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Astrophysics was a key starting point for discovering Newtonian mechanics, Newton was thinking about gravity and planetary motion. Hard to understate how much i

by joe__f 3y ago

Astrophysics was a key starting point for discovering Newtonian mechanics, Newton was thinking about gravity and planetary motion. Hard to understate how much impact Newtonian mechanics has had on the world.

vosper 3y ago
Newton died 300 years ago. What have developments in astrophysics contributed to “real world” problems in the last 50 years?
- clouddrover 3y ago
  The Global Positioning System is possible through the understanding of relativity. Einstein wasn't thinking about GPS satellites when he came up with relativity, he was just trying to understand how nature works. And a greater understanding of the fundamental workings of nature is what makes more things possible.
  - vosper 3y ago
    Ok, we’re getting closer - general relativity was 107 years ago. Anything in the last 50?
    - clouddrover 3y ago
      Relativity has been continuously worked on for the last century. It's not "old", it's current. Gravity waves are a prediction of relativity. LIGO was built to confirm they exist. It took a long time to build LIGO and a long time to make it work. But eventually it did work in 2016 and sure enough gravity waves exist: https://www.ligo.caltech.edu/ https://www.ligo.caltech.edu/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LIGO https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LIGO Black holes are a prediction of relativity. But black holes weren't imaged until 2019: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_hole https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_hole https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/resources/2319/first-image-of-a-black-hole/ https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/resources/2319/first-image-of-a... The predictive power, the depth of the results, and the work it takes to confirm the predictions of relativity is all a testament to Einstein's genius. If anything, Einstein is underrated.
      - vosper 3y ago
        I don’t think I said Einstein is underrated or that relativity isn’t interesting. I asked what astrophysics had contributed to the “Real world” in the last 50 years. Sounds like mostly “jobs for astrophysicists and builders of astrophysics equipment”. Maybe something developed for LIGO etc will find its way out of the world astrophysics, but so far I don’t think we’ve established a benefit that provided by Starlink-like systems (just my opinion, obviously)
        senttoschool 3y ago
        Maybe we should quit the field of physics and just stand still as a human species so that people living in rural places can use Instagram and TikTok.
    - TheLoafOfBread 3y ago
      Let's write off whole research institution, because everything what they could invent or discover has been invented or discovered. https://medium.com/swlh/everything-that-can-be-invented-has-been-invented-49c4376f548b https://medium.com/swlh/everything-that-can-be-invented-has-...
      - vosper 3y ago
        Where did I say that? The top-of-thread claim was that > This article frames the problem as if the value proposition of the science and the satellites is remotely similar. This couldn’t be farther from the truth. Satellite telecommunication is greatly improving life on earth. Astrophysics, not so much. I was just trying to find out what astrophysics has contributed to life on earth lately (50 years seems like a generous window) because I’m inclined to agree with the claim but would like to know if I’m wrong.
        nazgul17 3y ago
        A quick search returned this article which contains a decent list which includes recent works: https://www.iau.org/public/themes/astronomy_in_everyday_life/ https://www.iau.org/public/themes/astronomy_in_everyday_life... I picked one entry because it has the word "tumor" in it: > Radio astronomers developed a method that is now used as a non-invasive way to detect tumours. By combining this with other traditional methods, there is a true-positive detection rate of 96% in breast cancer patients (Barret et al., 1978). This article also seems to contain a decent analysis: https://nap.nationalacademies.org/read/1635/chapter/14#313 https://nap.nationalacademies.org/read/1635/chapter/14#313 Disclaimer: I only skimmed the articles.
    - joe__f 3y ago
      Some key parts of the Internet were developed at CERN in the 80s, as a by product of funding research in high energy particle physics. As I understand, a motivation for Stephen Wolfram developing the Wolfram language was to develop ideas he has that the universe is inherently computational on a fundamental scale. I read an article recently where he had linked up the Wolfram language with ChatGPT, producing more correct answers and less bullshit. It looked quite impressive. (I respect that it's important to subtract a Wolfram ego factor from articles he writes before you can really appreciate how impressive his results are)

by joe__f 3y ago

vosper 3y ago

Newton died 300 years ago. What have developments in astrophysics contributed to “real world” problems in the last 50 years?

