If a space probe falls on the moon, does it make a sound?
No, sound needs a medium to pass through and there isn't (ok fine, yes there is, but it's not sufficient) an atmosphere on the moon.
Interesting philosophical questions though :)
Athena spacecraft declared dead after toppling over on moon
131–140 of 360 posts
Re: Athena spacecraft declared dead after toppling over on moon
#132Earlier quoted context omitted.
> craft that tipped over last year (Odysseus) was also made by Intuitive Machines (IM) Have they published a root-cause analysis?
Apparently last time their laser rangefinder was turned off groundside and thus wasn’t available during landing. This time they remembered to turn it on, but it didn’t work very well.
I'm sure they're accounting for dust, but using a laser in an environment that kicks up a ton of dust just doesn't seem like a great idea.
Re: Athena spacecraft declared dead after toppling over on moon
#133Not a native English speaker here, my focus stopped at the subtitle "Robotic private spacecraft touched down about 250 miles from its intended landing site on Thursday". It feels odd to read "robotic private spacecraft" instead of "private robotic spacecraft" but I can't explain why.
You are likely aware of the English language's feature of multiple adjectives (that are modifying the same noun) needing to appear in a certain order to sound "correct". So for example "yellow big balloon" sounds wrong but "big yellow balloon" sounds right. This is because SIZE is supposed to come before COLOR in standard English phrases. In this case, "robotic" and "private" could be similar enough in category to be…
I am not a native English speaker (or English native speaker, ;)), but I've been using it forever...but didn't know there was an official adjective ordering.
Re: Athena spacecraft declared dead after toppling over on moon
#134Good advice: 1. Never invade Russia in winter. 2. Make sure your robotic lunar lander has a low center of gravity.
> Make sure your robotic lunar lander has a low center of gravity. Hmm. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starship_HLS
Don't worry, there will be people inside!
Oh, wait, hrm...
Re: Athena spacecraft declared dead after toppling over on moon
#135Good advice: 1. Never invade Russia in winter. 2. Make sure your robotic lunar lander has a low center of gravity.
> Make sure your robotic lunar lander has a low center of gravity. Hmm. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starship_HLS
Humans - and the mostly empty space they require - up top.
Fuel, engines, and water will be at the bottom.
(For practical examples, look at the F9 first stage, or the Starship prototypes they've already tested.)
Re: Athena spacecraft declared dead after toppling over on moon
#136If a space probe falls on the moon, does it make a sound?
No, sound needs a medium to pass through and there isn't (ok fine, yes there is, but it's not sufficient) an atmosphere on the moon. Interesting philosophical questions though :)
Wouldn't the crash make a vibration in the lunar soil?
I know it's actually quite dry, thin, and dusty, but half the density of common Earth rock (~1.6 v. ~2.7g/cm³) should still conduct some sound. If you put your ear (or more likely, a microphone) on the ground...
Re: Athena spacecraft declared dead after toppling over on moon
#137Earlier quoted context omitted.
You are likely aware of the English language's feature of multiple adjectives (that are modifying the same noun) needing to appear in a certain order to sound "correct". So for example "yellow big balloon" sounds wrong but "big yellow balloon" sounds right. This is because SIZE is supposed to come before COLOR in standard English phrases. In this case, "robotic" and "private" could be similar enough in category to be…
I am not a native English speaker (or English native speaker, ;)), but I've been using it forever...but didn't know there was an official adjective ordering.
I don't think most native English speakers know that, either. I only learned about it by hearing people explain it as an aspect of English to non-native speakers; it was not something anyone taught me in school, it's not something I've ever heard anyone mention in the context of proofreading or writing advice, and I couldn't actually tell you how it works - though I'm sure I must be using it instinctively.
Re: Athena spacecraft declared dead after toppling over on moon
#138Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is 50 year old technology and expertise a good standard for comparison for modern tech?
Well when I was a child I tried to land on the moon but missed by about 384,000 km. That was only about 30 years ago, so their doing a heck of a lot better then that which is something!
Before that I tried to get to the moon. I climbed the nearest tree. Good progress at first ...
Re: Athena spacecraft declared dead after toppling over on moon
#139Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I'm sure senior leaders at NASA are reconsidering giving any new contracts to IM. at NASA, and DOGE, when they catch wind of it bagholders on reddit trying to understand the 50% drop have not been open to anything rational that explains the 50% drop so far I've gotten "You are blinded by dumb hate." for pointing out that $LUNR's unintuitive machines getting contracts from Nasa are their only business plan, as if th…
Shit, NASA does space stuff, it fails sometimes! Do we want to only fund things we know to be 100% easy to do? And don't fucking tell me, "we already landed on the moon once, how hard can it be?" because this shit is really fucking hard and takes lots of cash and a lot of what apppears to be "waste" or "failure" on a first order approximation, but in reality is actually "learned knowledge". I can't believe people thi…
I don’t make comments based on what I want to happen
An entire federal agency was deleted and thousands of non profits and other organizations were using the funding source as their only client and are also deleted now
Just because this one is publicly traded we should expect a different outcome?
I love prediction markets because now there is another outlet for perceiving politics than just debating. I take your money in a zero sum game if my worldview is more accurate, love that. I would almost say it rewards having a contrarian view of the world, but there are some psychology studies that show even ideologues like you will make accurate predictions if there is a payout of basically any amount. So I doubt it’s actually a contrarian view given that you have the same information.
Re: Athena spacecraft declared dead after toppling over on moon
#140Not a native English speaker here, my focus stopped at the subtitle "Robotic private spacecraft touched down about 250 miles from its intended landing site on Thursday". It feels odd to read "robotic private spacecraft" instead of "private robotic spacecraft" but I can't explain why.
The order of adjectives in English is usually: opinion, size, age or shape, colour, origin, material, purpose It is sometimes difficult to classify adjectives this way, but "private" is probably opinion and "robotic" is probably purpose, so you are correct, "private robotic spacecraft" is probably correct. The problem with English, of course, is that you can figure out what someone means, even if they jumble all thei…
I'm curious how that would apply in this case Imagine a restaurant that sells french fries. They offer two kinds of fries, one with physically large fries (like steak fries) and the other with physically small fries (like shoestring fries). They call these "large" fries and "small" fries.
You can order a large quantity of fries or a small quantity of fries, giving 4 possible orders: large large fries, large small fries, small large fries, and small small fries.
If an order of large small fries asking for a large quantity of the shoestring fries or a small quantity of the steak fries?
I think I'd expect it to mean a large quantity of the shoestring fries.