- cross-posted to:
- world@lemmy.world
- cross-posted to:
- world@lemmy.world
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Now we just need to invent the Wall-E bot… We’re getting so close!
This is how the night sky looks right now:
It’s crazy to think that all this will be privately owned by ultra rich techno-fascists that are beyond any democratic control.
You know what they aren’t beyond?
lmao I’m on PC and that gif takes up the entire screen in my notifications. Beautiful.
As much as I love the elegance of guillotines though, I do believe that we should use something a little more emblematic of the American working class… and which permits a feet-first approach:
If this actually happens, I will dedicate my life to getting the funding to create a laser weapon that can shoot them out of the sky from Earth.
Then we’ll play Space Invaders for keeps.
Won’t they just become space debris and remain in orbit?
They’d last as debris for about 5 years before falling. Atmospheric drag among other things causes orbital decay that cause them to eventually fall to earth without adjustments.
The unfortunate thing about debris falling from space is that it could hit you or me and we could get killed.
They’re too small and fast for that. They burn up in the atmosphere.
Larger space debris on a different trajectory can, but not LEO communication satellites.
Well there’s still chances it wouldn’t burn fast enough…
He never respected his fellow man, why start now?
It’s so infuriating… I occasionally do astrophotography and it’s getting to the point where any long exposure just has satellite streaks everywhere… Fuck Musk.
I remember just 10 years ago using a special app on my phone to alert me of any potential satellite flares so I could run out and catch them.
Now I can’t look at the night sky for 2 minutes without seeing one.
For the uneducated, what do these look like and can you see them in areas with light pollution?
If you look towards the horizon with the sun, a little before sunrise or after sunset, you’ll probably be able to see flashes of them as they catch the light.
Yes. They are technically reflected sunlight, so they are as bright as the sun, just very small. It makes sense you can see them during sunlight, since they are reflections of sunlight. You will typically only see them on the side of the sky opposite the sun, but the exact angle depends on the location and orientation of the satellite and the surface that is actually doing the reflection.
Generally speaking, they are dots that fade in somewhat gradually, moving at a consistent pace (typically slower than a shooting star, but faster than an airplane at cruising altitude) in a straight line direction for awhile at full brightness, then fading away.
To me, they look exactly like all the other stars in the sky, except they move, a bit slower than a plane, and they don’t blink.
You can actually see some in broad daylight. I was shocked one day looking up and seeing one (white dot in the picture, verified with sat tracking app).
This photo is AI!
Poe’s Law strikes again:
https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe’s_lawAdding a
/swould help convey that intent a little more. And if you’re going for the “Got ya!” satire effect, you could always hide it in a spoiler.How so lol?
I was a space kid, followed every space shot since 1965, was a super fan of Apollo 11, I had a subscription to Nat Geo growing up, just for the Space photos.
So I can’t believe I’m saying this: Maybe we’ve gone far enough for now, and we should have a moratorium on space for the next 50 years.
We should concentrate on Earth for awhile, dontcha think?
maybe just for this one guy you know
This isn’t really space science related, just commercialization. And about focusing on Earth: we should let scientists work on what they’re passionate about, IMO they’ll be more motivated to research their field of choice
SpaceX has developed laundry list of new technology to enable Starlink and other endeavors. It’s silly to discount that as worthless.
lol just so you know a “laundry list” is a list of bad things.
And no, rockets that can put stuff into orbit where around even before Mama Musk shat out lil Mech-Hitler.
If your scientific discovery disproportionately benefits a few billionaires then it’s worse than worthless.
AND makes life far worse for literally the entire planet.
Imagine unilaterally deciding that increasing your already obscene fortune is more important than every living creature that will ever exist in the future having a sky to enjoy, ever again. To these people, human joy is not something worth preserving.
To these people, human joy is an indulgence for the weak.
You know how over-exaggerated cartoonish villains will talk about how love and caring make you weak? Basically that.
Dude is so cartoonishly evil that it hurts
True, that is how we got unit 731.
we should let scientists work on what they’re passionate about
*fund them
Why is it always 100x more on useless destruction and military? And yeah i know the answer already.
By work I meant study, not necessarily being employed by a company if that’s what you meant
Right. Elon hires people on the basis they’ll be making Mars travel possible, but that Starship is really for dumping metal all over the night sky.
