TRAPPIST-1 vs Alpha Cen, Catching The Voyagers, Lunar Space Elevator | Q&A 243

Why it's easier for James Webb to observe TRAPPIST-1 than Alpha Centauri? Is a lunar space elevator possible at all? What would my ideal space mission look like? Can we build a telescope the size of a solar system? Answering all these questions and more in this week's Q&A show.
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00:00 Start
00:47 [Andoria] Why it's easier for JWST to see Trappist-1 rather than Alpha Centauri systems?
07:16 [Vulcan] Is lunar space elevator possible?
12:09 [Risa] What would my dream space mission be?
16:28 [Aeturen] Any update on JWST's TRAPPIST-1 observations?
20:54 [Vendikar] Are we building a solar system sized telescope any time soon?
23:06 [Remus] Can we catch up to Voyagers if we need to?
27:03 [Janus] What will Artemis-2 be doing at the Moon?
29:38 [Cait] Can sub-surface oceans be a source for life on planets around red dwarfs?
32:55 [Betazed] How can we predict Betelgeuse exploding?
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[@frasercain]

I said that TRAPPIST-1 has 6 planets. I should have said 7.

[@yourguard4]

Very nice of you, to also count the not discovered yet exo-Pluto :P

[@oberonpanopticon]

Seven that we know of ;)

[@Bitchslapper316]

Thanks Fraser. Have you heard of any plans to build a large space based radio telescope? I was recently reading about some of the satellites the NRO uses and they allegedly have a 100m + dish in geostationary orbit used for signal intelligence on earth. I have no idea how it works but I imagine it's something like a fold up umbrella. It seems the technology is out there to build a similar sized one dedicated to radio astronomy.

[@desmond-hawkins]

Another correction: the moon's gravity is almost exactly 1/6th that of Earth, not 1/5th (1.62 m/s² vs 9.81 m/s²).

[@israeldiegoriveragenius2th164]

Will you grow a secondary atmosphere on your head Fraser?

[@eamonia]

Is your channel growing as fast as I think it is? I don't know which I like more, your awesome interviews with some of the greatest minds in their fields or your Q&A videos. Thanks for all your hard work and congratulations on your success. The sky is *not* the limit 😉

[@josephwoods5925]

I was fortunate enough to have been in the path of totality in 2017 and I'm hoping to be in the path, this year. It is one of the most beautiful things you will ever see in your life. We spent hours driving to the path, a night in a hotel and three times as long driving home.... that couple of minutes were worth every penny and every second of time spent to see it.

[@cacogenicist]

It seems like a dream to me. It's so surreal, and hard to explain to people who haven't experienced it.

[@TJ_Kat]

@@cacogenicist The best way I have to describe it is that it was like someone put a sepia filter on the whole world. Everywhere you looked it was like looking at an old, faded photograph/film.

[@greggrant670]

@@cacogenicist I agree, I've been in totality twice, in 2017 in Idaho and in 2001 in Zambia. And going to travel to this one in April, praying for clear skies. It's worth every effort to get to see one of these. I can just imagine what the ancients used to think, it must have been terrifying.

[@ThomasKelly.]

I traveled to the path of totality with my girlfriend and visited a childhood friend after 20 years (since I’d visited him last). I proposed to my girlfriend just as the diamond ring (just as the sun starts to reappear from behind the moon) began to appear. We’re celebrating our 5th wedding anniversary next month in February, 2024.

[@MarcosElMalo2]

Sir, this is a Wendy’s.

[@dnsswe]

You always come across as such a humble and kind soul. Love your calm and harmonious style!

[@frasercain]

Thanks a lot, I'm glad you enjoyed it.

[@jacoblojewski8729]

The topic on Betelgeuse made me have a thought: how well are our models of neutrino/vs light propagation from supernovas? Maybe constrained to a specific supernova type. I was thinking of a new distance measurement method of measuring the time difference between neutrino and light detection from a supernova, then calculating the distance from that time delta. I imagine if our models are good enough to know pretty precisely the time difference between the two escaping the bulk of the mass, then the difference in speed between the two and delta in arrival time we could come up with a distance.

[@lurkst3r]

Always wondered why we were looking at Red Dwarf type systems instead of the sun like star systems similar to our own. Need more of Andoria! thanks x

[@kaoskronostyche9939]

Simple - ease. Stars like ours - stable, long-lived - make up only about 2.5% of all stars. They are also very small and make it difficult to see a planet transitting let alone trying to find them in the vastness of space.

[@pauldavis1943]

...also we don't want to alert the Tri-Solarians to our existence ;-)

[@frasercain]

They're just easier with current tech.

[@itsmodsiw]

Great content as always!

[@vencdee]

Anyway, this one video especially in second part is pure genius. Big thanks for inspiring thoughts! 👌

[@hotrodpawns]

New subscriber here, just found your channel and wanted to say what an awesome job you have done explaining what's going on out there in space. 💯❤

[@simonb467]

Great topics as always, very thought provoking, thank you 🤗❤️👍

[@nerufer]

[Risa] no doubt. And im glad to see you are managing expectations regarding trappist 1 accordingly.

