James Webb Space Telescope

[Dutch_12078]

10 hours ago, Kirk W said:

I wonder what the Flat Earth Society has to say about the Webb?

                                      

The FES forums have a discussion of JWST in progress if you want some entertainment:

https://www.theflatearthsociety.org/forum/index.php?PHPSESSID=hpdv3724f8lbc3lrsbq09nvht4&topic=89543.0

[Kirk W]

1 hour ago, Dutch_12078 said:

The FES forums have a discussion of JWST in progress

What would you bet that they are also anti-vax?

[Pat & Pete]

1 hour ago, Dutch_12078 said:

The FES forums

The surface of the earth is approx 70% water. None of it is carbonated.

Proving the earth is flat.   

[Dutch_12078]

2 hours ago, Kirk W said:

What would you bet that they are also anti-vax?

I don't have to bet to guess that one...

[Dutch_12078]

2 hours ago, Pat & Pete said:

The surface of the earth is approx 70% water. None of it is carbonated.

Proving the earth is flat.   

Oh my gosh! I never gave that a thought!

[Pat & Pete]

18 minutes ago, Dutch_12078 said:

Oh my gosh! I never gave that a thought!

That's as far as I go down that road . LOL

[Kirk W]

The James Webb is now in the last day of travel and about 13k miles left on a million mile trip to L2! All components are fully deployed and ready for the fine tuning that starts once it is in it's final orbit. The orbit insertion burn is coming in a matter of hours. I am amazed that there will be 5 months of adjustments and such before we begin to see any images. After looking over the pictures from the Hubble I struggle to imagine what Webb is going to bring.

Quote

• After six months: “Science operations!” Webb will begin its science mission and start to conduct routine science operations.

 

[packnrat]

On 12/27/2021 at 6:18 PM, RV_ said:

Amen Joel. I haven't changed a light bulb in years with LED bulbs and fixtures. My shop lights are LED and even the two tube  foot shop light was only 24 bucks at Lowes with 4500 lumens I believe. We have Ring Security cams with Solar on them on all four sides front door and driveway with lights, sirens, and two way speakers that are loud and clear! my lawn mowers and even snow blowers are more powerful than the plug ins, even than many of the gas. I had a gas mower and it bogged down where the battery electric doesn't even slow down.

Hearing aids are tiny and invisible and rechargeable! My rechargeable batteries hold their charge for a years and the chargers are computer controlled, and the run times are as good or better than Alkaline, especially the Li-Ion. My tiny single cell AA LED flashlights actually are using 3.7 volt Li-Ion 14500 batteries and throw a beam further and brighter than my MagLite three cells did until I bought the LED kits for them too!

When we started up the first private Internet provider service in Bitburg Germany in 1995 we had 50 US Robotics 56k modems screaming on the long narrow shelves on the walls and heating the NOC (Network Operating Center) up pretty warm because there were few Air Conditioned offices there. We had an Octopus to handle calls in and out and finally bought a Cisco unit that took the place of all the modems and the Octopus for dial up and it was the size of a thick briefcase! We started a satellite biz there starting with 1 meter actuated dishes we had to install to the satellite Arc we wanted to use.  I returned to the US in Jan 1997 so had just started getting the digital dishes and receivers and before cable modems etc.

Has Moore's law become obsolete yet? Rockets land on their tails and are reusable, and launched much cheaper by a private company than NASA paid/pays their only other contractor who uses Russian Rocket engines where Space X makes theirs here in the US.

I still have a receipt for a 10 MB hard drive I bought in the 1980s for like $250 bucks or so.

MY car is electric and faster than any muscle car I have ever driven and is connected to the Internet. Yes I had muscle cars and trucks and even roadsters.

When was the last time you opened or even wanted a paper map? 5.25" floppy drive? Zip drive? Wind up watch (Not self-winding)?

70" 4k TVs for $699.99? https://www.bestbuy.com/site/tcl-70-class-4-series-led-4k-uhd-hdr-smart-android-tv/6481727.p?skuId=6481727

Amazing!

my way over priced led bulbs keep failing. ( in the short time i have lived in this house i have replaced at least 10 of them) the last of my normal light bulbs are still burning great. decades after buying them.

[packnrat]

i love space, to bad we have this gravity well to get out of. but what good is looking at stars. that we will never get to?

sure they say "due to the dimming" of a stars light there might be a planet there. but even this way over priced thing. still will not be able to see anything of note.

how many pot holes could have been "fixed" not patched, for this money? and how much of the cash just found its way into the pockets of the supper rich?

and how much more orbital junk did the launch put up there?

[palmeris]

9 hours ago, packnrat said:

my way over priced led bulbs keep failing. ( in the short time i have lived in this house i have replaced at least 10 of them) the last of my normal light bulbs are still burning great. decades after buying them.

