HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: gary@ke4zv.uucp (Gary Coffman)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Lunar advertising, eyeball resolution (was Re: Laser Space Mirror)
Date: 13 Oct 92 14:01:03 GMT
Reply-To: gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman)
Organization: Gannett Technologies Group

In article <1992Oct12.230209.1@fnala.fnal.gov> higgins@fnala.fnal.gov (Bill Higgins-- Beam Jockey) writes:
>In article <1992Oct10.151428.8423@ke4zv.uucp>, gary@ke4zv.uucp (Gary Coffman) writes:
>> I've heard of a proposal to "paint" the Coke logo on the Moon. Using a
>> highly reflective "dust", say titanium dioxide smoke particles, sputtered
>> onto the surface by an electron beam from a lunar orbiting satellite.
>> The layer could be molecules thick [...]
>
>Gary, this isn't clear.  How would "an electron beam" sputter
>"titanium dioxide smoke particles" onto the surface?

Well this was just something I overheard at a cocktail party for the
Atlanta advertising community, not a technical presentation. I'd guess
that the particles would be ionized and steered by some sort of accelerator
system. Sort of like a cosmic air brush using electro painting techniques
somewhat similar to what GM is using nowadays to paint cars.

>Even with very good contrast (like 90% albedo stuff painted on the 5%
>albedo Moon), you probably couldn't fit more than one or two dozen
>"pixels" across the Moon.  So much for the Coca-Cola logo.
>
>If we relax the requirements, and say that the advertising must be
>readable with 7-power binoculars, we can do much more.

Well I'm sure the old Coca Cola script logo is out, but the new Coke
logo might still be visible to those with excellent vision, and certainly
to anyone with binoculars. The free TV publicity it would generate might
be worth the entire cost of the project even if no one ever bothered to
read it directly.

I'm sure admen read SF too. So this idea isn't new. What caught my
attention was that it wasn't *junior* admen discussing it. Somebody
may actually be working a spreadsheet on this. Or, it could have just
been liquor talking, good booze though. :-)

Gary
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: alexho@microsoft.com (Alex Howerton)
Subject: Re: NASA town meetings
Date: 15 Oct 92 18:59:31 GMT
Organization: Microsoft Corporation
Keywords: NASA town meetings future direction

In article <8OCT199217131401@utrcv1> ree@utrc.utc.com writes:
>The following blurb was pointed out to me from a recent Aerospace Daily:
>
>   NASA HAS selected six cities around the U.S., including Hartford, CT, for
>   town meetings in which individuals and businesses can offer their views on
>   the future direction of the nations civil space and aeronautics programs.
>
>Since I'm pro-space and in the Hartford area, I'd like to go and put in
>my $.02.  Can anyone tell me what I need to do in order to attend?
>Useful info includes: date/time/place, how to register (if necessary), 
>who to contact.
Yes, I live in Seattle, and I read here that one of the meetings is going to
be here. If anyone who knows could post or e-mail the dates, times, and
locations, for all six of the meetings, I for one would appreciate it.
From: stgprao@st.unocal.COM (Richard Ottolini)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Magellan
Date: 8 Oct 92 23:42:09 GMT
Article-I.D.: unocal.1992Oct8.234209.5510
Organization: Unocal Corporation

In article <BvtL56.HI8@zoo.toronto.edu> henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) writes:
>Probably because the gravity work is an important secondary objective, more
>important than 100% stereo coverage, and they want to do the gravity-mapping
>cycle before the money runs out.  It already got postponed slightly, I
>think, to get the main radar-mapping mission done while the transmitters
>were still in good shape.
>

A good gravity map can answer the question whether there is active tectonics
on Venus.  The images are unclear whether the current features were created
recently or long ago (although crater counts help).  The gravity image should
match the geoid (aphrioid? :-) + topographic image in quiesent regions and
diverge in active regions.
From: Ligon@macgw1.ge.com (Woody Ligon)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: SETI functional grammer
Date: 16 Oct 92 14:36:49 GMT
Distribution: usa
Organization: GE-CRD

In article <1992Oct13.140239.22365@crc.ac.uk>, gwilliam@crc.ac.uk (Gary Williams x3294) writes:
> 

> The more I think about it the more difficult it seems to get past simple
> verbs and mathematics - so much of our languages assume concepts held in
> common and so everything would have to be defined (how rigidly?) even if

> -- 
> GARY WILLIAMS,  Computing Services Section,  Janet:       G.Williams@UK.AC.CRC
> MRC-CRC & Human Genome Mapping Centre,       Internet:    G.Williams@CRC.AC.UK
> Watford Rd, HARROW, Middx, HA1 3UJ, UK
> Tel 081-869 3294   Fax 081-423 1275   
> 
The absurd waste of money called SETI assumes a lot more than  language
concepts. 