[@nfarnell1]

I remember a part of a story that had a connecting structure between Pluto and Charon, they claimed the two are circling each in a perfect enough circle. That structure could hold huge amounts of stuff and would have reasonable gravity at either end.

[@oberonpanopticon]

Isaac Arthur imagined a similar structure. The two are an ideal location for a space elevator!

[@Jameson1776]

@@oberonpanopticonthat’s where I’ve heard that idea from also.

[@Jameson1776]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/in-1gnmBi7tpbqssi=48JFsk4SpA6E8Pdh

[@hishamg]

Budget no limit? 1) super-Hubble or Hubble 2; 8 metre space telescope with coronagraph AND/OR 2) 16 metre telescope on far side of the moon.

[@georgeflitzer7160]

I’m excited about the chronograph!❤

[@stanspanish253]

Great show! Thanks

[@hinesification]

GO 1618 look it up on the JWST approved science programs! That program will indeed observe Alpha Centauri with JWST, and one of its chronographs

[@MrSpot337]

5:40 Andoria, yes, was about to comment the exact same thing.. Been waiting for it for ages, apparently still in implementation. 1618 Searching Our Closest Stellar Neighbor for Planets and Zodiacal Emission PI: Charles Beichman Co-PI: Dimitri Mawet

[@friendlyone2706]

Thank you for the Great News! The problem is there is only one JWST. What it sees is phenomenal, but it's like throwing a very sharp dart at a wall ten thousand miles square. No matter how many times you toss the the dart, you will always miss most of the wall. It reveals pinpoints in our very wide sky, and everyone clamors for their favorite pinpoint target. I want Tabby's star just when it begins its next dimming and again at max dimming and then just finishing dimming. I also want it focus on one of the seemingly empty intergalactic spots associated with a sudden radio burst. And every other anomalous sighting, the weirder the better. Let lesser tools look at what we think we understand. Save James Web for those we argue most about.

[@frasercain]

Thanks a lot, I didn't realize it had gone into the queue. I'll be watching...

[@Graptopetalum]

If I could do a space project with no financial restrictions, I'd build Star Fleet! OK, don't know how I'd get the warp drives and things but ... well, can't think of anything cooler!

[@joakimlindblom8256]

Just a clarification on Apollo 8's trajectory: while it was initially on a free return flyby trajectory as a fail safe back up in case the service module propulsion were to fail on the way to the moon, it actually went into orbit around the moon and spent 10 orbits at the moon before the service module was fired to return Apollo 8 to the Earth. Artemis 2, on the other hand, is planned to stay on a free return trajectory and not go into orbit around the moon.

[@sheepwshotguns42]

i LOVE the idea of a solar gravitational lens, which is why i have to ask... can we use the moon, and especially a new moon, to do the same thing? it has no real atmosphere and its kinda stable so our telescopes wont just fly out of range. question is, can it work?

[@frasercain]

No, the lower the gravity, the farther it becomes a lens. You'd need to go halfway to Andromeda

[@sheepwshotguns42]

@@frasercain nuts

[@brandontedrow7840]

Regarding the interferometer topic: With the advent of cube satellites, it seems like we should be able to launch enough of those to make a space-based interferometer any size we want.

[@DedeLawyer]

Hi Fraser, question for a future Q&A hopefully: How much should we be concerned about the current build-up of space debris in our orbit? Are there any missions in any stage of planning to attempt to reduce the amount of trash in orbit?

[@MichaelBuetKESE]

It is a MAJOR concern, indeed!! We are tettering on the edge of a catastrophic Kessler Effect that will effectively seal us inside our Gravity Well for many nanny years. .. All proposals to clean it hit the Veto of almost all the Nations involved, which do not want anyone to have a close look at their dead safekeeping and or debris....

[@gordiebrooks]

I’ll say this about the space elevator and that is if they build like a normal elevator with a counter weight then the lifting cost is dramatically lower

[@TheJadeFist]

A couple of these videos have talked about the idea of a custom filter to look at a specific star and block it out to see planets around it. What if you had something like TV or computer monitor with an extremely dense and small set of pixels that it could block out as an overlay, have it project an obstruction over the telescope. If you had something along those lines, you wouldn't need new filters for each star you wanted to look at, you could simply load a filter file on the computer controlling a telescope. You could cheat the small sizes by having multiple screens that you reflect the previous image over to be filtered at each screen.

[@MichaelBuetKESE]

I personally participated in a NASA Proposal with the Inventor On Record of the Slave Elevator, the late Mr Jerome Pearson, for a South Pole of the moon Lunar Elevator: we currently already have all the materials and technologies needed to build it. The base attach point would be built with a robotic 3D laser printer using Lunar regolith, as pioneered by the University of Washington State. All we need is the political will to fund it....

[@maggipetty7047]

Fascinating video. I relate to the gentleman that stated he didn't really delve into mystic contemplation until he moved out into the wilderness. Same here. I never questioned life or history until I retired. I appreciate the open minded reflection of the archeologists too. I believe it's going to take a younger mind questioning the narrative in order to really change academia.

