Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s moon Europa

webbtelescope.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 278 posts

Re: NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s moon Europa

#121

Post by namirez »

tredre3 wrote: post #101
dmix wrote: post #87

> a fascinating world with a salty, subsurface ocean of liquid water—possibly twice as much as in all of Earth’s oceans combined. If we brought water back a container of water from Europa would this be the largest amount of new water entering the earth since planets struck it billions of years ago? I briefly googled it (I dont know much about this stuff tbh): > The water on our Earth today is the same water that’s be…

> The water on our Earth today is the same water that’s been here for nearly 5 billion years. We create tons of water as a byproduct of many industrial processes, that's "new" water. Of course in the grand scheme of things the quantities are inconsequential, so the statement is probably still generally true...

Except water is H2O where the oxygen comes from plants and plants get it from water and the hydrogen comes from hydrocarbon fuels where the hydrogen comes from water again. So technically you can never create new water on Earth but you can bring in more from the space.

Re: NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s moon Europa

#122

Post by prawn »

ghayes wrote: post #115
frogulis wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it truer to say "the hydrogen and oxygen on our Earth today are the same [...] 5 billion years"?

If those hydrogen and oxygen atoms had not previously been bonded into H2O, you would have to say this is “new” water, right?

Water of Theseus!

Re: NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s moon Europa

#123

Post by prawn »

ijidak wrote: post #98

Why does one random Jovian moon have so much water? And why not all similarly sized rocky bodies in the solar system? Isn't this even stranger than Earth's water?

Does material tend to settle and accrete at different orbits due to weight/density?

Re: NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s moon Europa

#124

Post by prawn »

mikeInAlaska wrote: post #66
sph wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly, the only thing I wish to see before I die is a submarine mission to Europa or Ganymede. It would be even more mind blowing and an amazing achievement for humanity, and the search for extraterrestrial life. That, and the dragonfly-helicopter-thing on Titan. Have you ever seen the Sun set on a methane lake? It's time for a rewatch of Europa Report (2013).

A Europa submarine mission is a good bucket list, but don't sell us too short. * Humans on Mars * Room temperature Superconductors and their effects on humanity. * Sustained Fusion Power for the masses. * General Artificial Intelligence * Human brain-computer interface. * Full reversal of climate change. * Extended human lifespan. * Curing all forms of cancer. * Universal translator for all human languages. * Discove…

"I can see Europa from my house!"

Re: NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s moon Europa

#126

Post by ricktdotorg »

Electricniko wrote: post #71
grecy wrote: post #4

Can Webb image Europa?

As others have said, you're looking at the image. We'll have to wait for a bit before we get some really good images of Europa. From Google: NASA's Europa Clipper is the first dedicated mission to explore a world with a global ocean, other than Earth. The spacecraft is scheduled to launch in October 2024 and will arrive at Europa in 2030. The mission will study Europa's surface and interior to determine if it has the…

> scheduled to launch in October 2024 and will arrive at Europa in 2030

wow, when you see dates like this it really puts things into perspective! a six year trip! any idea of how much of the trip is acceleration vs. deceleration?

Re: NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s moon Europa

#127

Post by keepamovin »

dmix wrote: post #87

> a fascinating world with a salty, subsurface ocean of liquid water—possibly twice as much as in all of Earth’s oceans combined. If we brought water back a container of water from Europa would this be the largest amount of new water entering the earth since planets struck it billions of years ago? I briefly googled it (I dont know much about this stuff tbh): > The water on our Earth today is the same water that’s be…

No, water is brought to earth by meteors and comets.

Re: NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s moon Europa

#129

Post by BurningFrog »

dmix wrote: post #87

> a fascinating world with a salty, subsurface ocean of liquid water—possibly twice as much as in all of Earth’s oceans combined. If we brought water back a container of water from Europa would this be the largest amount of new water entering the earth since planets struck it billions of years ago? I briefly googled it (I dont know much about this stuff tbh): > The water on our Earth today is the same water that’s be…

This is why I roll my eyes at alarmist talk of various processes "consuming X zillion gallons of water".

Water is much stronger than that. It just passes through our processes and will outlast us all.

Re: NASA’s Webb finds carbon source on surface of Jupiter’s moon Europa

#130

Post by BurningFrog »

ijidak wrote: post #98

Why does one random Jovian moon have so much water? And why not all similarly sized rocky bodies in the solar system? Isn't this even stranger than Earth's water?

There is a lot of water in the solar system. Comets are mostly water, for example.
Post reply on HN