 Consider, for example, that SETI assumes  that alien messages will
be sent in a serial format.  Suppose these beings have the good sence to 
utilize a large part of the EM spectrum and communicate massively parallel?
Decoding or even recognizing that could be nearly impossible. This is not
so crazy if you consider that combined human non-verbal and verbal
communication has to be considered "parallel" not serial.

Also consider that if we were sitting somewhere in "inner" space between 
our own eyeball and our own brain, we wouldn't have a clue from the EM 
signals  whether there was an image being transmitted, and we wouldn't stand
a chance in hell of decoding it. 

Moreover, here we are, unable to communicate fluently with a single
other species on this planet and we want to spend taxpayers money to listen
for species who may not even exist.  I might begin to think this is worthwhile
when we can speak to whales and dolphins and decode our own nerve impulses.

In my view, the whole SETI enterprise is absurdly anthropogenic in the
implicit  assumption that aliens will behave like us. Given the variety of
communications strategies seen  among and within organisms on this small 
planet,  such assumptions are just childish.

SETI belongs in the same category of science as BIOSPHERE and should be 
funded in exactly the same way.

Woody Ligon
Standard Disclaimer Applies
(Ligon@macgw1.ge.com)
From: rabjab@golem.ucsd.edu (Jeff Bytof)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Transportation on the Moon.
Date: 9 Oct 92 21:04:42 GMT
Distribution: usa
Organization: ucsd
NNTP-Posting-Host: lutherlab.ucsd.edu


>        We are looking for any feasible transportation ideas that could 
>accomplish this task. We have come up with several ideas including Pipelines, 
>Rockets, and Rail Guns. We are delivering about 2 tons of rock (containing 
>ice) a day.

My God, as far as we know the Moon's as dry as a bone, and we're talking
about mining ice on it!  Even if there IS ice, how do we know there's
going to be enough to support whatever operation is proposed?  
My guess is that whatever ice there was at the Lunar poles has
been blasted to Kingdom Come. 

---------------------
rabjab@golem.ucsd.edu
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: pgf@srl03.cacs.usl.edu ("Phil G. Fraering")
Subject: Re : Carl Sagan
X-Added: Forwarded by Space Digest
Organization: [via International Space University]
Original-Sender: isu@VACATION.VENARI.CS.CMU.EDU
Distribution: sci
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1992 23:56:20 GMT


\>>   Has Carl Sagan actually got a doctorate in anything ???  Last I heard
/>> (long time ago , true) he was just plain ol' C. Sagan

\>A glance at American Men and Women of Science shows Carl Sagan with:
/>AB - 1954, BS - 1955, MS - 1956, PhD - 1960 (Astron,Astrophys)
\>all granted by the University of Chicago.

/Doesn't he also have a medical degree from Stanford?

\Jeff Bytof
/rabjab@golem.ucsd.edu

I don't think so, but I think there's a degree from Cornell
missing somewhere in there.

Phil
-- 
Phil Fraering pgf@srl0x.cacs.usl.edu where the x is a number from 1-5.
Phone: 318/365-5418 SnailMail: 2408 Blue Haven Dr., New Iberia, La. 70560
---------------------
Disclaimer: Some reasonably forseeable events may exceed this
message's capability to protect from severe injury, death, widespread
disaster, astronomically significant volumes of space approaching a
state of markedly increaced entropy, or taxes.

Newsgroups: sci.space
From: henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: Controversy over V-2 anniversary
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1992 05:15:20 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <Bw2u3v.7pD@news.cso.uiuc.edu> jbh55289@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Josh 'K' Hopkins) writes:
>>... they made some 65,000 modifications to delay
>>mass production.
>
>I've seen numbers like this too, but it's not clear to me whether they made
>so many modifications because they wanted to or because, never having built a
>ballistic missile, it took a few tries to get things right.  

Actually, according to some of the more detailed histories, it was neither.
They were constantly having to revise the design because one material or
another featured in the original design had become unavailable.  They found
this frustrating, and said so.

