RIP Pluto

In third grade, a fellow student did a project on Uranus (mine was on Jupiter). As part of her project, she had to write a song about it. I still remember the opening to it 25 years later:

Uranus is big and green
It has nine rings
And five moons

Indeed.
 
Who the hell named Uranus Uranus anyways?? I can see a bunch of stoned scientists sitting around... dude... let's call it... Uranus... *cough*
 
Jack_Felis said:
How many tax dollars were wasted getting this information? Seriously, we can barely get to the moon (that is, if we ever did...?) and we're worried about which planets are and which aren't? No wonder we don't have those water-powered flying cars yet.
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So, you're saying the pursuit of knowledge is a waste of tax payers dollars?
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jack_Felis
How many tax dollars were wasted getting this information? Seriously, we can barely get to the moon (that is, if we ever did...?) and we're worried about which planets are and which aren't? No wonder we don't have those water-powered flying cars yet.


THATS MY VIEW!!! I dont see why we need to know about anything beyond the atmosphere! Screw space, we have enough problems on earth! I dont support funding a 12billion plan to land people on mars!
 
my astronomy teacher was talking about this this week. he said if they agreed then we'd have over 88 planets so they figure it wqould be easier to settle for less.
 
This all well and good, but unless NASA starts figuring out how to detect/find/destroy the next killer asteroid, I'm unamused.
 
mcgeedigital said:
This all well and good, but unless NASA starts figuring out how to detect/find/destroy the next killer asteroid, I'm unamused.
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Now that it's been demoted, they might want to keep an eye on Pluto so it doesn't pull some sneaky ****.
 
pto2212 said:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jack_Felis
How many tax dollars were wasted getting this information? Seriously, we can barely get to the moon (that is, if we ever did...?) and we're worried about which planets are and which aren't? No wonder we don't have those water-powered flying cars yet.


THATS MY VIEW!!! I dont see why we need to know about anything beyond the atmosphere! Screw space, we have enough problems on earth! I dont support funding a 12billion plan to land people on mars!
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Space programs are worth tax dollars.

Also note the astronomers who decided this movement were from Europe - so blame them LOL.

In any event - Space is far from intellectual luxury. Planetary travel may actually save the human race - even though that may be a million years off - I have no problem developing that technology now if it means humans can colonize Mars if the Earth gets really messed up then Jupiter and it's moons etc - Global warming is also the result of the Sun expanding in size - Venus used to be habitable like Earth and is pretty much well estimated to have had oceans and most likely life until the Sun expanded in size and made it 900 degrees during the day. Eventually that WILL HAPPEN TO Earth and then Mars will in turn, become warm enough to sustain life.

And when the sun swallows Mars and becomes a Giant Red Star and consumes the first four planets - the Solar Wind will probably Shrink Jupiter down to size and make it warm enough so it's moons may be habitable - May sound crazy, but Astronomers believe a few of Jupiters and Saturns moons have enough ice caps to create oceans and habitable life if warmed up. I believe Ganymede is suspected of being somewhat capable of sustaining primitive life as of right now.

But for the present time, it also helps studying the cosmos just to prepare for a potential apocalypse.

Sure if Meteor were a few days from Crashing into us, there's little that could be done.

But astronomers can detect asteroid's paths almost a few centuries in advance, so if someone spots an asteroid heading for Earth they can VERY ACCURATELY TELL US THE EXACT DAY even if it's 100 years away - in which case we'd have 100 years to prepare the technology to wipe it out with a nuke.

Hell - does everyone forget a few years ago they discovered an asteroid that was heading towards Earth that could potentially destroy the whole Planet in 2030 - that is usefull knowledge to know indeed. Even though upon further investigation it appears that asteroid will miss us just enough so that we're safe - it's definetely worth tax dollars to monitor it over the next 20 years. We're not even for certain completely safe from that asteroid in 2030 which is in your lifetime and all of ours. Even though the odds it hits Earth may be 1/1000 - that is still a scary ratio considering the final result.
 
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Psynema said:
Hell - does everyone forget a few years ago they discovered an asteroid that was heading towards Earth that could potentially destroy the whole Planet in 2030 - that is usefull knowledge to know indeed. Even though upon further investigation it appears that asteroid will miss us just enough so that we're safe - it's definetely worth tax dollars to monitor it over the next 20 years.
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Actually, yeah, I remember that.
 
Not only that, the fact we are sitting here with a computer in front of use can arguably be directly related to advances made in the space program.
 
