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Philae has landed

bbc.com

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Re: Philae has landed

#201

Post by vanschelven »

kartikkumar wrote: post #53

Absolutely stunning feat of engineering. My bosses are on the drill team for Philae and were amongst the nervy faces being beamed all over the world. Great example of what European nations can do when politics don't get in the way. ExoMars [1] and Bepi-Colombo [2] are perfect examples of the inverse. Look forward to the first pictures from the surface. I'm at the Division on Planetary Sciences (DPS) meeting [3] in Tu…

The video of Rosetta's 12 year journey in space is both impressive and informative:

http://www.esa.int/spaceinvideos/Videos/2013/10/Rosetta_s_tw...

Re: Philae has landed

#202

Post by Killah911 »

It is just me or has the story evolved into something a bit less jubilant in the course of the last two hours. It's an amazing feat, but this stuff is always a huge gamble.

As someone's who's worked on a few spacecraft project I feel really bad for the team(s) (recently worked on one which didn't go so well, years of work down the tube). Even if it didn't go perfectly I hope they're commended for the work they've done so far & the landing they achieved.

Re: Philae has landed

#203

Post by pnut »

throwit99 wrote: post #90
tmmm wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really we... Just very few people, most of us have no idea how they've done it.

But we all paid for it. We paid tax so they could play with toys.

In the time you've spent whining on this forum, you could have made many times your proportional contribution to this endeavor.

I'm in agreement w/ all the downvoters here - you are absolutely entitled to whatever opinion you desire to hold, but if you're going to be sharing it in a public forum, deliver sound criticism or don't bother.

Your comments are beneath the quality of conversation expected at HN.

Re: Philae has landed

#204

Post by talltofu »

stinos wrote: post #18
talltofu wrote: post #3

Live streaming of the event here http://news.yahoo.com/video/abc-news-plus-special-report-220... Thanks @brianpgordon - Check out this gif of the orbital maneuvers required for Rosetta to reach its destination: https://i.imgur.com/TUkKuhf.gif Live twitter feed of ESA https://twitter.com/esaoperations It looks like @Philae2014 made a fairly gentle touch down on #67P based on amount of landing gear damping #CometLandin…

any link to footage of the actual landing?

Not yet

Re: Philae has landed

#206

Post by nathan_long »

bane wrote: post #139
kartikkumar wrote: post #53

Absolutely stunning feat of engineering. My bosses are on the drill team for Philae and were amongst the nervy faces being beamed all over the world. Great example of what European nations can do when politics don't get in the way. ExoMars [1] and Bepi-Colombo [2] are perfect examples of the inverse. Look forward to the first pictures from the surface. I'm at the Division on Planetary Sciences (DPS) meeting [3] in Tu…

I agree, stunning stunning bit of science and engineering. Everybody involved in this should be beaming with joy. Once again the light of reason continues to chase away humanity's ancestral boogiemen.

> Once again the light of reason continues to chase away humanity's ancestral boogiemen.

Boogiemen like the belief that humans are more than collections of atoms and random emergent behaviors? Because if those are your boogiemen, there's no particular reason to rejoice in reason, or anything else for that matter - it's all ashes in the end, and nobody will be left to care, whether we colonize Andromeda or blow ourselves up this afternoon.

Science is a collection of methods for determining facts. I find it odd when people describe it in religious-sounding terms and simultaneously scoff at religion.

But perhaps I misunderstood you?

Re: Philae has landed

#207

Post by bennyg »

innguest wrote: post #165
bennyg wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not 20 more cents... It's actually less money over time. I feel like this argument is really working against you rather than in your favor. Extreme libertarianism is awesome in theory, but fails hard in reality. Income tax, when used smartly, can be one of the greatest things a nation has at its disposal.

> Income tax, when used smartly, can be one of the greatest things a nation has at its disposal. A nation is just its people. People are already in possession of this money before the income tax takes it from them. I agree that this money can be one of the greatest things that people have at their disposal, which is why I'm arguing we should not let government handle it. Why are you against peacefully convincing peop…

> You don't think the future is decentralized, including the funding of big projects? Wow.

Nowhere did I say that. I think there is room for both. You seem to think there isn't.

Re: Philae has landed

#208

Post by ahallock »

phaemon wrote: post #193
ahallock wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Taxation might not fit the strict definition of theft (easy when the gov creates its own jargon), but it is the threat of force to take property from someone against their will. I mean, how many of us are giving money directly to the gov by our own volition? I don't know of anyone. We were born into this system and we never agreed to it. Let's at least be honest about that. > There are no examples of large population…

> it is the threat of force to take property from someone against their will. No it's not. It's the threat of force against people who use that market and then refuse to pay the fees they owe. Any service can (and would) do the same via the legal system. I've never paid the US government a penny, because I don't use their market. > We were born into this system and we never agreed to it. You certainly have the option…

You're making a false equivalency between the State and other market actors. You may not be using the US government's services, but you're probably using your own government's. Forcing a service on people (say the War on Drugs) and then demanding payment through taxation is different from competing in the market. Even if you cite paying a fee for using the roads--not too controversial--to gain a monopoly on road-building, the government had to use the threat of force. You must follow things back to the origin.

> You certainly have the option of leaving that market if you don't like its fees.

For a price, and then only to enter another country.

Re: Philae has landed

#209

Post by TomGullen »

innguest wrote: post #153
cmc31 wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(stolen money should not be spent in more or less important things, it should be returned to their rightful owner so they can choose what to do with what they've earned) Just to be clear.. Your issue is not that money from taxes is spent on scientific research and space exploration, but really that you have to pay taxes?

My issue is, whoever wants to accomplish something that takes a lot of money to make happen, should do like ARKYD and make a kickstarter or any other peaceful alternative, that allows for every individual to choose whether they'd like to participate. My issue is that running to the government, just because it already has guns in place pointing to every individual's head in case they don't pay, and saying "we'll steal…

Serious question, why don't you move to a country that has a tax system that you agree more with? No one is stopping you, it would be a free market victory.

Re: Philae has landed

#210

Post by adrianN »

tedks wrote: post #199
bennyg wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What other arbitrary aims would you rather scientists work on, since all aims are arbitrary anyways? I don't think you really understand how scientific research works at all. The engineering effort of NASA took a bunch of disparate scientific discoveries and pieced them together to land humans on the moon. Don't tell me you don't think that sparked major economic development in this country for decades. One of the la…

Well, presumably if NASA is good because it produces things that can be spun off, you could just put the money into directly producing the spinoffs (somehow) and be more efficient. >The entirety of humanity has been involved with exploring our curiosities. Exploring our curiosities tends to lead towards societal/scientific progress. Space is one of those. I think this is almost certainly false. Very little of humanit…

> I think this is almost certainly false. Very little of humanity has been involved with exploring any curiosity. Go to a third-world village and see how much curiosity is being explored.

Throughout human history the vast majority of the population did nothing to contribute to the progress of society, except doing their job to keep their current society running. Eventually we figured out how to produce enough food without having everyone work all the time. The new free time could be used for arts and science; progress became possible.

But I think it's wrong to dismiss all the people who produce neither art nor knowledge. Without them, humanity couldn't afford to feed poets and scientists.

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