If the $100 billion International Space Station (ISS) had been constructed to orbit our Moon instead of Earth, prospects for the U.S.’ human spaceflight program would arguably be much brighter than today.
Here are a few reasons why:
An International Lunar Space Station (ILSS) would have guaranteed the U.S. maintained its Apollo-era global dominance in terms of crewed interplanetary transport.
Even if NASA had decided not to continue with the Apollo program as originally envisioned, the space agency could have ferried astronauts to lunar orbit using its remaining Saturn V rockets and begun construction of a scaled-down version of the current ISS.
“When a franchise is around for four decades, it can get impossibly unwieldy to try and grasp its lore — and Star Wars canon is no exception. Here’s a guide to the origins of Star Wars Canon, the rise and fall of one of the most prominent Expanded Universes in fiction, and where the saga stands with Disney today.”
Elon Musk might think it’s a good idea to warm up Mars with thermonuclear weapons so humans can live on it, but scientists are raising red flags about the idea.
The CEO of Hawthorne-based SpaceX talked Mars colonization, among other topics, on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” on Wednesday.
When Colbert asked how he would eventually transform the Red Planet into a livable place, Musk said it would need to be warmed up.
As a follow-up to Shailesh Prasad’s thought provoking video (just below this article), I offer two equally impressive visualizations of the scope and magnificence of our universe. These videos are the epitome of a teachable moment. And it’s fun, too!
Check out this simple, one-button interactive Scale of the Universe by Cary Huang. Simply pull a slider left or right to zoom in or out. It covers the Universe from 1027 meters down to 10-35 meters (from the entire universe to the Plank length and quantum foam).
Charles and Ray Eames
Unlike the classic film by Charles & Ray Eames (more about that later), the zoom doesn’t really take viewers closer or further away. Rather, it compares relative size by allowing users navigate by magnitudes (a circle indicates each power-of-ten).
Nikon, the camera and optics maker, created an alternate spin on this idea with more user control (identify and study objects used to illustrate size–and jump directly to any magnitude along the size continuum). Instead of panning in and out, the Nikon presentation crawls familiar objects along the horizontal axis. Interestingly, they end at modest lower limit of 10-15 meters, rather than attempting to illustrate quarks, charm and quantum foam.
In 1968, Charles & Ray Eames were already famous as sculptors, architects and designers of modern furniture. That’s when they created Powers of 10, one of the most popular educational films of all time. Just 9 minutes long, it was intended as a “rough sketch” in an effort to attract an animation partner to add visual punch. 9 years after the original film was released, IBM collaborated with the designers and the film was re-released with improved special effects. Both versions are included on the commercial DVD. I prefer the original rough sketch.
Eames Lounge Chair
In the original film, two clocks sit outside the main frame. As we » accelerate away from earth (covering 10X as much distance every ten seconds), the clocks track relative time from a traveler’s frame of reference –vs– a person on earth.
You can view the 1977 re-release (Be sure to raise quality to 480p). Interestingly, IBM has also posted a user-controlled, Zoomable version.
I can’t find the original film on the web. But I own it. Write to me if you want me to “loan” it to you via a web link.
Corporations aren’t inherently evil, they’re only as greedy as the humans behind them. It’s the same thing with robots. Robots have no emotions—they’re just a pile of metal, screws and circuits—but they will be as mean, selfish, and avaricious as the people programming them.
Wire Cutters is a brilliantly crafted student filmdirected and animated by Jack Anderson. It tells the story of two robots from rival mining companies that meet by chance in a desolate planet.
