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coldel

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Everything posted by coldel

  1. No assumptions on brightness and distance, its all doable here on planet earth turn on a light and measure the time in another position. I would imagine its clear that the further a light is away the harder it is to see. the less bright it is and the longer it takes to travel. So yes you measure how far light has travelled and I would say you assume there is a light emitting entity at the source which has fired off energy which has a destination which is where the telescope picks it up. Which isn't a daft assumption as again you can easily replicate here on earth. Clearly drastic changes in density can refract light and bend light (black holes?) which increases or decreases its brightness and thus distance but you have to drop that into the calculation, but a calculation that gets 99% right is still as good as anything and could be 100% accurate in the absence of abnormalities like black holes between us and the light source.
  2. Because its simple maths if you try. You can look at a position in the sky of a star, then say half a year later look again (yes they are in different positions) and you have three points and simple trigonometry allows your to triangulate distance. Clearly the further away something is the less the angle so it becomes impossible as the distance the Earth rotates the sun is not big enough to make the angle sufficient to measure difference, thats when colour spectrums and brightness come into play. But in terms of distance, apparently it would take hundreds of millions of years for the sun to complete a single orbit of the galaxy, so the constellations havent moved in a 1000 years, well of course not, we have a long way to go. It really isn't that hard to believe, drive your car through a tunnel and hear the noise bounce off the walls, its energy and it moves and it takes time - light is an energy just like sound is you just need to use established and proven ways of measurement at a larger scale. Given that the planet has been around for millions of years, stars having not moved in say 1000 years is quite sensible (that said 1000 years ago there was not the technology to accurately place stars in the sky) if you move a marble on a table 1mm over the course of a year it will look like its in the same position.
  3. Yep, could be looking at the past, something which disappeared.
  4. By very clever people who understand physics much more than we do! Fact is that until we solve the survival challenge of space we rely on these sort of vessels to go explore on our behalf, it must be exciting and frustrating in the same instance that you have to wait years to see the fruits of your labour but when you see something no one has ever seen before...
  5. Yes its effectively time travel, that we see things from many years ago, looking into the past. It really blows the mind to imagine that you are looking back in time as well as looking across the expanse of space. That in say 10000 years time another form of life could be looking in our direction and seeing our sun which might not be there and we are long gone.
  6. As exciting as making a bigger rocket is this is amazing https://www.nasa.gov/feature/new-horizons-captures-record-breaking-images-in-the-kuiper-belt Over three and a half billion miles away there is something man made getting on with looking further into space, it blows the mind. I know there were a lot of knockers when taking photos of the 'blue dot' a couple of years ago with Saturn in the foreground it really is astonishing that something can still pass information back to our planet from so far away.
  7. Its one of those things isn't it. Tesla realise that fossil fuels will run out/atmosphere is dying, governments know it, car firms were making little progress in moving to EVs, US government keeps Tesla from going belly up for years with billions of dollars to develop the tech regular car firms were not willing to move to. Ultimately tech can be replicated, I can only see the big firms copy/purchase Tesla once they have it nailed down and everyones happy. Its quite common for governments to spend billions of taxpayers money on cleaner energy, the UK government gives plenty of money to companies to develop better energy solutions.
  8. Space X is part funded by NASA, they are contracted to them to fulfill particular space development requirements whilst NASA work on other projects, from what I read - makes sense really to get private firms to focus on particular streams of development after all NASA only has finite staff, premises, equipment.
  9. Not unusual for Tesla to miss a target though is it
  10. Keep things civil please people or I will unleash the power of the lock...
  11. Cloverfield Paradox is utter garbage, it was worse than I actually thought it was going to be! A mismash of confused storylines stealing all the classic part from other sci-fi films and just making a complete mess of it. With JJ Abrams involved and some good actors like Daniel Bruhl on the cast you would think they could cobble together a decent storyline! It really was rubbish it was almost laughable.
  12. Yes I am a cynical old so and so now - but I think Mr Musk is just aiming to please his ego and say 'hey look at me' rather than putting his publicly financed wealth towards actual issues that will kill us all off way before we work out how to actually survive in space. The 'space survival challenge' has been there for decades which he has ignored from what I can see. All that said, it did look amazing watching those two booster rockets land. Has anyone got any footage of the main unit crashing though?
