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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

#261

Post by sajithdilshan »

notrealyme123 wrote: post #254
sajithdilshan wrote: post #250

I’m shocked, an European agency wants to regulate how many satellites should orbit earth at a given time? Is regulation the only solution EU has for everything? Have they forgotten how to think a bit more creatively? Like developing algorithms to remove clutter added by satellites in observation data or even to deploy more space telescopes. Is that too much to ask?

> A new European Southern Observatory (ESO) study has found that current proposals to launch over 1.7 million satellites into orbit, including extremely bright ones, would have “devastating consequences for astronomy.” I have a hard time fitting your response to the posted article.

> A new European Southern Observatory (ESO) study has found that current proposals to launch over 1.7 million satellites into orbit, including extremely bright ones, would have “devastating consequences for astronomy.” According to the study, no more than 100 000 faint satellites, below naked eye visibility, should orbit Earth, to safeguard our ability to observe the night sky with modern telescopes

Maybe you should have read the next sentence as well.

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

#262

Post by earth-tattoo »

dgellow wrote: post #115
Legend2440 wrote: post #8

This is a tradeoff we have to make with infrastructure and development in general. How do you balance human needs with pristine nature? Do we put up long-distance power lines and wind farms even though they ruin the views? Do you tear down a forest to put up farmlands and suburbs? Do you build a dam to provide water for irrigation, even though it kills the fish and floods a valley? Satellites are actually easier than…

> How do you balance human needs with pristine nature? How about we set a limit on how many satellites? That’s exactly how to balance

A limit that India and China are totally going to ignore?

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

#263

Post by m4rtink »

edelbitter wrote: post #201
Legend2440 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>the constant threat of big enough objects showing up on a collision course with earth I don't really think this is a serious risk. This is a once-in-a-million-years kind of event. Also, asteroid detection is not seriously affected by satellites. We can easily tell the difference between a moving satellite and a moving asteroid because of their speed.

We might have even seen the Chelyabinsk one coming, with current tech.. if only it had been coming at us from a slightly less bright direction. That one was probably in the once-in-a-hundred-years category.

That's exactly the thing space asteroid hunting telescopes solve - you can put them insuch a heliocentric orbit that they can watch for those asteroids coming from the direction of the sun.

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

#264

Post by m4rtink »

snovv_crash wrote: post #235
JuniperMesos wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a California resident I really don't like the idea of a legal framework that encourages more citizen initiatives. They would be used to try to prevent building more housing.

Citizen initiatives are the only thing that can cut across partisan lines and stop politics from turning into tribal warfare.

Maybe fix the system so there are not just two parties & bad parties fail to be voted in?

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

#265

Post by isthatafact »

xadhominemx wrote: post #5

I am a science and astronomy fan, but I am sorry, in this case progress is more important. If we regret our decision, the LEOs will fall out of the sky by themselves in a few years and it will be ok.

Science is progress. Putting mirrors in space in order to provide sunlight at night seems more like willful destruction than progress.

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

#266

Post by michelb »

gordonhart wrote: post #30
michelb wrote: post #2

Worrying for sure. But I doubt the current USA, along with Israel and Russia are going to be bothered about this. Everyone is launching satellites and other gear into orbit for war.

Interesting that your list omits China considering they have firm plans to launch ~41k satellites for government/commercial constellations plus ITU filings for >200k proposed satellites.

Thanks, they definitely also belong on that list.

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

#267

Post by cog-flex »

johnnyApplePRNG wrote: post #33
michelb wrote: post #2

Worrying for sure. But I doubt the current USA, along with Israel and Russia are going to be bothered about this. Everyone is launching satellites and other gear into orbit for war.

They're already itching to throw space-lasers into orbit. [0] I wish I was joking. [0] https://www.jpost.com/defense-and-tech/article-900854

The most moral lasers in the world.

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

#268

Post by metalman »

1- what night sky? do you mean the one that is so bright from electric lighting that the seagulls are now flying a night shift? 2- one of the taboo subjects is solar phenominon and what happens if everything in orbit looses guidance due to a local stellar event? do we get a ring? or lots of meteors

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

#269

Post by omicronxt »

throwaway-11-1 wrote: post #221
ben_w wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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...

Yeah that’s totally fair and really good to see. It’s maybe the one perspective that gives me some hope

Our world in data is neoliberal think tank supported by billionares. They got bad reputation of misrepresenting data to favor capitalism as inherently progressive.
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