I’ve been really passionate about space. My bday is on the anniversary of the moon landing, and my one aunt has always reminded me of the fact. My great grandfather worked for NASA and my aunt gave me his stargazing binoculars that his brother gave him when he got hired at NASA. That part of my family instilled a huge love of science in me, esp space stuff. I wanna go to space more than anything, but I don’t have the brains or constitution to be an astronaut. So I just daydream, stargaze, and write poems about the cosmos.
I dunno, every engineer not working on space almost certainly ends up optimizing some sort of ad delivery system. The tech industry is almost completely enshittified.
I was thinking more like Climate Change and Infrastructure and whatnot and suchlike.
That’s great, but that comes from funding those things, not shutting down a different industry. It’d be better to shut down non-productive industries like bombing brown kids in the Middle East.
Believe it or not, you can do two things at once. Some people are interested in space, some in geology. That’s fine.
Kinda missing the point there.
i just tried to chew gum and walk and my personal injury attorney would like to know your address (they think you’re cute)
Not gonna happen. Not with the effective altruist cult running things.
I don’t think you are using altruist right, or I am missing some sarcasm here.
A lot of the ultra wealthy espouse a nonsense philosophy called “Effective Altruism”, which asserts a kind of utilitarian “most good for the most people” ethic, but in such a way that one can basically justify any action as being, eventually, for the most good ¯_(ツ)_/¯
Including being good to hypothetical, unlikely trillions that may live someday if we colonize Mars.
This conversation is a waste of time no matter how much of a nazi Elon is.
This is what the sky would be like in the majority of science fiction. If you want space exploration, there will be space infrastructure, and as time goes on that infrastructure will increase both in amount and size, not to mention the traffic to and from.
It is like complaining about the clutter of the marina while wanting to explore the ocean.
I’d almost understand where you’re coming from but most of us can’t afford a ship to explore, a slip in the marina, or even a property/room on the shore. For some of us, staring out at the ocean & capturing images from land is all we have. There’s gotta be a better way that doesn’t ruin it for the majority.
I can’t afford a boat, but I benefit from the goods and food that they transport.
Nothing is being transported via constellation satellites that wasn’t already paid for by the American people (and then not delivered on).
Why would we want our infrastructure to be the most polluting expensive version (with shit latency BTW so you can’t selfhost), in control of basically one asshole billionaire who will gleefully censor whatever he feels like, after a critical mass of dependency has been reached?
Are you glad we put our communication into such a restrictive model under a monopoly that’s cozy with a fascist government?
Stop lying to yourself and others that this was “the most efficient outcome”.
Orbital data enters aren’t happening. A million starlinks aren’t happening. And musk will eventually die. I’m only defending a reasonable size of constellation.
Why would we want our infrastructure to be the most polluting expensive version (with shit latency BTW so you can’t selfhost), in control of basically one asshole billionaire who will gleefully censor whatever he feels like, after a critical mass of dependency has been reached?
Stop lying to yourself and others that this was “the most efficient outcome”.
NASA has tried to build their own rockets for i think 30(?) years. Like the space shuttle. The ship was expensive. Reusability never delivered on its promise to make things cheaper, instead it made them more complicated and more expensive when NASA tried. that was the public sector, it was attempted. Then SpaceX came and somehow managed to build rockets that were both reusable and cheaper than non-reusable rockets.
So yes, that’s not an ideological adherence to capitalism or anything, just plain data, that SpaceX is simply more efficient than NASA was able to be. With building rockets i mean.
Well said.
Can we even get spaceships put if they are a million of those satellites on spaces?
Space is very big. A million is nothing in the grand scheme of things like launching at a specific point.
for everyone on Earth
The people that are doing the actual space exploration aren’t even effected by it!
People want houses, that doesn’t mean they want forests clear cut.
Similarly people want space exploration, that doesn’t mean they want to speedrun Kessler syndrome.
The infrastructure isn’t the only issue here. Its the fact that this is being done by a corporation owned by a nazi, with many other companies looking to compete. So instead of having one set of LEO satellites, we’ll have several.
If this was actually used to benefit humanity the light pollution caused by this would be understandable and minimized. But this isn’t being done in a sustainable way, or owned by the people.
And that’s all before considering the detrement to the environment from these satellites constantly burning up in the upper atmosphere.
And with all that said, this isn’t space exploration, and it isnt the type of space infrastructure that would aid exploration. Actual exploration doesn’t need thousands, hundreds of thousands, or millions of these tiny satellites aimed only at Earth.