  13. Had a housemate years back who did TA. Again a bit of a headcase who seemed to like inflicting aggression on people, probably best he did it there rather than on members of the public. From what I saw he never socialised with any of the other TA outside of when they were on tour/training had his own friends back in the civilian world.
  14. Where does it say this on that website? All I can see are a list of news stories on each of his businesses. Terrible website by the way looks like it was set up in a day by someone buying some free website software! Surely if I was looking to avoid planetary extinction I would have a vision focused on the planet? So that would include reduction in all pollutants, waste products, landfill, so on and so forth. To be quite frank the Space X programme is just a private companies effort to get on the payroll of countries who need a vehicle to put satellites into space, it will be a huge money spinner. If the vision for it was planetary exploration why is he not investing in the main issues which are space survival, our bodies failings in zero gravity, radiation issues, fuels that work in space that are more efficient, lighter, less volatile etc. Thats the goal for space exploration. The cynic in me sees it somewhat differently, he wants to build a commercial product for launching larger satellites. The Mars thing is just to garner support from the inner child in us all.
  15. I think it gives you some indication of priorities. Musk has had money thrown at him for years to get EVs off the ground and to be quite frank the process has been much slower than expected, whilst Space X seems to be making much bigger strides. But ultimately whats the point of Space X? Whats the company vision? Whats the point? If its purely bragging rights then it seems like a monumental waste of money - if there genuinely is a thought through plan for it to address all the challenges of space travel and not just building the biggest rocket then good on it. It just seems daft that whilst Model 3 production skips QC stages and cannot build enough batteries so we cannot get CO2 vehicles off the road that are destroying our planet, yet they can launch a tesla into space, what on earth is the point - he shouldnt be getting financed by the taxpayer if its purely an ego trip for him with no actual usable end product. Edit: Im sure I could spend a few hours on google finding some answers but have better things to do...!
  16. Just watched the first 10 mins of the Cloverfield Paradox on Netflix, looks a bit crap already but worth giving it a go. I really liked Bright with Will Smith that came out recently though! Will start on Altered Carbon soon...
  17. I guess like anything there generally has to be a reason for spending tens of billions on something - simply getting a man to Mars, what is the reason other to say you have done it? When there are millions starving to death, millions homeless, millions without clean water here on this planet right now. Sure its 'exciting' to get someone up there but no government is going to fund that just for the sake of it (and quite rightly so) so its up to privateers.
  18. I used to follow space exploration I totally wanted to be an astronaut ad a kid (hey didn't we all!) from what I understand the issues of getting to Mars are that we cannot build craft with enough fuel to get there and back, that radiation would kill you before you got there and that landing would be nigh on impossible for the size of craft required to get there and back. Can see he is attempting the landing bit but who is sorting the other issues?
  19. Yep lived in central Tokyo and it was FANTASTIC. And great memory guys, or do I just go on and on about it all the time? It was about ten years ago but pretty sure most of what I remember still exists in terms of tourist stuff to do. I also traveled around Japan a fair bit. In general learn to be patient, polite, smile - any display of bad manners is a big no no. Learn the word that's pronounced 'sumi-mas-san' it effectively means 'excuse me' and you will need to use it when in busy places and you bump into someone etc. Of course 'ari-gato-gozai-mas' is 'thank you' use it when you can it will get you a little extra special treatment in restaurants etc. Off the top of my head for Tokyo: 1. Meiji Jingu Shrine, its huge and if you are lucky and go on a weekend you may see a real wedding with everyone dressed up in ceremonial outfits 2. Right outside the entrance to this shrine is a place called Harajuku which is famous for a bridge where the Japanese youth come and wear outrageous outfits and pose for photos - its also a very cool and funky place to shop for all sorts of crazy clothes etc. 3. If the wife wants to do some upmarket shopping you will want to visit Ginza which is full of all the prestigious department stores and brands - this also has the Kabuki za theatre here where you can nip in on the afternoon and watch comedy drama in crazy outfits all in Japanese but its very visual so easy to follow 4. In Asakusa you have the Senso-ji shrine which is really famous for lots of things including the incense pot which if you breath in the incense it cures all ailments 5. Shibuya is a great place for evenings out, loads of bars and restaurants and has the multiple direction pedestrian crossing which has been in many movies - you can also find the karaoke bar from that Bill Murray/Johanssen movie - by the way, definitely do