clouddrover 3y ago
The Global Positioning System is possible through the understanding of relativity. Einstein wasn't thinking about GPS satellites when he came up with relativity, he was just trying to understand how nature works. And a greater understanding of the fundamental workings of nature is what makes more things possible.
- vosper 3y ago
  Ok, we’re getting closer - general relativity was 107 years ago. Anything in the last 50?
  - clouddrover 3y ago
    Relativity has been continuously worked on for the last century. It's not "old", it's current. Gravity waves are a prediction of relativity. LIGO was built to confirm they exist. It took a long time to build LIGO and a long time to make it work. But eventually it did work in 2016 and sure enough gravity waves exist: https://www.ligo.caltech.edu/ https://www.ligo.caltech.edu/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LIGO https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LIGO Black holes are a prediction of relativity. But black holes weren't imaged until 2019: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_hole https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_hole https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/resources/2319/first-image-of-a-black-hole/ https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/resources/2319/first-image-of-a... The predictive power, the depth of the results, and the work it takes to confirm the predictions of relativity is all a testament to Einstein's genius. If anything, Einstein is underrated.
    - vosper 3y ago
      I don’t think I said Einstein is underrated or that relativity isn’t interesting. I asked what astrophysics had contributed to the “Real world” in the last 50 years. Sounds like mostly “jobs for astrophysicists and builders of astrophysics equipment”. Maybe something developed for LIGO etc will find its way out of the world astrophysics, but so far I don’t think we’ve established a benefit that provided by Starlink-like systems (just my opinion, obviously)
      - senttoschool 3y ago
        Maybe we should quit the field of physics and just stand still as a human species so that people living in rural places can use Instagram and TikTok.
  - TheLoafOfBread 3y ago
    Let's write off whole research institution, because everything what they could invent or discover has been invented or discovered. https://medium.com/swlh/everything-that-can-be-invented-has-been-invented-49c4376f548b https://medium.com/swlh/everything-that-can-be-invented-has-...
    - vosper 3y ago
      Where did I say that? The top-of-thread claim was that > This article frames the problem as if the value proposition of the science and the satellites is remotely similar. This couldn’t be farther from the truth. Satellite telecommunication is greatly improving life on earth. Astrophysics, not so much. I was just trying to find out what astrophysics has contributed to life on earth lately (50 years seems like a generous window) because I’m inclined to agree with the claim but would like to know if I’m wrong.
      - nazgul17 3y ago
        A quick search returned this article which contains a decent list which includes recent works: https://www.iau.org/public/themes/astronomy_in_everyday_life/ https://www.iau.org/public/themes/astronomy_in_everyday_life... I picked one entry because it has the word "tumor" in it: > Radio astronomers developed a method that is now used as a non-invasive way to detect tumours. By combining this with other traditional methods, there is a true-positive detection rate of 96% in breast cancer patients (Barret et al., 1978). This article also seems to contain a decent analysis: https://nap.nationalacademies.org/read/1635/chapter/14#313 https://nap.nationalacademies.org/read/1635/chapter/14#313 Disclaimer: I only skimmed the articles.
  - joe__f 3y ago
    Some key parts of the Internet were developed at CERN in the 80s, as a by product of funding research in high energy particle physics. As I understand, a motivation for Stephen Wolfram developing the Wolfram language was to develop ideas he has that the universe is inherently computational on a fundamental scale. I read an article recently where he had linked up the Wolfram language with ChatGPT, producing more correct answers and less bullshit. It looked quite impressive. (I respect that it's important to subtract a Wolfram ego factor from articles he writes before you can really appreciate how impressive his results are)