HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: alg@is.morgan.com (Al Guintu)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: HRMS/SETI Answers
Date: 13 Oct 92 21:34:08 GMT


In <1992Oct9.145536.19786@elroy.jpl.nasa.gov>,
eto@elroy.jpl.nasa.gov (Edward T. Olsen) wrote:

> IT IS A REQUIREMENT THAT ANY ETI SIGNAL DETECTION BE REOBSERVABLE, NOT
> ONLY WITH THE NASA HRMS SEARCH SYSTEMS, BUT ALSO BY SIMPLE
> CONFIRMATION SYSTEMS. THIS REQUIREMENT FOR REOBSERVABILITY IS CRUCIAL
> AND ALL PREVIOUS SEARCH "CANDIDATES" HAVE FAILED TO MEET IT.

Q: "WHAT IF ETI STOPS SENDING?"
   what about a hypothetical eti civilization that stopped 
   transmission for example, because their government 
   cut off the resources for the work  ;->  ?  would the current
   research ignore observation of the tail end of such a 
   transmission? 


> The strong military radars which have been used over the last decades
> to detect possible bomber attacks and ICBM attacks are another source
> of signals which HRMS could detect from nearby stars. 

Q: "ETI DETECTION MAY, BY DEFINITION BE NEAR-IMPOSSIBLE"
   i'm sure someone has already brought this up, but the statement
   above brings up a hypothetical question: would eti be increasingly
   harder to detect as its technology and society advances?  just
   look at the way *our* technology and society is advancing (no
   religious/political flames here, please ;->):

   1.  many high-power transmission systems of the past are continually 
       being replaced by low-power transmitters and sensitive receivers.
   2.  technologies such as fiber optics, and infrared communications 
       will not leak signals that can travel light years.
   3.  digital communications poses another problem:  broadcast digital 
       transmissions will probably involve an increasing amount of 
       sophisticated encryption, which may be observed as background
       noise by eti.
   4.  overall global peace could cause the dismantling of large 
       military radar arrays, propaganda broadcasts, etc.

   my point here is that if *we* are becoming increasingly harder
   to detect, what about eti?  maybe eti is *not* reobservable 
   because of data encryption that makes eti signals look random
   or (worse) natural in source.



/al   

+-----------------------------------------------------+--------------------+
| "The ideas and opinions expressed here are my own   | alg@is.morgan.com  |
| and are NOT those of Morgan Stanley & Company."     |                    |
+-----------------------------------------------------+--------------------+



From: Tomas.Svitek@f118.n109.z1.fidonet.org (Tomas Svitek)
Sender: Uucp@blkcat.UUCP
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Query Re: pluto direct/ o
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1992 18:37:00 -0500

HS>>Aerobrake?

HS>In what? :-)  Pluto does have an atmosphere of sorts at the moment, but
HS>I'd guess it's too thin to do much aerobraking in, even if we knew its
HS>properties well enough to plan an aerobraking mission, which we don't.
HS>And we'd have to kill a lot of velocity; Pluto is roughly 150 km/s-years
HS>away (how's that for strange units? :-)), so for a reasonable trip time
HS>we're talking about killing maybe 20 km/s, which is high.

Actually, there is a fairly serious proposal (albeit very tentative)
from GE Reentry Systems regarding aerobraking at Pluto.  Surprisingly,
they claim that it can be done, with the inflatable heat shield.  I guess
that because you are moving so fast, the atmospheric drag is very high.

I cannot judge the proposal on its technical details, but they sound quite
serious, and they *know* about heat shields.  It is, however, true that
by far the biggest problem is absolute uncertainity about the postulated
Pluto atmosphere.

                        Tomas Svitek
  OLX 2.1 TD  Back Up My Hard Drive? I Can't Find The Reverse Switch!

