If the Earth were 100 pixels wide • Hacker News Board

Re: If the Earth were 100 pixels wide

#81

Post by shardling » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 10:40 PM UTC

vacri wrote: post #75

aetherson wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, he knows. But the point is: They say they're going 20% of the speed of light (in pixels). But the closest approach of Earth and Mars is about 4.35 light minutes away from each other. So if our virtual speed is 20% of the speed of light, it follows that the page should take more than 20 minutes to reach Mars. And it doesn't. It doesn't even take 4.35 minutes, so the page must be continuing to accelerate past the…

The page flashes for me a couple of times, after which the starfield is still and then rapidly speeds up again. I assume this means that we're travelling with the assistance of warpgates or similar - and at 127km/pixel, it's unlikely that the warpgate or the ship would show on the map.

Nah, because if it's physical travel the starfield won't change at all. :P

Re: If the Earth were 100 pixels wide

#82

Post by vadman » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 10:42 PM UTC

JDGM wrote: post #42

vadman wrote: post #10

Not sure if it's a bug or a typo, but the "width" (diameter) of the Earth is 12,742 km, not 6,371 (which is the radius).

You're right! How frustrating. The most frustrating is that I was just about to share this with some friends and know that I now risk either: 1.) Them smugly pointing that inaccuracy out and failing to enjoy how cool this is otherwise, or 2.) The website author correcting it by the time my friends see the link so any "btw there's a typo" comment I make being confusing. I'm going to share it anyway! EDIT: I fear this…

So it's a bug after all :/ hope the author fixes it, such a neat idea otherwise.

Re: If the Earth were 100 pixels wide

#83

Post by itafroma » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 10:43 PM UTC

vadman wrote: post #10

Not sure if it's a bug or a typo, but the "width" (diameter) of the Earth is 12,742 km, not 6,371 (which is the radius).

I tweeted the error to the creator (David Paliwoda) and it's now been corrected.

Re: If the Earth were 100 pixels wide

#84

Post by vacri » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 10:45 PM UTC

afreak wrote: post #20

izend wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like to imagine if Mars and Venus were swapped would Venus then be habitable?

No. Simply put: the core is likely solidified just like Mars and its magnetic field is very weak, causing the weather to be influenced by only its rotation and solar winds. It would be far more difficult to terraform than Mars really. Also a Venusian day is something like 5,800 hours and its surface temperature is capable of melting lead.

Moving to a Mars orbit would have a significant effect on the surface temperature.

More of a problem is the bulk of the atmosphere being carbon dioxide (breathing even a 5% mix is excruciatingly painful for humans), but the real challenge would be dealing with the rains of sulfuric acid... at least Mars wouldn't be trying to dissolve your hermetically sealed environment.

Re: If the Earth were 100 pixels wide

#85

Post by b_emery » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 10:49 PM UTC

If the Earth radius was 100 pixels, the average depth of the ocean (~4km) would be less than 0.1 pixels. I once had a professor hold up piece of paper and say "this is my scale model of the pacific ocean". Took me a while to realize he wasn't joking.

Re: If the Earth were 100 pixels wide

#86

Post by afreak » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 10:51 PM UTC

fusiongyro wrote: post #40

afreak wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. Simply put: the core is likely solidified just like Mars and its magnetic field is very weak, causing the weather to be influenced by only its rotation and solar winds. It would be far more difficult to terraform than Mars really. Also a Venusian day is something like 5,800 hours and its surface temperature is capable of melting lead.

I like to believe we could circumvent some of these problems technologically. After all, there is no particular reason to feel bad about macroscopic terraforming on a lifeless planet. Yes, it would be more work than Mars. But it's also bigger than Mars and further from the asteroid belt. No planet but Earth is going to be ideal.

The amount of energy you'd have to expend to fix Venus would be far more costly than trying to keep Mars warm by using baseboard heaters on every square metre.

One of the largest issues facing Venus is that it is effectively a dead planet. Mars is a dead planet too but it's far easier to make it warmer than to cool down Venus so we can live on it. On top of that, Mars has water frozen at its surface and perhaps in liquid form beneath; Venus only has water vapour that accounts for less than 0.01% of the total atmospheric make up.

And if it is size that you want to take into account, then think about this: it's far easier to fix a smaller planet that is geologically dead than it is a planet of our size.

Venus is never going to be colonised. Mars maybe not, but at least that is less of an impossibility.

Re: If the Earth were 100 pixels wide

#87

Post by Gravityloss » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 10:55 PM UTC

The starfield should not move anyway, because of parallax. The stars are really far away and the sky looks the same on Mars and Earth.

Re: If the Earth were 100 pixels wide

#88

Post by anonymfus » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 10:55 PM UTC

joeycastillo wrote: post #35

One thing that's always gotten to me about this distance is what it means for communication latency. Mars is 20 light-minutes away. If we sent colonists, communication would be a 40-minute round trip. No phone calls home, no way to have a chat with friends or loved ones; at best they could send a message, and wait 40 minutes for a reply. That's far away.

Like foreign country few hundreds revolutions of our planet around the Sun ago.

Re: If the Earth were 100 pixels wide

#89

Post by DavePaliwoda » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 10:56 PM UTC

Hey guys, Dave here, made the site.. Really amazed by how much coverage this thing has got, and really surprised by how poor my maths were. Not surprising given I failed both maths and physics at college. Really happy to be inspiring debate, I've gone over my sums and given it another shot

Thanks!

Re: If the Earth were 100 pixels wide

#90

Post by JDGM » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 10:56 PM UTC

b_emery wrote: post #85

If the Earth radius was 100 pixels, the average depth of the ocean (~4km) would be less than 0.1 pixels. I once had a professor hold up piece of paper and say "this is my scale model of the pacific ocean". Took me a while to realize he wasn't joking.

The one my teacher used was the billiard ball, and told us "if the Earth were the same size as this, it would be smoother". A quick google suggests that is indeed true, but it would not be rounder. (http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/09/08/te...)