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Hubble Captures Crisp New Image of Jupiter and Europa

spacetelescope.org

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Re: Hubble Captures Crisp New Image of Jupiter and Europa

#51

Post by Kattywumpus »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #17
dylan604 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For a few hundred years now, we've been looking at the planets. Finally makes it sound like we just did this yesterday or within current life times.

For the past few hundred years until recently, we've been seeing bright and fuzzy dots. There's a difference between that, and ~640000 square pixels worth of details we see in the article.

I think about this a lot. We are the first people in human history to see the planets up close, so to speak.

For thousands of years, humans stared up at the sky and watched these luminous dots change position over time. They made up stories about them, tracked them, designed instruments to turn these blurry, luminous dots into slightly-less-blurry luminous dots.

But in this long human journey of thousands of years, we are the first generation to actually see these dots of light as the worlds they are. Us. You and me. So many thousands of years of ancient dreaming and wondering, going all the way back to our hominid ancestors, gazing at the night sky in wordless wonder.

And we, our generation of humans, are the culmination of this journey of imagination.

What they could only imagine, we know. For the first time in history, in my lifetime, we've visited every planet in the solar system. Any planet you see in the sky? We have photos of it. We've mapped its surface, or visited it directly. You want to know what sunset on Mars looks like? You don't have to guess.

We take this all for granted. I don't think we even appreciate the legacy we inherited. It feels like there should be a Planet Day, where we all celebrate the knowing. Where we symbolically link hands with our ancestors across time, with everyone who ever squinted up at all the little sparkles on the big black ocean and wished they knew what they were.

A day when everyone looks at at least one photograph from every celestial body we've seen, and appreciates the gift we've been given. And then maybe looks at the best photos we have of exoplanets, and realizes that we are in the same position today that our hominid ancestors were, wondering what these places will someday turn out to be, and who we will be when we finally know them.

Re: Hubble Captures Crisp New Image of Jupiter and Europa

#52

Post by dylan604 »

elihu wrote: post #45
holler wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

perhaps but I would think the descent before entering the clouds would have plenty to look at..

Video from a low orbit satellite could be pretty spectacular. Especially if it's in a polar orbit and can see in whatever wavelength is necessary to see the weird geometrically symmetrical storms at the poles.

https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/juno/videos/index.html

Re: Hubble Captures Crisp New Image of Jupiter and Europa

#53

Post by Rebelgecko »

java-man wrote: post #3

For one Hubble, something like a dozen of Keyhole spy telescopes have been launched [0]. Just imagine the kind of science we would have gotten if we launched a dozen of Hubbles instead... [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KH-11_Kennen

How many Hubbles could we have made if we didn't have to spend billions of dollars after it launched to fix manufacturing fuckups?

Re: Hubble Captures Crisp New Image of Jupiter and Europa

#54

Post by jessriedel »

jniedrauer wrote: post #32
jessriedel wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The science output of a given device usually shows heavily diminishing returns. I would say 12 Hubbles would have had at most twice the impact of 1 Hubble, probably less.

The famous "deep field" image from Hubble almost didn't happen, at least for many more years, due to limited time availability[0]. > “The telescope allocation committee would never have approved such a long, risky project,” Other similar "high risk" experiments would be more likely to occur if time constraints were not such a concern. [0]: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2015/04...

The deep field images are not a significant fraction of the total scientific output of Hubble.

Re: Hubble Captures Crisp New Image of Jupiter and Europa

#55

Post by sterlind »

java-man wrote: post #3

For one Hubble, something like a dozen of Keyhole spy telescopes have been launched [0]. Just imagine the kind of science we would have gotten if we launched a dozen of Hubbles instead... [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KH-11_Kennen

The NRO actually donated a couple suspiciously Hubble-like satellites to NASA a few years ago. They'd removed all the electronics, of course, and the lenses are shaped to better capture terrestrial images, but still! Loose pocket change from the intelligence agencies. Of course, I'm sure Hubble got funded because of Keyhole in the first place.

Re: Hubble Captures Crisp New Image of Jupiter and Europa

#56

Post by melling »

NikolaeVarius wrote: post #43
melling wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hubble’s replacement, James Webb, could offer us an opportunity to have a second space telescope. We just need to figure out how to repair the Hubble.

Its not a replacement . Its a successor

Hubble will be gone in 5-10 year.

Whenever it breaks it’s done.

Call the James’s Webb whatever you want. The point is that it would be useful to have both for decades

Re: Hubble Captures Crisp New Image of Jupiter and Europa

#57

Post by tdy721 »

jessriedel wrote: post #54
jniedrauer wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The famous "deep field" image from Hubble almost didn't happen, at least for many more years, due to limited time availability[0]. > “The telescope allocation committee would never have approved such a long, risky project,” Other similar "high risk" experiments would be more likely to occur if time constraints were not such a concern. [0]: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2015/04...

The deep field images are not a significant fraction of the total scientific output of Hubble.

Nope, they are the icons of the project. Images from the edge of reality.

They significantly impacted how I grew up seeing the universe though, and I’m sure I’m not alone on this.

Re: Hubble Captures Crisp New Image of Jupiter and Europa

#58

Post by tdy721 »

melling wrote: post #40
jniedrauer wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The famous "deep field" image from Hubble almost didn't happen, at least for many more years, due to limited time availability[0]. > “The telescope allocation committee would never have approved such a long, risky project,” Other similar "high risk" experiments would be more likely to occur if time constraints were not such a concern. [0]: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2015/04...

Hubble’s replacement, James Webb, could offer us an opportunity to have a second space telescope. We just need to figure out how to repair the Hubble.

James Webb isn’t a spy satellite chassis. The Vera Rubins telescope is though

Re: Hubble Captures Crisp New Image of Jupiter and Europa

#59

Post by dylan604 »

Kattywumpus wrote: post #51
TeMPOraL wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the past few hundred years until recently, we've been seeing bright and fuzzy dots. There's a difference between that, and ~640000 square pixels worth of details we see in the article.

I think about this a lot. We are the first people in human history to see the planets up close, so to speak. For thousands of years, humans stared up at the sky and watched these luminous dots change position over time. They made up stories about them, tracked them, designed instruments to turn these blurry, luminous dots into slightly-less-blurry luminous dots. But in this long human journey of thousands of years, w…

These images are amazing, but I do feel that we as a society just sort of take them for granted now. However, I would highly recommend finding a local star party in your area. There is nothing like putting your eyeball on a telescope and seeing things for yourself. Yes, it will not be nearly as detailed as NASA images, but it will still impress.

For all of those made up stories you mentioned, I shed a tear every time I hear modern day things like flat earthers. We still have not gotten away from made up stories.

> You want to know what sunset on Mars looks like? You don't have to guess.

Sadly, people on the west coast have seen it in person.

Re: Hubble Captures Crisp New Image of Jupiter and Europa

#60

Post by Causality1 »

It will be quite sad when Hubble retires. JWST is a superior scientific instrument but I believe something immaterial but very important will be lost when we don't have a high-power visual spectrum telescope overhead. Infrared just doesn't have the ability to fire hearts and minds like visible light.
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