Those overpirced LED bulbs are designed to last 50,000 hours...since you are having such a high failure rate perhaps you got a bad batch...or perhaps something else is going on with your electrical system in the house...are all 10 replacements you speak of failing in the same fixture???? ...or perhaps it's just bad technology... but maybe just the luck you make as I havent had a single LED bulb fail out of the 20 or so that are installed in my S&B the past decade

9 hours ago, packnrat said:

i love space, to bad we have this gravity well to get out of. but what good is looking at stars. that we will never get to?

sure they say "due to the dimming" of a stars light there might be a planet there. but even this way over priced thing. still will not be able to see anything of note.

how many pot holes could have been "fixed" not patched, for this money? and how much of the cash just found its way into the pockets of the supper rich?

and how much more orbital junk did the launch put up there?

Based in space and optimized for a wide swath of the infrared spectrum, Webb will provide data scientists can use to create truly multi-dimensional models of exoplanets. To understand how their atmospheres are structured and what makes up their composition. We’re going to be able to look at signatures from things like carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, methane, all sorts of chemical signatures. We can start to move away from that dim one-dimensional optical view of the exoplanet and start to understand what it looks like in two in three dimensions.

We look up to the stars to try and understand how they are made, why they are there, where did they come from, where are they going, and to ask the question are we alone in the universe.

JWST will orbit a point in space at L2,  which is about 1 million miles from earth. No more orbital junk was "put up there" 

Pothole repair comes out of a different budget

 

 

[RV_]

6 hours ago, palmeris said:

Those overpirced LED bulbs are designed to last 50,000 hours...since you are having such a high failure rate perhaps you got a bad batch...or perhaps something else is going on with your electrical system in the house...are all 10 replacements you speak of failing in the same fixture???? ...or perhaps it's just bad technology... but maybe just the luck you make as I havent had a single LED bulb fail out of the 20 or so that are installed in my S&B the past decade

Based in space and optimized for a wide swath of the infrared spectrum, Webb will provide data scientists can use to create truly multi-dimensional models of exoplanets. To understand how their atmospheres are structured and what makes up their composition. We’re going to be able to look at signatures from things like carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, methane, all sorts of chemical signatures. We can start to move away from that dim one-dimensional optical view of the exoplanet and start to understand what it looks like in two in three dimensions.

We look up to the stars to try and understand how they are made, why they are there, where did they come from, where are they going, and to ask the question are we alone in the universe.

JWST will orbit a point in space at L2,  which is about 1 million miles from earth. No more orbital junk was "put up there" 

Pothole repair comes out of a different budget

 

 

Well put Palmeris.

[Pat & Pete]

7 hours ago, palmeris said:

 

Pothole repair comes out of a different budget

 

 

But , doesn't it come out of the same pockets ?

[bigjim]

sumthin' ain't right. I have not had a failure either.  I would bet though that the 50.000 hrs are based on something like 3 hours of use per day.  A good number of years ago I was looking at some name brand supposed quality incandescents and happen to see the smaller print. It is what it is but I just hate to have a company try to be deceptive. The one I was looking at that caught my eye was a floodlight bulb used for security and certainly going to be on more than 3 hours per night.

[Dutch_12078]

58 minutes ago, Pat & Pete said:

But , doesn't it come out of the same pockets ?

The NASA budget typically amounts to about 0.5% of the total federal budget.

[sandsys]

Our whole apartment is lit with LED bulbs. They replace them for free. We have had them do a couple in the five years we have lived here. We leave on most of the kitchen and living room lights most of the day since it's the kitchen lights through the pass-through that light up my desk area in the living room. 

[Pat & Pete]

12 minutes ago, Dutch_12078 said:

The NASA budget typically amounts to about 0.5% of the total federal budget.

And , where exactly does the federal budget come from ? 

[Barbaraok]

7 minutes ago, Pat & Pete said:

And , where exactly does the federal budget come from ? 

We often don't know all of the things that any scientific endeavor will unleash.  Given the anti-science bent of so many in this country, it is amazing that we have been able to move forward as a society at all.   

[Dutch_12078]

20 minutes ago, Pat & Pete said:

And , where exactly does the federal budget come from ? 

About half of it come from individual taxpayers. The rest comes from corporate and other taxes, as well as fees, tariffs, etc. A part of the NASA budget is offset by the commercial launch operations charges they receive from companies like SpaceX, ULA, etc.

[Pat & Pete]

52 minutes ago, Barbaraok said:

We often don't know all of the things that any scientific endeavor will unleash.  Given the anti-science bent of so many in this country, it is amazing that we have been able to move forward as a society at all.   

We've been moving forward ? 

I guess , in some instances . 

Agreed , amazing .

43 minutes ago, Dutch_12078 said:

About half of it come from individual taxpayers. 

That's the part that drives all the rest . So , one way or another it's all because of the taxpayer .

