Almost mass-produced, medium-sized, modular launchers are probably the better way (this Delta does show some of those aspects - and, say, Angara will be very nicely scalable, from 1 to 7 identical core modules) than some huge, rarely launched rocket & the infrastructure required by it.
Especially since we're quite good, for a long time now, at autonomous docking and on-orbit assembly.
Repurposing and shared-mission SIGINT satellites for scientific use is as old as space flight itself.
And it goes much further than that. R-7 family of rockets is probably the most striking example - a rocket which launched the first satellite and first human in space; which launches to this day Soyuz & Progress spacecraft and many other payloads.
Well, this one will be placed at 44 degrees E, so it's probably not aimed at you - more at Russia, Caucasus, Middle East, perhaps Somalia.
(that said, the one being "replaced" by this launch was moved just to the west of Europe; so between the two of them there's probably a nice view of the EU)
Bus drivers do an order of magnitude better than average drivers, so I wouldn't call what the latter do "good" (well, except that of course 80-90% of them thinks they are in the top 50%...)
For them, preserving us will be roughly analogous to us preserving chimpanzees and gorillas and their habitats.
Not quite - chimpanzees and gorillas are parallel branches, not our ancestors. The latter do live in a way, in us. And considering probably quite rapid (if ever), on evolutionary scale, shift to "AI" - but still gradual - there's a possibility those type of descendants will be us in a much stronger sense than good old biological lineages. Making the question of what "they" will do with "us" a bit moot.
What does that even mean? Both reduce to quantum mechanics... (programmer's intelligence, or generally of intelligent people gathering facts, doesn't exist in isolation, too)
Not sure if so trivial - the irrational thinking extends beyond the "I'm better than the machine", it's also "I'm among the best drivers" (80-90% think they are in the top 50%)
We can probably throw in almost all the elevators around, too (basically a small train on a very short vertical track?;) ). Many of them were manned by a "skilled operator" long after that was no longer necessary...
Boring? Don't think about it in terms of operating a car - it could be more like a train or bus (or, you know, as a passenger of a car), with many ways of filling the passing time.
Especially in case of "long motorways" - where most of your reservations might not apply much sooner.
Somewhat the other way around - it seems what the official talks about is the physical size of the antenna, deployed after launch (apparently around 100m). When it comes to mass it's apparently quite average, and nowhere near the top - that title certainly goes to the ISS... (yes, yes, "modular" - well, just one major ISS module launched by Proton or Shuttle, or ATV launched by Ariane (to use some examples related to ISS; there are other) is ~2x more)
Also, heavy version of Atlas V is the biggest, for some values of "currently in service" (it never flew yet, maybe never will)
There is almost no "unfamiliar course", for a bot driver, in the era of GPS maps now. Will be much more the case when autonomous vehicles will go on sale.
(oh, you want to purposely handicap the abilities of bot driver? Why not blindfold the human while you're at it?)
And quite possibly no reason to send it (a waste really, one way empty...), might be just in the form of car sharing as part of public transport (though it would require us coming to our senses, also including things like bikes in the process)
The location is actually not North Pole, but some place in the Lapland region of...Finland. Only fitting / I'm sure there's more to the story with this touchscreen.
That's why slightly bigger preview would be nice - just glancing over the beginning of a post is often(*) enough to decide if it's worth expanding. One line gives too little, especially on smaller horizontal resolutions and when posts become very nested.
(*)yes, not always - but that's beside the point. You will never manage to read every comment you "should", anyway... Ultimately it's about optimizing the task at hand, and IMHO D2 makes a good effort, in the end (now I can hardly imagine/. comments without the capability to hide large blocks & autorevealing added comments; if only previews were slightly better & if loading new comments could reveal also changes in moderation...) And yes, I do realize how this post (and certainly most of mine) wouldn't pass "is it worth expanding?" glance:P
They are most likely, as far as our current understanding of planet formation goes, very related. Those processes, in turn, are what gave them their orbits (hence also "cleared..." part). And those are things the Scattered Disk objects don't share.
I'm not sure how true even that will turn out - only some people end up, in one way or another, nomadic (Africa has the biggest genetic diversity, despite what some people might think because of appearances); but reaching the sky requires monumental amount of "right alignment" of factors. Perhaps even to the point of doing it before being replaced...
Slashdot Mirror
Almost mass-produced, medium-sized, modular launchers are probably the better way (this Delta does show some of those aspects - and, say, Angara will be very nicely scalable, from 1 to 7 identical core modules) than some huge, rarely launched rocket & the infrastructure required by it.
Especially since we're quite good, for a long time now, at autonomous docking and on-orbit assembly.
Repurposing and shared-mission SIGINT satellites for scientific use is as old as space flight itself.
And it goes much further than that. R-7 family of rockets is probably the most striking example - a rocket which launched the first satellite and first human in space; which launches to this day Soyuz & Progress spacecraft and many other payloads.