However, it also appears to be true that they never did get complete and
final convergence on the build-test-analyze-revise cycle for the mass-
produced version.
-- 
MS-DOS is the OS/360 of the 1980s.      | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
              -Hal W. Hardenbergh (1985)|  henry@zoo.toronto.edu  utzoo!henry
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: andy@osea.demon.co.uk (Andrew Haveland-Robinson)
Subject: Laser Space Mirror 
Distribution: world
Organization: Haveland-Robinson Associates
Date: Tue, 6 Oct 1992 00:26:37 +0000


In article <a9774633@Kralizec.fido.zeta.org.au> ralph.buttigieg@f635.n713.z3.fido.zeta.org.au writes:

>As most of the infrastructure is on Earth, the Space cost would be minimal.
>The ground laser system can be large in area, allowing a small mirror.
>
>Questions:
>
>1) I would think that the limiting size of the mirror would be its capacity
>to withstand the waste heat. Any ideas on how small we could make the mirror
>with todays technology?

You think you need a very long laser for a highly collimated beam - even so,
I think the divergence due to atmospheric heating could render it
ineffective.  The beam could be diverged and re-collimated as a much wider
parallel beam, to reduce atmospheric distortion, but the engineering 
required would be phenomenal to stop the lenses from melting/distorting.

>2) What would be the best way to convert the infra-red light back to
>electricity?

How about a huge lens focused on a black boiler in a greenhouse??

>3) How efficiant would the total system be? Especially compared to current
>ground based power transmission?

Very low!

>4) Is anyone working on such a scheme? I think SDIO was considering space
>mirrors for defense purposes.

I should think that light pressure knocking the mirrors out of alignment and
orbit would be a bigger problem, give the kind of intensities needed!
After atmospheric absorption of course...

I think research into conventional solar energy/storage technology would
be money better spent, though would be an interesting research topic.

+-------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Haveland-Robinson Associates     | Email: andy@osea.demon.co.uk         |
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Newsgroups: sci.space
From: i0c0256@rigel.tamu.edu (IGOR)
Subject: Re: Math programs with arbitrary precision for the Mac?
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41    
Organization: Texas A&M University, Academic Computing Services
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1992 17:56:00 GMT

In article <seal.719016011@leonardo>, seal@leonardo.Jpl.Nasa.Gov (David Seal) writes...
>Having been duly inspired by an episode of northern exposure i tried
>fiddling with ramanujan's and borwein and borwein's formulas for 
>computing pi on my mac.  however, the floating point accuracy
>for MATLAB (which i was using) isn't settable and i can't get past
>the sixteenth decimal place or so.  other mac programs or ways of computing
>pi?  thanks.


a very simple way of computing pi is as follows:
pi/4=4*atan(1/4)+atan(1/239) i may actually mess up the argument in front
of the atan so you would have to check on a calculator.

The fancy thing about this instead of using pi=4*atan(1),  one can expand
the atan in term of series atan =x -x^3/3+x^5/5-x^7/7 with a radius of 
convergence of r=1, which means it this specific case that the acceleration of
convergence will be tremendous if you are using arguments less than 1 such as
1/4 and 1/239. With this formula, the problem of finding pi is to develop
routines doing subtraction,addition and division of infinitely long numbers...\
which is a problem that one probably solved in sixth grade...
I think that after the third term computed i was able to get a seven digit 
accuracy... not bad




Igor
Texas A&M University
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Its a nice bike
	terminator 2
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Newsgroups: sci.space
From: amon@elegabalus.cs.qub.ac.uk
Subject: Re: Drop nuc waste into sun
X-Added: Forwarded by Space Digest
Organization: [via International Space University]
Original-Sender: isu@VACATION.VENARI.CS.CMU.EDU
Distribution: sci
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 17:17:42 GMT

> Why on earth do you think that fusion doesn't produce waste?
> Read up on the effects of neutron bombardment.  Commercial fusion
> reactors will produce substantial amounts of waste, but it won't
> be in the form of spent fuel rods.
> 


I would strongly disagree with the word substantial. It is also  
important to note that they are not high level wastes. The only "high  
level" waste is a bit of tritium, and if it all escaped you couldn't  
detect it outside the plant. It wouldn't even overdose someone in the  
plant itself.

And if you go to He3 fusion, there are very few fast neutrons. Most  
of the energy comes out as fast electrons from which energy is  
extracted directly as electricity via a magnetic field. What neutrons  
there are come from a lower probability reaction similar to that in  
the current D-T reactors.