Blaine said:
Not only that, the fact we are sitting here with a computer in front of use can arguably be directly related to advances made in the space program.
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Yes we also have world war 2 to thank for that. But I could have lived without it. (Well actually I wouldnt have lived without it but thats a different story)
 
Blaine said:
Not only that, the fact we are sitting here with a computer in front of use can arguably be directly related to advances made in the space program.
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And Space technology also makes possible to keep a very good eye on nations with nucular weapons.

So those tax dollars NASA spent is surely well worth it. Part of the reason you don't have to worry about being nuked off the face of the earth by the Soviet Union is because of our Space Program.

So I don't get the other posters WW2 comment - Space Programs have pretty much made the possibility of WW3 significantly lower.

And the internet, 20-30 years from now will most likely be ran by satellites in space providing the whole world communication and the ability to transfer GBs and TBs worth of data in a matter of seconds and help our global economy overall.
 
Psynema said:
And Space technology also makes possible to keep a very good eye on nations with nucular weapons.

So those tax dollars NASA spent is surely well worth it. Part of the reason you don't have to worry about being nuked off the face of the earth by the Soviet Union is because of our Space Program.

So I don't get the other posters WW2 comment - Space Programs have pretty much made the possibility of WW3 significantly lower.
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He's refereing to the fact that the computer was invented as a direct result of WW2.
 
not necessarily true. here are a few possible answers as to why computers were invented:

The first computers were invented as counting devices. The Pascaline, one of the earliest mechanical devices for calculating, was invented in 1642 to help Blaise Pascal with the recording of taxes. The first electronic calculating machine was invented by Herman Hollerith in the late 1800's, this time for the purpose of the U.S. Census. The first computer-like machine was the Mark I, built in the 1930's, but it was really little more than a highly sophisticated calculator. Finally, in 1946, ENIAC, the first true computer was completed. Originally built to help with the war effort by calculating the trajectory of artillery shells, ENIAC (Electronic Numerical Integration and Calculator) could make decisions, the key feature that distinguishes calculators from computers. It was constructed at the University of Pennsylvania by John Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert. Credit for the original design of the electronic computer, however, is given to John Atanasoff of Iowa State University.


If your definition is any device that uses computation to turn an input into an output, then the first computer was developed in ancient greece. A person could input day and time information and have information on the position of the sun, moon, and known planets output.
The first electronic digital computer was built by John Vincent Atanasoff and Clifford Berry at Iowa State University during 1937-42. What today is known as the Atanasoff-Berry Computer (ABC) was intended to solve large systems of linear equations.
Atanasoff met Dr. John W. Mauchly in December of 1940 and taught him how his computer worked, even taking him on as a house guest. Mauchly then passed this information on to the Army Ordinance Department's Ballistic Research Laboratory in early 1943. The result of this work was the ENIAC, which was completed in 1946, and Petented in 1947 as the first electronic digital computer.
This patent was overturned on October 19, 1973, and the ABC officially credited as the first electronic digital computer. Despite this ENIAC is still often given this credit, and most people, even those familiar with technology have unfortunately never heard of the ABC. To some extent, this is natural, as the ABC was an academic project, where ENIAC was a fairly major program by the army and received enormous publicity when it was successfully completed. In 1973 the computer was a fairly minor facet of life for most Americans, and the overtuning of the ENIAC patent was probably barely noticed by the country at large, so few people know about it.

or so i heard
 
My point wasnt that WW2 did all of this, but it helped.

Space exploration
Cold war
WW2
Gaming industry

have all there part in why im sitting here with my nonbattery dell laptop and writes to people over the atlantic.
 
Blaine said:
Now that it's been demoted, they might want to keep an eye on Pluto so it doesn't pull some sneaky shi*.
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I agree. What if Pluto decided that since it isn't a planet it may as well be an asteroid and started hurtling through space towards us! That would make a pretty good sci-fi movie.
 
Eh the whole pluto thing has me divided. I mean, the whole idea of "its a planet" is all man-made anyways. We could call those things bananas and "poof" it's a "banana". Us changing the name we gave it in the first place doesn't really mean much. Now, if it suddenly high-tailed it out of our orbit because we aren't showing it any love anymore, that would be something to care about. Or if we sent it a parting gift of about 30 nukes just to show it "Hey you! Orbiting mass formerly known as Pluto! We named you, and now we're gonna un-name you! Suck this! BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM"

I think i'd pay more attention then.

Note: I'm running on a chronic lack of sleep lately, so that justifies my completely random posts of late.
 
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