Newsgroups: sci.space
From: M22079@mwvm.mitre.org
Subject: Re: ENV SATELLITE SHUTDOWN IN DEC 1992
Organization: The MITRE Corporation, McLean VA 22102
Date: Fri, 9 Oct 1992 20:44:55 GMT

In article <Bvv8xA.HGw@news.larc.nasa.gov>
rowland@zorba7.larc.nasa.gov (Michael W. Rowland) writes:
 
>
>This is a repost of 6 Oct. posting (revised)...
>
>We at Langley Research Center received news on Thursday, October 2,
>1992 that NASA intends to shutdown the following satellites in
>December to save about $15M:
>
>     NUMBUS-7
>
>     ERBS
>
>     NOAA-9 (partial?)
>
>     NOAA-10 (partial?)
>
>     UARS (SPRING 1993)
>
>Some of the following experiments that will terminate when
>their satellites are shutdown are:
>
>     Stratospheric Aerosol Measurement II  (SAM II)
>
>     Earth Radiation Budget Experiment (ERBS) (3)
>
>     Stratospheric Aerosol and Gas Experiment II (SAGE II)
>
>     Total Ozone Measurement System (TOMS)
>
>     Halogen Occultation Experiment (HALOE)
>
>     Microwave Limb Sounder (MLS)
>
>No plans have been stated to restart the satellites.
>
>Budget cuts are specified in House Conference Report 102-902
>that is attached to HR 5679, Sept. 24, 1992.
>
>Mike Rowland
>
>Mike Rowland, Aerosol Research Branch, MS 475
>NASA Langley Research Center, Hampton VA 23681
>internet: rowland@zorba7.larc.nasa.gov
 
The UNOFFICIAL word I get is that NASA is dropping its direct downlink from
the satellites listed in the previous post.  The satellites previously
listed were NOAA satellites and will continue to be managed by NOAA.
 
It is however true that at least one NOAA satellite will be let go due to
ground limitations when a new NOAA satellite is launched.
 
                                    - Karl J. Pitt
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: kentm@aix.rpi.edu (Michael V. Kent)
Subject: Re: ENV SATELLITE SHUTDOWN IN DEC 1992
Keywords: nasa, environment, meteorology, satellite, ozone, aerosol
Organization: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY
Date: Fri, 9 Oct 1992 19:47:52 GMT

In article <Bvv8xA.HGw@news.larc.nasa.gov> rowland@zorba7.larc.nasa.gov (Michael W. Rowland) writes:
>This is a repost of 6 Oct. posting (revised)...
>
>     NUMBUS-7
>     
>     Total Ozone Measurement System (TOMS)

Is this real?  NASA plans to shut down TOMS?  Why?

This is about the last instrument on the last satellite I expected to be
voluntarily shut down.

>Budget cuts are specified in House Conference Report 102-902
>that is attached to HR 5679, Sept. 24, 1992.

I guess this is a likely explanation.  Were these satellites mentioned by name
or was it just a line item that got hacked to death?

Mike

-- 
Michael Kent                                   kentm@rpi.edu
McDonnell Douglas                              Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
All facts in this post are based on publicly available information.  All
opinions expressed are solely those of the author.    Apple II Forever !!
From: bafta@cats.ucsc.edu (Shari L Brooks)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Don't forget the Other Guy
Date: 8 Oct 1992 18:34:41 GMT
Organization: University of California -  Santa Cruz, CA, USA
NNTP-Posting-Host: am.ucsc.edu


In article <STEINLY.92Oct7181139@topaz.ucsc.edu> steinly@topaz.ucsc.edu (Steinn 
Sigurdsson) writes:

>Actually I like the rather devious argument I first heard recently 
> - probably on the net ;-) - that the US was quite happy to be second
>as they wanted the Soviets to establish precedent on limits to
>airspace, at the time it was not clear if air space restrictions
>extended up to orbit, would have been most inconvenient if pushed by
>somebody like the Soviets.
>
>But then again I doubt anyone had much of a coherent policy taking
>such factors into account...

Actually you are correct.  By allowing the Soviets to launch first, the US
guaranteed that they would not shriek about our satellite flying over them.
As far as I know this was indeed a policy.  By doing so the US opened up
the possibilities of military spy satellites, which could conceivably have
never happened if we had launched first and Russia had protested violation
of sovereign [air] space.

-- 
If you blow fire against the wind, take care to not get the smoke in your eyes.
      Big & Growly Dragon-monster        |       bafta@cats.ucsc.edu
     ------> shari brooks <-------       |       bslb@helios.ucsc.edu
                             All opinions are my own.
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: andy@osea.demon.co.uk (Andrew Haveland-Robinson)
Subject: Laser Space Mirror 
Distribution: world
Organization: Haveland-Robinson Associates
Date: Fri, 9 Oct 1992 01:09:04 +0000


In article <BvrGs5.9q3.1@cs.cmu.edu> amon@elegabalus.cs.qub.ac.uk writes:

>The secret to opening the space frontier is to be found in plastic  
>mounted bits of old satellites; pet moon rocks; committing ashes to  
>the deep; asteroid desk sets (Ceres, Vesta, Pallas... Collect em!  
>Trade em with your friends!); garbage disposal... and so forth.
>

How err... very um.. well...  American! :-)

Why not laser raster scan the clouds with MacDonalds adverts?   >cringe<

You'd need all sorts of permissions to scan from the ground, 'cos of
aircraft etc. but from above?  an idea, but the beam intensity would have
to be *colossal*!

