, much less another planet.
But these are SPACE DIAMONDS, and clearly far more likely to get you laid than those silly artificial diamonds.
Message from Ceres to Pluto
> Having a diamond the size of Texas would certainly create a new space race
Diamonds are not a compelling reason to go to other planets. The difference in economic scale is staggering. Diamonds are an artificially constrained resource. De beers and friends have conspired to keep cheap artificial diamonds (not fake zirconium) out of the luxury market, somewhat successfully. This doesn't mean it's work spending billions of dollars to get more. We can manufacture them here, cheaper than going out into orbit, much less another planet.
Just buy white sapphire. Looks just like a diamond unless you compare them side by side (and then only by color of the light or by hardness) and about a third of the price.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
Bonobos just figured out that civilization is a lot of extra work to go through for fucking and eating. Especially when you can just fuck and eat without it.
Overall I don't think there's be any reason for them to suspect that we were once here.
True but possibly because they may never make the leap now that all the easy fuel is used up. Wasn't there a story on here a few days ago about how difficult it would be to restart industry after a civilization collapse because there would be no infrastructure that can drill 10000ft underwater, etc? It took a lot more than 5M years under very different surface conditions for all that oil and coal to collect. The fact that we've burned as much fossil fuel as we did makes me think that there hasn't been a prior intelligent species (or at all?).
Yes, they do, and no, they're not.
"Think about how stupid the average person is. Now, realise that half of them are dumber than that." - George Carlin