We’re creating our own “Mini Kuiper Belt”. By the time we’re ready to make interplanetary space travel a practical thing (intriguing but doubtful given present circumstances and trajectory) there will be so much space shit that it’ll be as dangerous as trying to land a plane in the United States today!
Billionaires don’t give a fuck about anyone but themselves, not even their kids. And, we’ve all agreed to let billionaires run the world, it seems.
We’re just a few millimeters away from revoking that agreement though. There’s not that many of them.
I don’t see the beginning of anything to rein in the power they get from just being overrich assholes.
Ironically, the only countries on Earth that control tightly (some of) their billionaires are Russia and China. I rememer Vietnam also executed one for tax fraud. Something for which they are barely slapped on their hand in western countries.
I think it’s a waste of time to fight it.
Elon just has to ask daddy Trump and he will get anything necessary to get the autorisation.
I don’t think the Astrophysicists will convince Trump obviously.
I remember Europe saying the same thing around the 1930s lol
Maybe you can’t fight a rocket, but an autonomous taxi on the other hand…
An autonomous taxi can fight a rocket…?
They move the rockets on the highway and instead of a giant flatbed they bolt wheels on to the rocket. It would be really easy for a robot Tesla to merge into the side and total it.
Elon Musk is such a goddamned literal supervillain that he managed to make the theme of Firefly wrong.
Apparently, they can take the sky from you.
Ads on the fucking moon are going to do it for me.
Well, at least we’ll always have Sinatra.
theoretically
That’s where you draw the line?
(Also, say hi to your chickens for me)
If we get that we’ll also definitely get a Moon Banksy.
… ‘Bansky goes to Space’ …
That would make for quite a story.
everything the tech bros touch, dies
Literally the plot of Horizon
Who needs the night sky when you can download the old night sky via satellite internet with gig speed downloads in vr? /s
LEO satellites decay very quickly every one of them will burn up in the atmosphere within 10 years. They need to be replaced constantly. As soon as spacex goes out of business these will all fall out of the sky.
Don’t count on it. These things don’t just zip along in their orbits. LEO is crowded. They have to maneuver to avoid collisions… a lot.
Over the past six months, Starlink satellites have been increasingly performing collision avoidance maneuvers. According to a report filed by SpaceX with the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC), SpaceX broadband satellites were forced to avoid more than 25 thousand times from December 1, 2022 to May 31, 2023. And since their launch in 2019, the total number of maneuvers has reached 50 thousand.
If Starlink or any other mega-constellation company loses control of their satellites for any reason, there could be collisions. A recent study (Note: PDF) suggests that a sufficiently powerful CME could cause a runaway Kessler Syndrome in as little as 2.8 days if the loss of control lasts that long.
And the orbits of that debris would still decay within a decade in LEO.
even less for Starlink
What’s your point? We would have a LEO like a minefield for 10 years.
I mean with proper regulation or would be slightly better. If they can maneuver to avoid collisions they can likes deorbit themselves at a quicker pace.
The main issue is if ever they went under someone would buy it, or try to buy it, at a discount. So they likely wouldn’t go away even if Star link went under.
Eh, i’m not so sure. I just did a quick doodle.
My opinion is that when a collision happens, it’s probably very unlikely for each fragment to actually stay on a stable orbit around Earth. Chances are high that it gains a lot of energy and the orbit is significantly distorted. Now, if an orbit is already very close to Earth, that means that any distortion will make it not fit tightly around Earth anymore, instead will make it go elliptic and therefore on trajectory of collision with Earth. The only way a fragment would not do that is if it’s accelerated perfectly sideways, in which case it would continue to circle around Earth for 10 years before deorbiting due to atmospheric friction. So, the cascading is a bit limited.
I don’t think you are familiar with orbital mechanics. A collision would barely disturb an orbit.
then are the fragments dangerous?
The fragments are dangerous to other things in low earth orbit. They will burn up before they hit the ground here. So really it might be for the best because I would rather see a world where every single satellite is destroyed at this point.
Definitely.
sooo then this isn’t a problem if they all burn out eventually? hehe i’m just being pedantic of course
There’s reasonable hope at least that this is a problem that will solve itself, and unfortunately we have bigger problems to worry about.
I expect that we will get in orbit refueling to extend their life once you get a good nuclear and solar panel power tug with an electric thruster that can deliver fuel, they’re in a similar orbit if you just do that.