Andy.

+-------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Haveland-Robinson Associates     | Email: andy@osea.demon.co.uk         |
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+-------------------------------------------------------------------------+
From: sl25@cus.cam.ac.uk (Steve Linton)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: SETI functional grammer
Keywords: SETI communication grammer and syntax Sagan
Date: 13 Oct 92 23:42:12 GMT
Organization: U of Cambridge, England


|> 
|> Saying this is very hard is an understatement :-)  And rember that it may take
|> a few centuries to say "Sorry, I didn't catch that..."

What you don't do is wait for a response. Having found evidence of someone out
there, you send them everything you can think of, on every frequency you can
think of and just keep talking. After a few centuries they will (hopefully)
reply, and if they ask any questions you haven't already sent answers to you put
the answers in straight away. Even if it takes them decades to crack your
language it's a safe bet that they'll have recordede what you sent so far, so
they can go back and translate it all.

By all means send them clever codes and mathematics and so on, but also send them
encyclopedias and newspaper back issues and TV game shows. Who knows what'll be
the key to them cracking the language? Meanwhile of course we have to crack their
codes, mathematics, language and TV dating ads.

|> 
|> I ran across a thought experiment once where the prototype teleporting machine
|> ends up on an alien planet and won't come back.  How do you tell the aliens
|> to press the right (manual override) button and not the left (self destruct)
|> button?  I couldn't figure a way out.

This is a fundamental physical problem. The easy answer is to refer them to some
assymetry in the machine, or in the distribution of quasars or something. Failing
that you can send them a helically polarised radio beam. Failing all those, you
have to describe a rather complicated piece of particle physics which
demonstrates that the universe is not symmetrical. I don't recall the details,
but it can be done (as long s you agree on the direction of time).

		Steve Linton
From: jim@netlink.cts.com (Jim Bowery)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Military Funding
Date: 9 Oct 92 15:30:52 GMT
Organization: NetLink Online Communications, San Diego CA

Audit: sci.space,JBowery,2

18084TM@msu.edu (Tom) writes:
>
>ICBM's.  So the military _does_ R&D, sometimes necessary R&D, but not
>all military R&D, and especially not all military spending, is actually
>necessary.  So we should save the dough, let someone else develop it,
>on their bill.
 
The military generally does a good job in areas of imminent danger,
such as ICBMs and remote sensing.  That's where the real incentives 
exist for the military.
 
In other areas, such as civilian agencies like NASA and DoE and the less
critical military areas, the incentives are primarily political -- 
although 
good traditions can ameleorate the politics somewhat.  Astronomy is a
case in point with NASA -- although as I warned in this newsgroup just
prior to the launch of Hubble, Astronomers were in for a rude awakening
due to a departure from those traditions and an adoption of NASA's 
culture.  Hopefully the privately funded Keck Telescope will help
astronomy recover some of the integrity it lost with NASA's culture.
 
The military generally has good traditions of discipline that keep it 
from getting as far out of hand as civilian government technology
agencies -- even when operating in noncritical military areas.  The
best that can be said for such noncritical military expenditures is
that they don't produce bureaucracies with incentives to attack 
technical progress the way spending on civilian government technology 
does.
 
Yesterday I was talking to the ONR guy who pushed through funding for 
the laser gyro.  He told me about his efforts to upgrade the power
plants for the surface fleet to use commercial jet turbines due to
their low maintanence load (>100man year savings per).  The Navy
technology guys just had to spend tens of millions trying to develop
special purpose turbines because of some specious technical arguments
that made those special turbines sound like more advanced technology.
Eventually, they figured out that what they really wanted was powerful
and reliable power with low operating costs including maintanence.  
They finally junked the technology program and just went with DC-10 
engines.  
 
This is a good example of how the noncritical mission people in the
military may run around playing with themselves for awhile, but
they eventually come around to doing the right thing (ie: procureing
 commercially available subsystems from US industry) rather than
stretching some ridiculous technology program on for decades and
billions of dollars.  Civilian government technology agencies have no 
such sense of self-restraint nor do they take kindly to outside 
competition
which might force them to behave themselves.  That's why they end
up suppressing technology in proportion to their funding levels.
 