Me and you ...

[palmeris]

A little dated but you can get an idea from this post from space.com

The Obama Administration just announced its budget proposal for the 2012 fiscal year: The total budget is $3.73 trillion, and $18.7 billion of that will go to funding NASA. But how much are you, personally, contributing to space exploration?

We did the math, and it turns out that a little more than half a penny of every federal tax dollar ends up at NASA. That means that a family with the median household income ($49,777 according to the U.S. Census Bureau), which pays $6,629 of federal taxes, pays the space agency ...  $33.

 

And some more recent information....

President Joe Biden's federal budget proposal for 2022 gives NASA more science funding than ever before while continuing to pave the way for the next human moon landing in 2024. 

The White House's $6 trillion federal spending bill, released Friday (May 28), gives NASA a total of $24.8 billion, including "the largest budget request for NASA science, ever," NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said Friday in a news conference. "The Biden administration is proving that science is back," he added. Of the agency's total proposed budget, about $7.9 billion will go to the agency's science division, a 9% increase from 2021.

 

Not sure of the exact math but perhaps another $3.00 so maybe were at $36.00 per household? You can do your own research if you really want to know, I look at it as the price of admission to play in the good ole USA.....

[Kirk W]

It has been fascinating to watch the Where's Webb site since the launch as I continue to check it every few days. With all of the alignment of mirrors that is in process the changes have slowed a great deal but it does seem that all is moving ahead well. 

Quote

It is also important to consider the cost of the James Webb Space Telescope in context. Not only are its costs spread out over more than two decades, but its total cost pales in comparison to human spaceflight projects, infrastructure spending, or even a partial border wall. Compared to the hundreds of billions of dollars the United States spends per year on defense, social, and medical safety net programs, the James Webb Space Telescope’s cost is a rounding error.

How much does the James Webb Space Telescope cost?

[packnrat]

On 3/10/2022 at 8:40 AM, palmeris said:

Those overpirced LED bulbs are designed to last 50,000 hours...since you are having such a high failure rate perhaps you got a bad batch...or perhaps something else is going on with your electrical system in the house...are all 10 replacements you speak of failing in the same fixture???? ...or perhaps it's just bad technology... but maybe just the luck you make as I havent had a single LED bulb fail out of the 20 or so that are installed in my S&B the past decade

Based in space and optimized for a wide swath of the infrared spectrum, Webb will provide data scientists can use to create truly multi-dimensional models of exoplanets. To understand how their atmospheres are structured and what makes up their composition. We’re going to be able to look at signatures from things like carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, methane, all sorts of chemical signatures. We can start to move away from that dim one-dimensional optical view of the exoplanet and start to understand what it looks like in two in three dimensions.

We look up to the stars to try and understand how they are made, why they are there, where did they come from, where are they going, and to ask the question are we alone in the universe.

JWST will orbit a point in space at L2,  which is about 1 million miles from earth. No more orbital junk was "put up there" 

Pothole repair comes out of a different budget

 

 

but the launch did put more trash in orbit around the planet earth. we (as humans) need to find a far cheaper way and one that is 100% non disposable. if nothing more than no more nuts or bolts, paint chips. coming loose.

sure i like to read si-fi. but humans will never be able to visit another star system. there is a reason stars are so far away.

[Kirk W]

11 hours ago, packnrat said:

sure i like to read si-fi. but humans will never be able to visit another star system. there is a reason stars are so far away.

In your lifetime or mine, no but I sure wouldn't predict that it will never happen. You sound just like my grandmother who in the late 50's assured me that men would never walk on the moon and that her Bible proved it. Perhaps you might enjoy this organization?

Are flat-earthers being serious?

[Jaydrvr]

My guess is that the 50,000 hour rating is only based on the actual LED itself and doesn't include the necessary circuitry. I've had several fail, but I've been using them for quite a while. I haven't disassembled any of them to find out what failed, but my $$ are on ancillary circuitry. Jay

[packnrat]

no i am not a flat headed.

just other stars are just that far away. it would take many life times worth of travel. one-way. (Alpha Centauri about 4.5 light years away)

or with some of the "special" ways to gain speed one would be going too fast to stop. or so much power would be needed to try to slow down. a ship could not hold enough "fuel". (as in all the varied nuke stuff, half life's would be gone before getting there).

sure i do not know it all, just what i have read about, the fuel is one of the big problems. the weight of the ship, and the life time of a human is the other.

now if worm holes could exist? but how would we get the "other gate" there?

ftl is not possible due to a law of physics, something about mass, and fuel. (more mass needs more fuel= more mass thus more fuel....etc....etc).

heck look at the size of the Saturn 5 moon rockets. or the boosters and fuel tank on the shuttle. and that is just to get in low earth orbit.

but what do i know. i am just a 62 year old truck driver. maybe area 51 does hold alien tech?