Astronomy and space exploration

Some of them look OK. AFAIK there are a couple of mounting techniques being tested at the same time, that might be the difference.

I think up to now the welding has been manual, though they've just recently taken delivery of some welding robots. Moreover someone on a YT vid said that the humidity in Texas isn't great for welding, especially stainless steel.

 

Apparently through battery optimisation Electron has a payload bump
https://www.rocketlabusa.com/news/u...ling-interplanetary-missions-and-reusability/

Also this is their first recovery booster
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EeszTyJUYAAZ85b?format=jpg&name=large

 

Another bloody spy sat

But a successful launch

 

Eeee.... SN6 seems to have landed a little bit on the piss too. (not found a link to a still yet).

 

The Royal Astronomical Society are briefing the press at the moment. They've measured amount of phosphine in the atmosphere of Venus. It's either chemical process we don't understand or microbes floating around in the temperate part of Venus's atmosphere. Awesome discovery either way. The team are on the BBC's Sky at Night program this evening. They're having an AMA tomorrow.

 

So they've detected alien farts....

 

'temperate'

 

It's around 30C in the layer they're looking at. I should have used 'balmy'.

 

Edit: hmm bit thats about 30deg?
I dunno, seems unlikely to evolve life 50-60km up in atmosphere

 

Even if you do presume that it's impossible for life to evolve in the atmosphere, life doesn't have to have started in those conditions. Once created life adapts, evolves, and migrates. There is life present in many, many places on Earth, but it's unlikely to have been formed in-situ. It was formed elsewhere and moved in to that niche. For example bacteria inside rocks on Antartica. Sound like an obvious cradle for life? Not so much.

Conditions on the Venusian surface are thought to have been a great deal more hospitable in the past, around about the time that life appeared on Earth IIRC. As conditions on the surface deteriorated, extant life would be forced to evolve and migrate to less challenging environments.

 

Thunderf00t thinks little of this Venus thing.

Kinda missed the bit where he actually pointed out the more likely source between the ranting, was it volcanic vents?

 

I've only seen a couple of his videos and they were snarky garbage.* Response in the comments from Dr Becky (astrophysicist at the University of Oxford):

* I mean, I'd find them fun if they were nice and accurate, but they lose any punch when they're not.

 

Which of his video's do you consider garbage ? (snarky absolutely)
i DO LOVE A GOOD NERD FIGHT

 

Yes that is an ongoing theme of his videos: stupid media ppl over-sensationalising stuff with wall to wall 'this is the greatest thing ever' coverage when the underlying science is vague or bad.
But also Universities & big name science ppl putting their name to said vague/bad science & putting out sensationalist quotes that feed the bad media coverage.

'Scientists discover probably currently unknown chemistry on Venus' doesn't quite have the same ring...

 

I've met Jane a couple of times and seen her speak a handful, she is a good scientist. I may even be a co-author on one of her papers, I can't recall. Sara I only by reputation and she is also highly regarded in the field. She is US-based, which kind of changes thins a bit when it comes to public stuff, and very much wants to be the one to discover extra-terrestrial life (it's kind of what drives her career). I watched the original press conference and they were very circumspect about the life implications of this result.

Trying to get across the subtle nuances of maybe/perhaps/possibly in a press release and have the media stick with that bloody line is virtually impossible though. Once a story is out in the the public domain you kind of lose control of it, regardless of how straight you play it in the original release and in interviews, etc. We are kind of buggered either way. We have to make our releases interesting enough to catch the eye of the media and the interest of the public. Public engagement is part of our job, and an implicit and in some cases explicit requirement of our funding. Having the media act as some unhelpful combination of food blender + agricultural muck spreader really doesn't help matters. It also doesn't help that it's not something we generally receive much if any training in (though there is access to that), and many scientists by their very natures just aren't very good at that sort of thing. Personally I am crap at it and I hate doing it with a passion.

What is sobering though is seeing what the media do with stories from my field, then pondering quite what that implies for stories from others which aren't my field.

 

Lay off the drugs dude