--                    
INTERNET:  jim@netlink.cts.com (Jim Bowery)
UUCP:   ...!ryptyde!netlink!jim
NetLink Online Communications * Public Access in San Diego, CA (619) 453-1115
From: gary@ke4zv.uucp (Gary Coffman)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Telepresence
Date: 10 Oct 92 14:42:41 GMT
Reply-To: gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman)
Organization: Gannett Technologies Group

In article <9210070147.AA09594@cmr.ncsl.nist.gov> roberts@CMR.NCSL.NIST.GOV (John Roberts) writes:
>
>Here's an interesting item from the July 1992 issue of NASA Tech Briefs:
>
>..............
>
>  Predictive Display for Teleoperation With Delay
>
>  The Predictive image helps the operator control the remote manipulator.
>
>  NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California
>
>  A computer-graphical simulator helps an operator control a robotic 
>  manipulator located so far away that controlling and monitoring signals
>  are delayed significantly in transmission. The simulator displays a phantom
>  image of the robot superimposed on the delayed "real" monitoring image of
>  the robot. The phantom responds to control signals immediately -- that is,
>  without transmission delay. Its motion predicts that of the real robot.
>  After the transmission delay, the real image of the robot follows the motion
>  of the phantom image.

After successfully maneuvering the phantom image, the operator sits back
and watches the delayed image of the rover slowly fall into a subsidence
hidden from the scan. The screen image is replaced by the words "GAME 
OVER. INSERT $1 BILLION TO PLAY AGAIN"

Gary
From: dodson@convex.COM (Dave Dodson)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Drop nuc waste into sun
Date: 8 Oct 92 21:33:25 GMT
Reply-To: dodson@convex.COM (Dave Dodson)
Organization: Engineering, CONVEX Computer Corp., Richardson, Tx., USA
Originator: dodson@bach.convex.com
X-Disclaimer: This message was written by a user at CONVEX Computer
              Corp. The opinions expressed are those of the user and
              not necessarily those of CONVEX.

In article <BvtLs1.Hv7@zoo.toronto.edu> henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) writes:
>To get it into the Sun's atmosphere, so the orbit will decay into the
>Sun in a reasonable time, you will have to kill *most* of that 30 km/s.
>This is hard.  Launching entirely out of the solar system is easier;
>for that we only have to add about 12 km/s.

Since the earth's escape velocity from near the surface is 11 km/s, a
payload on a direct solar impact trajectory would have to be moving at
about sqrt(11^2 + 30^2) = 32 km/s at thrust termination.  However,
a payload on a solar escape trajectory would need a speed of only about 
sqrt(11^2 + 12^2) = 16 km/s.  Since energy is proportional to v^2, the
direct solar impact trajectory takes about 4 times the launch energy as
the solar escape trajectory.  This is a HUGE difference.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Dave Dodson		                             dodson@convex.COM
Convex Computer Corporation      Richardson, Texas      (214) 497-4234
From: dswartz@sw.stratus.com (Dan Swartzendruber)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Somewhere in the decimal stream (Was: arbitrary precision)
Date: 16 Oct 92 19:08:27 GMT
Distribution: usa
Organization: Stratus Computer, Inc.

In article <SJE.92Oct16131147@xylos.ma30.bull.com>, sje@xylos.ma30.bull.com (Steven J. Edwards) writes:
> In article <1992Oct16.141153.4298@pixel.kodak.com> dj@ekcolor.ssd.kodak.com (Dave Jones) writes:
> # Millard Edgerton (millard@eos.arc.nasa.gov) wrote:
> #>  

[deleted]

>
> Second, Carl Sagan's suggestion that pi contain messages is thought
> provoking, but becomes obviously incorrect after a certain amount of
> thought.  The reason for this is because pi is a completely nonrandom,
> totally deterministic number and so any embedded message can be the
> only possible message.  A sort of superdeterminism, if you will.
> There is no freedom for a creator to choose the message, at least as
> long as said creator is bound by common logic.  If no such bound
> exists, then further discussion by us is irrelevent.

Well, we're kind of getting into metaphysical things here, but I think
that ruling out things based on demonstrable, provable things (i.e.
1+1=2) is fallacious when dealing with the creator of the universe.
What we're really talking about is basically the metastructure of the
universe, i.e. why is 1+1=2?  Why is ratio of a circle pi?  Why do the
angles of a triangle add up to 180 degrees?

