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The difference here is that space is a lot more international (and thus harder to police) than your wrist. We really want to avoid https://en.wikipedia.org/wik
by MauranKilom 6y ago
The difference here is that space is a lot more international (and thus harder to police) than your wrist.
We really want to avoid https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome, and so far humanity has shown a pretty terrible track record when it comes to exploiting earth's commodities or ensuring the prevention of long-term global disasters...
Already we have astronomers being increasingly hindered by man-made objects dashing through the field of view of ground-based telescopes.
- cmehdy 6y agoScott Manley made a good youtube video about just how much of the "basic" stuff one can already see around the earth by recording the sky in a 360-degrees video from a deserted place[0]. The current trends in launches with little thinking about the long run reminds me a bit of how we've approached fossil fuels.. we're basically waiting to hit the wall hard before re-thinking our approach. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJNGi-bt9NM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJNGi-bt9NM
- LargoLasskhyfv 6y agoNice video. But one can have almost the same by installing [1] http://stellarium.org/ http://stellarium.org/ fiddling with the settings for activating the satellite tracking plugin and TLE-data import, and maybe even import ones own horizon panoramic silouette for perfection. Stellarium is a really very good program!
- vkou 6y agoYou don't even need to be in a deserted place, with super-human vision to see this! Just grab a pair of binoculars, go out on your roof, and look at the sky. I'm in the middle of a light-polluted city, and I can observe a satellite transit directly overhead every minute or two.
- divbzero 6y agoI’ve spotted a similar frequency of satellite transits by eye and don’t recall seeing so many as a child. Not sure if I’m more observant now or if there’s really been a marked increase.
- progers7 6y agoSee A Satellite Tonight (https://james.darpinian.com/satellites https://james.darpinian.com/satellites) is a nice tool for finding these. I have a young kid and it's been fun heading out at night and spotting these.
- hahajk 6y agoThe good news (for now) is most of these low cost satellites are going into LEO and will deorbit on their own, even if something goes wrong with their planned deorbit (like a collision).
- holoduke 6y agoPost processing of images i desired at all times. Filtering out moving dots isnt that hard. not even if the sky gets 1000 times more populated. I know this is not a populair view, but sky pollution by satelites is way too overestimated. City light pollution is much more affecting the nightly life of people
- ISL 6y agoHow much are you willing to wager that filtering out moving dots with intensity comparable to or somewhat below the statistical noise in an instrument is easy? Furthermore, for transit-hunting experiments, a slight dip in a star's brightness once per year or once per decade is the entire signal. Even if the satellite doesn't produce a moving dot, surely it cannot be transparent and non-refractive.
- growlist 6y agoSpace-based astronomy is the future, and lowered launch costs should contribute towards that.
- ISL 6y agoLowered launch costs can't compare with the expedience of ground-based experiments. Some things work really well in space, some do not. Low-cost launch will revolutionize some experiments, but not all. Building radio experiments like SKA, big telescopes like TMT, or starting up innovative low-budget instruments like Dragonfly is still impossible with low-cost launch. In the latter case, until a graduate student with a screwdriver can make daily adjustments to an on-orbit instrument, we will lose the earliest-stage R&D capability. Finally, it is essential for our future generations to see a dark and unfettered sky with the human eyeball. That perpetual perspective, for 7,500,000,000 people, is inaccessible with launch vehicles.
- grey-area 6y agoEverything is more international nowadays. Not sure this is a problem at all? Kessler syndrome is far more likely to be caused by war than progress in satellites. Space is big and sats are tracked and powered nowadays. How about we stop starting wars instead of stopping progress? Space based telescopes are going to be vastly more useful and popular than land based telescopes today. As costs come down dramatically access to space is going to expand rapidly, that is a good thing, not something to fear.
- Moru 6y agoLet's put fear away, this is an excellent idea for another startup - Space Garbage Trucks!
- chromedev 6y agoUntil we start mining other planets, pretty much all space missions are going to have a huge costs on precious resources either directly or indirectly. We are basically hitting the point of no return if we haven't already passed it when it comes to destroying the natural balance on our own planet, and when things get bad here on Earth, leaving to civilize space or another planet will be reserved for affluent. Right now we are basically just helping them accomplish that goal for them to one day say... "So long suckers!"
- grey-area 6y agoIncorrect. When starship is flying space missions will cost a few million in lox and liquid methane. No precious resources involved. This is not an either/or choice - we can both improve life on earth and expand into space, and we will.
- raducu 6y agoIsn't there another "Kessler syndrome" we need to talk about? The colision of signals travelling in free space, that is. Unless we talk about super directional signals, eventually we will run out of bandwidth to talk to those satellites. Perhaps higher orbit satellites could talk to SpaceX satellites in lower orbit(again, very directional signals) which in turn could relay those signals via internet, not yet practical though.
- StevenWaterman 6y agoThat is quite different as it's a gradual worsening, which stops getting worse if we stop broadcasting signals. The issue with kessler syndrome is that once it starts, space is immediately unusable for decades if not centuries, even if we turn everything off and stop launching new satellites.
- FeepingCreature 6y agospace below the debris shell* is unusable for satellites* You can still launch through a Kessler shell. It's not very dense in absolute terms.