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Does anyone have any random fun facts about a very niche subject.
A fucking sentient encyclopedia:
the future is now old man
I have a love/hate relationship with a lack of a comma somewhere around “old” in your message.
So if orbiting earth doesn’t count as “on earth”, why does sitting in a plane just couple hundred kilometers away count?
The limit of space is widely defined as 100 km, which no commercial plane even nearly crosses.
Yeah that’s called Kármán line, but it’s just arbitrary line. ISS is still orbiting within Earth’s thermosphere
Yes, definitions are arbitrary but that is the definition of space.
One can be simultaneously on earth, and in space. In fact we all are
But I’m just arguing that while orbiting earth and being within the Earth’s atmosphere, it’s pretty much still on Earth. Just like you’re still at home even if you’re at the on the yard or even just outside the gate picking up mail from the mailbox. Looking at it from distance, it really doesn’t make difference
I’m also orbiting the sun, ergo, I am a planet
It’s not like citizenship you don’t get to be a planet just because your mom is.
Look, I won’t go down without a fight like pluto did
Look at Mr “hasn’t cleared his orbit” over here getting all up in Plutos face. Neptune is being real quiet right now.
You’re part of a planet for sure :)
What does “ISS” stand for again? I forgot.
Imperial Starship. Wait, wrong comm.
Islamic State of Syria
The Karman Line’s lowest theoretical point is still substantially higher up than commercial airplanes and its highest is substantially lower than the ISS. Most nations agree on it as the boundary for the purposes of law and regulation. Commercial airplanes fly about half as high as the line, while spacecraft orbit at four times its altitude or more.
It may be scientifically arbitrary, but it’s got a lot going for it as a rough approximation.
Thank you for the accents
My favorite fact is that earth’s atmosphere extends 95,000 miles / 150,000 km beyond the moon.
I couldn’t find any source for that, but exosphere is considered to extend to 10,000km or 190,000km, from which the latter is about halfway to the moon.
Anyways those numbers are pretty damn tiny even on a small solar system scale
Anyways, even if you look from very close, from our own moon to the earth, anything on the low earth orbit is so extremely close to the planet. Just look at some of the famous earthrise photos, and think of something orbiting ~8% of the radius distance
But a plane is not “on earth”?
Extremely pedantically, sure. But under that level of pedantry, the whole metric falls apart anyway because there’s surely never or rarely been a point in recorded human history where someone hasn’t jumped/fallen/not been physically touching the ground themselves (let alone this having been measurable). What about “touching”; your feet are just repelling the ground via electromagnetism.
It’s really obvious what the metric is, and trying to pedant-proof it isn’t worth bloating it into a mouthful. We can just recognize what it obviously means, say “oh, neat”, and move on with our day.
I guess you could count the atmosphere as part of earth, then things over 100km are in little enough of the atmosphere that it’s not really ‘touching’ it the same way. (For example not generating significant lift)
You could also count earth’s gravitational field, then nobody ever left it.
I was recently talking about this but with the moon. I’m not sure about a moon base but the next time mankind will land on the moon is 2028. If they settle and get a rotation going for supplies people could probably be living on the moon in 2030.
Enjoy looking up at a deserted moon while it lasts, soon you’ll always be looking up at moonmen.
Both NASA and China are planning some kind of bases. So with both those going it could very well be a Moon era.
Well the ISS will be destroyed in a few years so idk if this will be true
Artemis II landed yesterday after returning from orbiting the moon. In a test flight mission that marks the beginning for long term plans for a lunar station, a base of operations for going to mars.
at least one
Imagine being the one and only person in space. I consider myself a pretty extreme loner, but even I think that would be terrifying.
there’s some places on earth where when the iss files over they’re gonna be the closest other human to you if there’s anyone on board at the time:
That’s fucking awesome
That we know of…
That one North Korean that fucked off to Mars in the 1990s.
what?
For All Mankind reference.