> Einstein had a comment about this.  Paraphrased from memory:
> "As I learn to understand more about the order in the Lord's universe,
> the more I believe that He had little choice in the way of His
> creation."

Again, anyone (anything?) which can not only create the universe, but define
the fundamental laws and relationships (the metastructure?) is probably
beyond our ability to even reason about.  Mind you, I'm not advocating the
existence of such a creator, just that if he/she/it exists (or existed), I
think it's kind of silly to try to prove/disprove what he/she/it could or
could not have done.

> 
>  [The above opinions expressed are my own; not necessarily held by others.]
>       == Steven J. Edwards           Bull HN Information Systems Inc. ==
>       == (508) 294-3484              300 Concord Road         MS 820A ==
>       == sje@xylos.ma30.bull.com     Billerica, MA 01821          USA ==
> "That Government which Governs the Least, Governs Best." -- Thomas Jefferson

-- 

#include <std_disclaimer.h>

Dan S.
From: WAF102@psuvm.psu.edu (William Fabanich)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: NASA bugets....etc
Date: 15 Oct 92 16:40:55 GMT
Article-I.D.: psuvm.92289.124055WAF102
Organization: Penn State University

I would like any info you experts might know of the top of your heads...or wher
e to find it...about NASA bugets/ Military space bugets...and any comparison wi
th other governement agencies....something for me to show that the amount we sp
ent on space is not really enough to solve all our countries ills.
  Thanx!
    Bill Fabs
Xref: sparky sci.space:14131 sci.astro:10471 talk.politics.space:1357 alt.politics.bush:7977 alt.politics.clinton:8796
From: gary@ke4zv.uucp (Gary Coffman)
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.astro,talk.politics.space,alt.politics.bush,alt.politics.clinton
Subject: Re: Clinton and Space Funding
Date: 7 Oct 92 05:52:26 GMT
Reply-To: gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman)
Organization: Gannett Technologies Group

In article <Bv90sJ.C3F@mentor.cc.purdue.edu> hrubin@pop.stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin) writes:
>
>There is another, and extremely important, reason for colonization, namely,
>escape from an oppressive government.  The Spanish colonies were moderately
>successful only where they were eminently profitable; the missions in
>California must be considered a failure.  The French colonies in Canada
>and Louisiana were not particularly successful.  On the other hand, the
>English colonies to escape oppression were generally quite successful,
>even bringing in others.  A major part of the US immigration in the 19th
>century was to escape oppression.

That's true, but the entry cost for space is considerably higher than
for a man with an ax and a gun trekking out on foot to find elbow 
room. And likely to remain so for a long long time. Any space colonies
are likely to have to be highly regimented in order to survive at all.
When disident groups have colonized the ocean floor, nearly as difficult
a place as space, then we'll see if colony life is really less oppressive
than our lives here.

Gary
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: higgins@fnalc.fnal.gov (Bill Higgins-- Beam Jockey)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: NASA Daily News for 10/02/92 (Forwarded)
Date: 12 Oct 92 18:47:48 -0600
Organization: Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory
NNTP-Posting-Host: fnalc.fnal.gov

In article <9Fw5RB5w165w@clubzen.fidonet.org>, mwallis@clubzen.fidonet.org (Michael Wallis) writes:
> davem@ee.ubc.ca (david michelson) writes:
> 
>> Just a correction or two:
[list of mistakes deleted]
> 
> Sounds like another typical NASA press release.
> 
> * sigh *

Not fair, Mike.  Whatever other criticism they may be open to, NASA
press releases are usually quite accurate.  Furthermore, Mr. Redmond
posted a public apology last week for the mistakes that crept into
"NASA Daily News."  Want to keep beating a dead horse?

> PLAN:   Live fast, die young, leave a neat corpse.
>         Oh ... I'm too old to die young?     Rats!

I've got my doubts about the corpse, too. (-:

     O~~*           /_) ' / /   /_/ '  ,   ,  ' ,_  _           \|/
   - ~ -~~~~~~~~~~~/_) / / /   / / / (_) (_) / / / _\~~~~~~~~~~~zap!
 /       \                          (_) (_)                    / | \
 |       |     Bill Higgins   Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory
 \       /     Bitnet:     HIGGINS@FNAL.BITNET
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Newsgroups: sci.space