The life cycle waste of even a D-T plant is small in comparison with  
the waste from a decommissioned fission plant. Addtionally it can  
simply be buried for a few decades since it is mostly low atomic  
number materials that have gotten a bit of a kick from the fast  
neutrons. Not particularly nasty stuff at all.
From: wolfone@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Patrick Chester)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Russia's OPERATIONAL Starwars Defense System
Date: 8 Oct 92 07:08:58 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin TX

In article <BvG03L.Bxx@watserv1.uwaterloo.ca> dp10@mc4adm.UWaterloo.ca (Derek Kirkland) writes:
)Sounds like this guy has been reading too much science fiction.
No, he hasn't read enough. Else he would have seen that all of his ideas
were taken by previous authors. He also wasn't creative enough to put a mass
driver at our "secret" moonbase instead of the ridiculous laser weapon on
the moon. What would the laser shoot at? The UFO base next door? ;>

Trust me, I've read too much science fiction. I could make up a better story
than he did. Maybe I should try. :)

-- 
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Patrick Chester            |"The earth is too fragile a basket in which to keep
wolfone@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu |  all your eggs." Robert A. Heinlein
Politically Incorrect      |"The meek shall inherit the earth. The rest of us
Future Lunar Colonist      |  are going to the stars." Anonymous
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: strider@acm.acm.rpi.edu (Greg Moore)
Subject: Re: All systems are what? (was Re: Mars Observer Update #2 - 10/07/92)
Organization: The Voice of Fate
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1992 03:10:13 GMT

In article <Bvw0y0.31E@well.sf.ca.us> collins@well.sf.ca.us (Steve Collins) writes:
>
>
>stuff like : "AACS is GO except for the high gyro temp". In a way this
>is tradition from the early space program, but the formality of the
>language serves to clarify communications on the net. Saying "Nine-er"
>helps to distinguish "Five" from "Nine". 
	
	Actually this is a result of english being the language of
international aviation.  Nine sounds exactly like nein of German.

For the most part, the
>com nets are pretty clear, but people do have problems with headsets and
>interference. I had the pleasure of being "on the console" during launch
>         but that's a different story,
>              Steve Collins
>              Mars Observer Spacecraft Team (AACS)
Organisation: European Space Operation Centre (E.S.O.C)
Date: Thursday, 15 Oct 1992 08:50:37 CET
From: <TNEDDERH@ESOC.BITNET>
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Two-Line Orbital Element Sets, Part 2

Thanks for posting the elements.

    -Thorsten-
Newsgroups: sci.space,alt.sci.planetary
From: mheney@access.digex.com (Michael K. Heney)
Subject: Re: Pioneer Venus Out of Fuel, Orbit Deteroriating
Organization: Express Access Online Communications, Greenbelt, MD USA
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 1992 14:37:24 GMT

In article <1at959INNru4@darkstar.UCSC.EDU> bafta@cats.ucsc.edu (Shari L Brooks) writes:
>
>I am not sure I understand this.  It seems to me that every time the S/C
>encounters atmospheric drag, the orbit should lose energy.  I always thought
>that this would circularize the orbit (decrease the apoapsis) before
>significantly decreasing the periapsis.  Where did I go wrong?  Don't circular
>orbits of a given radius have less energy than an elliptical orbit with
>that same value as the periapsis?
>

The problem is, you're looking at this as if the only energy loss occurred
ONLY at periapsis.  In reality, while the maximum energy loss occurs at 
periapsis, there is a continuum (sp?) of energy loss before and after
periapsis.

Consider the point in orbit 5 degrees before reaching periapsis.  In a 
vacuum, you'd have a specific velocity profile leading to periapsis at
a certain altitude.  However, at every point between our initial point and 
periapsis, the velocity is lower due to drag, resulting in a lower
periapsis than the vacuum case.  On each orbit, the fraction of the orbit 
exposed to significant drag increases, resulting in an accelrating drop
in periapsis.

You are right that the orbit will tend towards circular.  The apoapsis will 
drop faster than periapsis; however, a circular orbit is the LIMITING case.
The orbit will approach circularity; however, before it achieves this, the
periapsis will have dropped to the point where the spacecraft will reenter
and burn up.

Sorry for the length on this - it's a lot easier to visualize the concepts
than to put them down in gleaming phosphors ...

-- 
Mike Heney                |   Senior Systems Analyst and     |  Reach for the
mheney@access.digex.com   |  Space Activist / Entrepreneur   |  Stars, eh?
Kensington, MD (near DC)  |     * Will Work for Money *      |
From: davem@ee.ubc.ca (david michelson)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Earth's two moons
Date: 17 Oct 92 03:24:45 GMT
Article-I.D.: ee.1992Oct17.032445.22917
Organization: University of BC, Electrical Engineering


In article <Bw8Gn4.1wJ@csugrad.cs.vt.edu> cocking@csugrad.cs.vt.edu (Cara
Cocking) writes:
>
> I took an astronomy class in high school and my teacher told us that
> Earth really has two moons but that the other one can't be seen unaided
> because it's a lot smaller and farther out. 
>
> I've been telling some people that Earth has two moons but no one 
> believes me.  Could someone please confirm this?