karaoke, its super cool to do it and it comes with all the extras you can go in sing and get served food and drinks as you do. You can book just 30 mins if you dont think you can hack the missus voice for that long! 6. Onsens are big in Japan, if you dont have any tattoos you can use them. It does mean going in the buff into a hot pool with strangers (gender segregation of course) but worth doing it (Japanese will really respect you for it too), maybe save it for Kyoto as the Tokyo ones are a bit functional 7. Jump on the tram that goes over Rainbow bridge to Odaiba - best done at night so you can see all the lights. Odaiba is an island which contains all the big Japanese corporations but you can walk around their buildings and of course loads of restaurants etc 8. I cannot remember the name (Tusiki?) but the fish markets are great if you like fish - you need to get there at 5am for when the boats arrive back from sea but you can buy and eat fish taken straight from the sea there you will never have eaten anything fresher 9. If you like gadgets Akihabara has literally hundreds of electronics stores you can shop in - beware though although electronics are cheap in Japan for the Japanese brands they often do not have an English language option, I ended up buying a fair few SLR camera lenses as they are effectively language redundant at about 1/3rd the price of them here in the UK. Although I hear the pound isn't so strong nowadays... Had a quick look and here is a copy of the metro/underground/trains https://www.tokyometro.jp/en/subwaymap/pdf/rosen_en_1702.pdf it runs perfectly every minute of every day. When I lived there once my journey home from work was delayed by something like 12 minutes because of an electrical fire in a tunnel. Trains were back to normal in 12 minutes, imagine here it would be out of action for a week. They run to a schedule that includes seconds i.e. trains arrive at 17:25 and 15 seconds its that good. Taxis are everywhere, like literally you only need wait a few seconds before one comes along, its tempting to use them all the time but they are pricey and you miss the experience of using public transport. Additionally, do ask for directions if you are lost in popular areas in Tokyo, most Japanese speak some level of English and they LOVE to practice it with real speakers. I got a tattoo done in Tokyo and I got a discount by teaching the artists daughter English whilst having it done haha. Also, dont be surprised it they walk you to the place you are looking for, its common for people to do this rather than point in the rough direction and send you on your way, dont worry they dont expect payment just your gratitude Do experiment with food, when I was there Tokyo had more michelin star restaurants than anywhere else in the world, they love cooking but are accommodating to non Japanese speakers usually with photos and even plastic mock ups of meals you might be ordering! Not sure if you have sorted out your travel to Kyoto yet but the standard approach is bullet train, if you can afford to upgrade get yourself in a green car to sit in absolute luxury. Other places which are pretty cool are Nara, I went to both Hiroshima and Nagasaki, they are lacking culture and the architecture is quite bland as you might expect for cities that were effectively leveled to nothing - I would spend one night in Hiroshima and visit the A Dome (building directly below the explosion epicentre that was the only thing that stayed up) and see the ever burning flame of peace (I think its called) its all very emotional and a great way to remind yourself the reality of war. I also visited Nagano for a spot of skiing and visited the mountain monkey park which was cool. In Kyoto you must visit Kiyomizu which is a mountain side temple (and a lot of walking!) also there is the Golden Temple near Kyoto another must see.
  20. I think some extra rules from OP would help otherwise I put forwards the Chiron, easy in traffic, performance, practical...
  21. Not owning an Android phone I am not sure, although imagine someone on here might know.
  22. In terms of navigating the pages - on an iphone I know if you double tap the status bar at the top it takes you straight back up. Alternatively if you are on a laptop/pc with a keyboard simply pressing home will again return you to the top.
  23. There was quite a lot of communication at the time of the format change of the forum as to the reasons why we have changed it, I wont go into detail again. In summary the new format is an upgraded system that is more secure, allows a better mobile experience, uploading photos takes seconds etc. Sorry that it reads a slightly different way around when looking through threads, but if you complain several times we have no choice but to respond each time saying it cannot be changed as its part and parcel of the forum format we have selected, we cannot change it, that response cannot change if you complain 'several times'. In the grand scheme of things its a minor issue, one which is much less of an issue than people complaining previously about not being able to upload photos from their phone or using it in mobile mode. Ultimately its a much more secure environment and less open to being corrupted by malicious hackers - I suggest its worth spending a bit of time learning to read the text the other way around in exchange for all the extra benefits this new format brings.
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