It was also the first operational ICBM, R-7 Semyorka (not a very good ICBM, not very practical - but turned out to be a fabulous launcher, the most reliable and most frequently used launch vehicle in the world, and that's coming from, basically, its competitor)
Well, this one will be placed at 44 degrees E, so it's probably not aimed at you - more at Russia, Caucasus, Middle East, perhaps Somalia.
(that said, the one being "replaced" by this launch was moved just to the west of Europe; so between the two of them there's probably a nice view of the EU)
Bus drivers do an order of magnitude better than average drivers, so I wouldn't call what the latter do "good" (well, except that of course 80-90% of them thinks they are in the top 50%...)
For them, preserving us will be roughly analogous to us preserving chimpanzees and gorillas and their habitats.
Not quite - chimpanzees and gorillas are parallel branches, not our ancestors. The latter do live in a way, in us. And considering probably quite rapid (if ever), on evolutionary scale, shift to "AI" - but still gradual - there's a possibility those type of descendants will be us in a much stronger sense than good old biological lineages. Making the question of what "they" will do with "us" a bit moot.
Thought is chemical, not electronic.
What does that even mean? Both reduce to quantum mechanics... (programmer's intelligence, or generally of intelligent people gathering facts, doesn't exist in isolation, too)
There's a difference between keeping high concentration and merely being convinced about it. Especially in mass traffic.
(but yes, we need improvisation and intelligence - for example no elevator can be safe and speedy without its human operat...hm, wait)
Not sure if so trivial - the irrational thinking extends beyond the "I'm better than the machine", it's also "I'm among the best drivers" (80-90% think they are in the top 50%)
More to the point: "anybody driving slower than me is a moron, anybody driving faster - a maniac!"
I don't see many "manned" elevators around nowadays...
We can probably throw in almost all the elevators around, too (basically a small train on a very short vertical track? ;) ). Many of them were manned by a "skilled operator" long after that was no longer necessary...
Of course, the reality of it often is - "human error" ;p
Boring? Don't think about it in terms of operating a car - it could be more like a train or bus (or, you know, as a passenger of a car), with many ways of filling the passing time.
Especially in case of "long motorways" - where most of your reservations might not apply much sooner.
In Soviet Russia, Earth launches you?
Also at GEO mere stationkeeping makes the fuel run low.
Somewhat the other way around - it seems what the official talks about is the physical size of the antenna, deployed after launch (apparently around 100m). When it comes to mass it's apparently quite average, and nowhere near the top - that title certainly goes to the ISS... (yes, yes, "modular" - well, just one major ISS module launched by Proton or Shuttle, or ATV launched by Ariane (to use some examples related to ISS; there are other) is ~2x more)
Also, heavy version of Atlas V is the biggest, for some values of "currently in service" (it never flew yet, maybe never will)
There is almost no "unfamiliar course", for a bot driver, in the era of GPS maps now. Will be much more the case when autonomous vehicles will go on sale.
(oh, you want to purposely handicap the abilities of bot driver? Why not blindfold the human while you're at it?)
And quite possibly no reason to send it (a waste really, one way empty...), might be just in the form of car sharing as part of public transport (though it would require us coming to our senses, also including things like bikes in the process)
Ahhh, but remember there are hardly any mediocre or worst drivers - 80-90% thinks they are in the top 50%.
Power steering and power braking don't just instantly vanish after engine cutoff in general, and newer systems are shifting to electric in particular.
Buses are an order of magnitude safer, so there's quite a lot of room for improvement when it comes to training and abilities of an average driver.
The location is actually not North Pole, but some place in the Lapland region of...Finland. Only fitting / I'm sure there's more to the story with this touchscreen.
That's why slightly bigger preview would be nice - just glancing over the beginning of a post is often(*) enough to decide if it's worth expanding. One line gives too little, especially on smaller horizontal resolutions and when posts become very nested.
(*)yes, not always - but that's beside the point. You will never manage to read every comment you "should", anyway... Ultimately it's about optimizing the task at hand, and IMHO D2 makes a good effort, in the end (now I can hardly imagine /. comments without the capability to hide large blocks & autorevealing added comments; if only previews were slightly better & if loading new comments could reveal also changes in moderation...) :P
And yes, I do realize how this post (and certainly most of mine) wouldn't pass "is it worth expanding?" glance
When talking about market share?
They are most likely, as far as our current understanding of planet formation goes, very related. Those processes, in turn, are what gave them their orbits (hence also "cleared..." part). And those are things the Scattered Disk objects don't share.
The sky calls to us...
I'm not sure how true even that will turn out - only some people end up, in one way or another, nomadic (Africa has the biggest genetic diversity, despite what some people might think because of appearances); but reaching the sky requires monumental amount of "right alignment" of factors. Perhaps even to the point of doing it before being replaced...