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“Beyond the limit”: Satellites and mirrors in space pose threat to the night sky

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Re: “Beyond the limit”: Satellites and mirrors in space pose threat to the night sky

#171

Post by ben_w »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #140
HPsquared wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can all orbits be completely filled at once, though? They'll intersect at some point (I had originally said poles but that's only polar orbits..) ... I suppose you have phase, altitude and inclination (and eccentricity which adds another couple of variables). But they do intersect, don't they?

> Can all orbits be completely filled at once, though? They’ll intersect Correct. I wasn’t proposing a realistic configuration. Just showing why OP’s visual doesn’t work for the numbers it gives. (It 1D space fills. I expand that to 2 and 3D.) Millions of satellites is currently accepted as the maximum carrying capacity of LEO before collisions becomes a PITA.

Can't take advantage of the 3D-ness when you want them all to be in terminator-following SSOs. Best you get is 2D, and with current safety margins, even that fills up fast.

However, this was not the point of the illustration, which is more "if you can do this at all, you can do better".

Re: “Beyond the limit”: Satellites and mirrors in space pose threat to the night sky

#172

Post by throwaway-11-1 »

piloto_ciego wrote: post #137
throwaway-11-1 wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“We” can’t even effectively distribute food, healthcare and housing yet but yeah I’m sure capital will totally figure it out if we build enough machines that just accumulate more wealth to the richest people in history. I love cool new tech but I’m perfectly aware it will not do shit to solve any problem other than “eliminate or make labor cheaper”

I mean, there are less starving people than there were in most of the world. We've made progress. In my lifetime we've made progress! I mean, there are momentary set backs and they are egregious, I agree with that for sure, but the world is wildly better than it was in the early 90s or early 00s. I was there (cue Elrond meme), I remember. And god forbid you were gay back then, or had an ailment that needed some high…

Your response is not addressing my claims, homelessness is increasing, life expectancy is lagging poorer countries and there are still food security issues not being addressed in the richest country in history. I’m discussing material outcomes and you want to focus on social progress….which is fine I guess? Anyway I have receipts

https://www.healthsystemtracker.org/chart-collection/u-s-lif...

https://www.unc.edu/discover/u-s-life-expectancy-drop-caused...

https://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/food-nutrition-assistance/fo...

https://www.security.org/resources/homeless-statistics/

Re: “Beyond the limit”: Satellites and mirrors in space pose threat to the night sky

#173

Post by SidewaysView »

piloto_ciego wrote: post #169
SidewaysView wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand you because I can read your posts. (God, the fedora.)

Ok, go ahead and troll away elsewhere, I am hip to your game. Have a nice day and I sincerely hope that you are happier in the future than you are now.

(Seriously, can someone please explain how you write this paean to creepy uncle sci-fi without realizing how it sounds? Anyone?)

Re: “Beyond the limit”: Satellites and mirrors in space pose threat to the night sky

#174

Post by ben_w »

roughly wrote: post #154
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> None of the problems with building a utopia are technological Of course they are. Pre-Green revolution humanity probably couldn’t make a utopia. Currently, I’d argue we need way more energy to make utopia-like conditions available to all. Technology isn’t sufficient. But I wouldn’t go so far as to say it’s unnecessary, unless one’s utopia permits dying horribly of infection due to minor cuts and abrasions.

> Pre-Green revolution humanity probably couldn’t make a utopia. Post-Green revolution humanity hasn’t pulled it off either.

Not entirely, but we have entirely eliminated at least one disease that was once so common there was a specific goddess to whom you prayed if you wanted to be cured of it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shitala

Re: “Beyond the limit”: Satellites and mirrors in space pose threat to the night sky

#175

Post by SidewaysView »

pshirshov wrote: post #56
arjie wrote: post #13

These kinds of caps have for years been a dampener on human flourishing. My observation has been that those in stagnation or decline tend to attach themselves to these desires to hold the status quo. Anti-energy, anti-housing, anti-industry and so on because they've reached a local maxima in their ability to live and have chosen to spend their life in leisure. But there is the rest of the world, and if I'm told that…

> we will build Sun orbital structures and swarms, Another episode of arrogant fantasy in the ponyworld.

Hear, hear! Promote this man!

Shut these ridiculous baboons out of society. Take their TESCREAL libertarian nonsense with them.

Re: “Beyond the limit”: Satellites and mirrors in space pose threat to the night sky

#176

Post by ben_w »

throwaway-11-1 wrote: post #172
piloto_ciego wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, there are less starving people than there were in most of the world. We've made progress. In my lifetime we've made progress! I mean, there are momentary set backs and they are egregious, I agree with that for sure, but the world is wildly better than it was in the early 90s or early 00s. I was there (cue Elrond meme), I remember. And god forbid you were gay back then, or had an ailment that needed some high…

Your response is not addressing my claims, homelessness is increasing, life expectancy is lagging poorer countries and there are still food security issues not being addressed in the richest country in history. I’m discussing material outcomes and you want to focus on social progress….which is fine I guess? Anyway I have receipts https://www.healthsystemtracker.org/chart-collection/u-s-lif... https://www.unc.edu/disc…

Those are all US stats.

US got problems.

World's much bigger than the US, and is getting better:

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/life-expectancy?time=1770...

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/prevalence-of-undernouris...

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/total-population-living-i...

Re: “Beyond the limit”: Satellites and mirrors in space pose threat to the night sky

#177

Post by piloto_ciego »

SidewaysView wrote: post #173
piloto_ciego wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, go ahead and troll away elsewhere, I am hip to your game. Have a nice day and I sincerely hope that you are happier in the future than you are now.

(Seriously, can someone please explain how you write this paean to creepy uncle sci-fi without realizing how it sounds? Anyone?)

Genuinely, have a happy life.

Re: “Beyond the limit”: Satellites and mirrors in space pose threat to the night sky

#178

Post by Aaron_NW »

I'm building a weather app, so this hits close to home.

We talk about satellites as connectivity infrastructure, but I had not considered the impact to the night sky. I wonder if there are solutions like satellites posted further away around the moon with fewer relay satellites shared around the earth?

Re: “Beyond the limit”: Satellites and mirrors in space pose threat to the night sky

#180

Post by strangecasts »

upofadown wrote: post #55

>SpaceX plans to send one million more satellites into orbit, for space-based data centres, ... I think we should wait to see how the first satellite data centre works out. It seems fairly unlikely that it could be practical. It seems kind of nuts... >Reflect Orbital, a US start-up, aims to launch a constellation of very large mirror-like satellites to provide sunlight at night, with reflected beams that span at leas…

> I think we should wait to see how the first satellite data centre works out. It seems fairly unlikely that it could be practical. It seems kind of nuts...

I strongly suspect that what'll happen is SpaceX does launch satellites with onboard GPUs, so the SpaceX hypemen can go "the skeptics said it couldn't be done!" and take off before the actual, more crucial question of "does it make _financial_ sense?" is answered in the extreme negative

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