Especially with the number of them it’s probably cheaper to just put up new satellites. LEO sats are designed to be temporary.
Cheaper and easier to upgrade the constellation to newer and faster tech. If you have backwards compatibility, you just start launching v2 and v1 will eventually just burn up, and hopefully finish just in time for v3 to start launching so you only have to be compatible with n-1 versions.
Any way to help them do that?
It starts with ass and ends with ass in nation.
Ha ha, yes, took me a half hour.
No way that’s cheaper or easier than waiting
At least not legally
Who enforces space law?
My mind was on the more practical idea of intervening on the ground.
But basically no-one, since it’s largely based on international law which is toothless.
Exactly
I’m wondering from a pure academic standpoint here honest. Like What about a laser?
Lmao I wish. Satellites and their components have to be “hardened” to survive extreme temperatures and radiation in space. There’s probably nothing on it you could disable with any laser you could buy. Plus there’s the matter of targeting them.
Good ole brute force is the best method, though, as you said, targeting is a huge problem. Basically you need a low Earth orbit shotgun.
Kessler syndrome though.
Oh yeah. I keep forgetting about that. I suppose I need to study it a little more to make it stick.
Do they have those at Walmart?
i remember some startup tried to build a slingshot to shoot satellites into orbit with something like a bit catapult. that was 5 years ago, haven’t heard of them since.
Probably. I imagine you could probably get one at a gun show in Texas
Now with lasers you buy perhaps, what about with the lasers you build?
In the future where Federal Authority is concentrated on robbing and stealing elsewhere, I cannot imagine a high energy beam could not take these motherfuckers out.
If you have the capability to build a laser that can focus enough energy, from the ground through the atmosphere, with enough precision to lock on to an LEO constellation member long enough to disable it, you’d probably already either be captured, or working for DoD.
Also: great, you exploded it before reentry. Now we have a hundred thousand smaller, lighter fragments skipping off the atmosphere, disbursing randomly, and spinning around like hypersonic chaff bullets for actual worthwhile spacecraft and satellites to fly through, twinkling in infrared like a billion new streaky sparkles on those telescopes. It takes a lot longer for all that bullshit to rain down, and it pollutes just the same. Tell me, who were you fighting for again and why?
This is like when the humans blacken the sky in the Matrix to defeat the machines. Yeah it wrecked the earth, but is also didn’t defeat them and they just found something else to exploit.
I mean I was trying to Broach a theoretical, completely academic, discussion about what could or could not take these satellites out.
How rare are these materials that are sending to space? Literally sending rare metals out of our planet. Even if they fall back down to earth. Is it even possible or viable money wise to recover them?
Nope, not viable at all. A lot of it is straight up atomized on reentry especially for the smaller devices. Some of it is rare and some is not. The wet dream of these billionaires is they will be the first to figure out space mining and then manufacture. That’s why Elon musk has spacex and the boring company. Then raw resources like precious metals become infinite over night. Hopefully capitalism dies before that happens so we can all enjoy that.
Destroying these satellites with lasers poses a similar problem to what happens when you light zombies on fire: the satellites are held in space by their momentum and the reduced atmosphere vs Earth’s gravity. If you break the satellites into pieces via laser, then now you have uncontrolled and unpredictable space junk to deal with. Some of the pieces might return sooner, but what was once a concern is now a problem. Just like how a zombie at your door is very concerning, a zombie on fire at your door is an immediate problem.
Now, what could be interesting would be sending up another satellite that sprays black paint on the sun-facing side of other satellites. The energy absorbed and then exhausted could propel it towards Earth sooner. Maybe? I dunno, I’m just a simple country Fartographer, your honor.
No, it would run out of black paint. Give it a robot arm with scissors or something to cut the power lines on the Starlinks. (And also push them out of orbit? Maybe exchange energy with some sort of maneuver to stay in orbit longer?)
Polluting atmosphere doing so.
That’s fair but unfortunately nothing compared to the pollution from launching them
Which is also nothing compared to a slew of other pollution sources
Which is also nothing compared to the general entropy of the universe.
Definitely true. But not very relevant.
Elon Musk is a plague upon the human condition. Our best hope in the US, right now, is that a Starship launch goes horribly right and hits the White House during a cabinet meeting with Elmo as a a guest. Burn it black…pave over it and start over. Preferably after a mandatory prison-raping of all billionaires, especially those who loved Epstein. Fuck em all…let god sort em out.
