Re: Space: The Final Frontier William Shatner BlueOrigin SpaceX
Posted: Thu Oct 14, 2021 9:01 am
Amazing. Good for Capt Kirk. What a thing to scratch off your bucket list.
Falsehoods Unchallenged Only Fester and Grow
https://thefogbow.com/forum/
"NASA, as well as the U.S. Air Force and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), currently consider “space” to start at 50 miles above the Earth — a threshold that Virgin Galactic’s VSS Unity soared past on Sunday. But on July 20, Bezos and his crew intend to fly over the Kármán line, defined as around 62 miles (or 100 kilometers) above the Earth.roadscholar wrote: ↑Thu Oct 14, 2021 10:52 am My nit to pick is using the term "outer space." Surely that should be reserved for, you know, space that's further away than "just above earth's atmosphere."
China anger after space station forced to move to avoid Elon Musk Starlink satellites
China said its space station deployed prevention collision avoidance control measures in July and October and called on the US to ‘bear responsibility’
Rhoda Kwan in Taipei
Tue 28 Dec 2021 01.17 GMT
Beijing has called on the UN to remind the US to abide by the treaty regulating outer space after space satellites launched by tech tycoon Elon Musk’s aerospace company SpaceX almost collided with its space station twice in the past year.
China said its space station deployed prevention collision avoidance control measures in July and October to avoid colliding with Starlink satellites in a recent report submitted by Beijing to the UN’s Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space earlier this month.
“China wishes to request the secretary general of the United Nations to circulate the above-mentioned information to all states parties to the Outer Space Treaty,” the report submitted by its permanent mission in Vienna read.
It added that state parties must “bear international responsibility” for national activities carried out by both government and non-governmental bodies in space.
Jonathan McDowell, an astrophysicist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, told the Guardian it was “highly unusual” for a country to lodge a complaint through an “informational bulletin”.
SpaceX has launched more than 1,600 satellites into space in a network dubbed Starlink and has received permission from the US Federal Communications Commission to launch up to 12,000 satellites into space.
https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... satellites
Tesla Owners Silicon Valley @teslaownersSV wrote: "Patents are for the weak" - @elonmusk
William Shatner describes ‘overwhelming sadness’ he felt for Earth in his Blue Origin flight to space
In an excerpt of “Boldly Go: Reflections on a Life of Awe and Wonder,” published by Variety last week, the Star Trek actor wrote that everything he expected to feel about going to space was wrong.
I had thought that going into space would be the ultimate catharsis of that connection I had been looking for between all living things—that being up there would be the next beautiful step to understanding the harmony of the universe. In the film “Contact,” when Jodie Foster’s character goes to space and looks out into the heavens, she lets out an astonished whisper, “They should’ve sent a poet.” I had a different experience, because I discovered that the beauty isn’t out there, it’s down here, with all of us. Leaving that behind made my connection to our tiny planet even more profound.
It was among the strongest feelings of grief I have ever encountered. The contrast between the vicious coldness of space and the warm nurturing of Earth below filled me with overwhelming sadness. Every day, we are confronted with the knowledge of further destruction of Earth at our hands: the extinction of animal species, of flora and fauna . . . things that took five billion years to evolve, and suddenly we will never see them again because of the interference of mankind. It filled me with dread. My trip to space was supposed to be a celebration; instead, it felt like a funeral.
In his book, he said he later learned that his feelings were not unique.
“It is called the ‘Overview Effect’ and is not uncommon among astronauts, including Yuri Gagarin, Michael Collins, Sally Ride, and many others,” Shatner wrote. “Essentially, when someone travels to space and views Earth from orbit, a sense of the planet’s fragility takes hold in an ineffable, instinctive manner.”
https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/13/politics ... index.htmlExclusive: Musk’s SpaceX says it can no longer pay for critical satellite services in Ukraine, asks Pentagon to pick up the tab
Since they first started arriving in Ukraine last spring, the Starlink satellite internet terminals made by Elon Musk’s SpaceX have been a vital source of communication for Ukraine’s military, allowing it to fight and stay connected even as cellular phone and internet networks have been destroyed in its war with Russia.
So far roughly 20,000 Starlink satellite units have been donated to Ukraine, with Musk tweeting on Friday the “operation has cost SpaceX $80 million and will exceed $100 million by the end of the year.”
But those charitable contributions could be coming to an end, as SpaceX has warned the Pentagon that it may stop funding the service in Ukraine unless the US military kicks in tens of millions of dollars per month.
Documents obtained by CNN show that last month Musk’s SpaceX sent a letter to the Pentagon saying it can no longer continue to fund the Starlink service as it has. The letter also requested that the Pentagon take over funding for Ukraine’s government and military use of Starlink, which SpaceX claims would cost more than $120 million for the rest of the year and could cost close to $400 million for the next 12 months.
“We are not in a position to further donate terminals to Ukraine, or fund the existing terminals for an indefinite period of time,” SpaceX’s director of government sales wrote to the Pentagon in the September letter.
https://twitter.com/highbrow_nobrow/sta ... 5414879232The Intellectualist @highbrow_nobrow wrote: NEW: Elon Musk is threatening to cut Ukraine off from Starlink because a Ukrainian Ambassador was mean to him on Twitter.
bluetooth earpieces.Foggy wrote: ↑Fri Oct 15, 2021 5:11 pm Many of the technological wonders in the Tee Vee series are long since invented. Doors that open when they sense your approach. Computer AIs that talk to you. Heck, our cell phones are far superior to the "communicators" they had in the show.
Still waiting for tractor beams. I think tractor beams are totally cool.
Transporters. I want to say, Beam me to Plitvice, and I’m there. (Or home from the office vs commuting.)Flatpoint High wrote: ↑Fri Oct 14, 2022 12:04 pmbluetooth earpieces.Foggy wrote: ↑Fri Oct 15, 2021 5:11 pm Many of the technological wonders in the Tee Vee series are long since invented. Doors that open when they sense your approach. Computer AIs that talk to you. Heck, our cell phones are far superior to the "communicators" they had in the show.
Still waiting for tractor beams. I think tractor beams are totally cool.