Perhaps you're thinking of Little Luna, the asteroid that Tom Swift, Jr's
"space friends" put into orbit around the earth in the Tom Swift Jr. series
of books by Victor Appleton III.  Or maybe not :-)
 
--
 
Dave Michelson
davem@ee.ubc.ca
From: dstevens@educ.ucalgary.ca (Douglas Stevens)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Gallileo's antenna
Date: 13 Oct 1992 22:42:53 -0500
Organization: UTexas Mail-to-News Gateway
NNTP-Posting-Host: cs.utexas.edu

Does anyone know if NASA has managed to get Gallileo's antenna
open yet?
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.astro
From: eto@elroy.jpl.nasa.gov (Edward T. Olsen)
Subject: SETI NOT POSITIVE
Originator: eto@seti
Keywords: HRMS, SETI
Organization: HRMS Sky Survey, Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1992 14:51:25 GMT

Gentlemen:

The NASA search for signals of extraterrestrial intelligent origin has
not yet begun. The Initial Deployment of the High Resolution Microwave
Survey (HRMS) will be October 12, 1992.

Do not propagate misinformation and rumor!

Edward Olsen
HRMS



-- 
 Edward T. Olsen
 Mail Stop 169-506, Jet Propulsion Laboratory
 4800 Oak Grove Dr, Pasadena, CA  91109 
 Phone: (818)-354-7604   INTERNET: eto@seti.jpl.nasa.gov (Node: 128.149.82.1)
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: cecil@physics.unc.edu (Gerald Cecil)
Subject: Re: what use is Freedom?
Reply-To: cecil@physics.unc.edu
Organization: University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1992 19:29:11 GMT

In article 091092154527@l30346.mdc.com, Cohena@mdc.com (Andy Cohen) writes:
>In article <1992Oct7.031717.19507@den.mmc.com>, whitmeye@den.mmc.com
>(Richard Whitmeyer) wrote:
>> OK, I do have some questions,  <most deleted>
>> 2.   Any plans for one in polar orbit?
>2...no plans at all for polar orbit....polar orbits are VERY expensive
>.....just imagine the resources needed for putting all that mass into such
>an extreme orbit... unless of course the components could be lifted off
>from a different part of the globe.....which they can't at this time
Actually, you just need to get to the mid 50's lat to cover most of the land.
Trivial for a Kennedy launch (<15% payload loss), and would then be
accessible to CIS (which are locked out of meaningful participation at
28.5 deg inclination).  We discussed this ad nauseum last summer.

>> 5.   How visible will this thing be from the ground?
>5. I'm told that when the sunlight hits it, the reflection will be
>extreme....  I've been told that when it goes by at night it will be very
>hard to miss.  I've also heard it will be visible during daylight too....
At 28.5 deg inclination not many US taxpayers will be able to see their $100
billion creation.  Move to Hawaii (I enjoyed living there.)
---
Gerald Cecil cecil@wrath.physics.unc.edu  919-962-7169 
Physics & Astronomy, U of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3255 USA
From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Impact in AD 2000?
Date: 8 Oct 92 01:39:15 GMT
Organization: Computer Science Department University of Rochester

In article <9210080128.AA16768@cmr.ncsl.nist.gov> roberts@CMR.NCSL.NIST.GOV (John Roberts) writes:

> I notice you kill just about everybody on the planet, no matter where the
> impact. An impact of a two-mile-diameter asteroid would be pretty severe,
> but I'm not sure it would be quite *that* bad. Isn't that only about a
> tenth of the mass of the alleged "dinosaur killer" asteroid?

Good eff-ing grief!  The K/T boundary event and its aftermath killed
off every last land animal weighing more than 25 kilograms.  This
requires massive overkill.  An event that just killed off (say) 99% of
all such individuals wouldn't show up in the fossil record.

Anyway, all the impact need do to kill billions of people is
to interfere with agriculture for a year or so.

I consider large volcanic eruptions to be a more serious threat,
btw.  The Toba event of 78 thousand years ago, for example, would
have major bad effects if it happened today.  The solution is
to enlarge grain stockpiles.

	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu
Xref: sparky sci.space:14343 sci.astro:10614