[@MarkFrankowitz]

Moving towards a non Extinction space movement.

[@oskarskalski2982]

12:49 that was the first thing I also thought about:).

[@belliott538]

We need to start Spinning Up Mirrors in Space!!! I love that Book Series… 😎

[@GadZookz]

The solar gravitational lens sounds great but how do you point it at the exoplanet you want to observe?

[@CorwinPatrick]

It's a matter of station keeping at the optimal focal point on the other side of the Sun from the Exoplanet. The problem then becomes... Are you in Orbit of the Sun and only observe occasionally? Or are you expending energy to maintain a constant position, therefore also having limited, but constant observation.

[@dougsinthailand7176]

Thank you! It’s counter intuitive to think that the easiest Star system to examine would be the closest stars!

[@MistSoalar]

Vulcan. but I want to see a mass driver on the lunar surface too

[@amzarnacht6710]

0:50 The planets orbiting Trappist is that the tidal forces of the planets in the 'habitable' zone would make them unlivable for our type of life. Due to their orbital proximity, as well as the other inner planets, they would pull cometary debris into each other. Their stable lagrangian points would be far too small to capture and hold slower moving orbital debris. It's also a red dwarf system, so their orbital velocities within the very constrained habitable zones would create even more gravitational havoc. The problem with alpha/proxima centari is that they're a close binary system (paired stars are within a light year of each other) . The energy that their individual planets receive would be far too unstable to create and sustain atmospheres tenable for life forms we are familiar with. The highs and lows would be far too extreme. And planets orbiting *both* would be, most likely, entirely frozen or jovian giants with their own internal heat, either form being entirely inhospitable for recognizable life. Just think... why does the northern hemisphere have 'dog days of summer'? Because of Sirius which is over 8.5 light years from our solar system, yet it can elevate temperatures sufficiently to be noted long before civilization even understood that other solar systems existed. Two sun like stars within 1 light year would cook the planets orbiting where they would be exposed to the energy of both stars, and that would be planets limited to each star individually. Planets orbiting beyond the pair would be frozen and any somehow caught in a lagrange point between the two stars would be cooked. 7:20 A space elevator by current envisioning would not work because of one very necessary component: The tether (i.e. the elevator). As mass is moved up and down the elevator the tether will stretch, contract, and transfer gravitational forces along its entire length which, at the point of the orbital station node in the lagrange point (L1), would be considerable. Energy would need to be continually exerted to keep the station in a stable location, in the L1 or otherwise. One anchored on Earth would be in an even worse position and could *never* be maintained in a lagrange point.

[@nirorbach8046]

Hello Fraser First Thanks a lot for your wonderful channel. Regarding the first question: Isn't the Trapist1 system preferable because it stroke the luck that its planets revolve in the same plane that coincide to our line of sight, so they make eclipses with their star?

[@cacogenicist]

40 planets without atmospheres isnt enough tp give up on red dwarfs, I dont think. Because of the possible combination of very old, less active red dwarfs, with planets featuring exceptionally strong magnetic fields.

[@lostinfrance9830]

Unlimited funding!!! Off the the Cassini moons we gooo 🚀✨🌔✨

[@garymiller8320]

For a second, I thought you meant off to the casinos! 😃

[@timpointing]

18:04 Three cheers for Fraser properly using "data" as a plural and conjugating "to have" appropriately... 18:15 albeit, not entirely consistently! 🥰😂😋

[@CharlesShopsin]

Is it actually possible to focus a gravitational wave observatory? Other than making sure it’s turned on and hoping its orientation lines up? Or were you talking about Lisa where they could potentially reorient to the optimal layout?

[@MistSoalar]

For the total solar eclipse, I'm heading to ontario/niagara falls. wish me luck on weathers

[@flippdoubt8057]

Hey Frasier! I really loved this episode. I’ve watched on & off for a few years. I’ve been subscribed, but I don’t always get your notifications due to the fact I’m subscribed to quite a few channels. While that sounds like I’m a subscriber to anyone, I assure you it’s anything but. I’ve had a Social Media Company and needed to promote a boat load of channels. Thousands, BUT…. Yours is one of my few cherished. Anyway, you make a great point about Alpha Centauri …and I agree that it’s been a less interesting target. Still… hmmm? Why hasn’t it been. Now I’m not a conspiracy theorist, but it is intriguing. I would love a follow up episode on this subject specifically although I know that’s not your MO currently. Hopefully you get this and understand that I support you fully! Keep up the good work!

[@stevesedio1656]

Instead of a space elevator, build a low orbit, rotating space station. Rotation is in the same plane as the earth. It rotates such that the outer edge is going 1000MPH, the same as the earth. That speed also provides 1G. A rocket flies to the station, and the payload latches to the station. Being in a 200 mile high orbit, gravity in the rocket is always over 1G, when the payload attaches to the station, it experiences 1G as it swings with the station. To be in orbit at 200 miles, the station must be orbiting over 17,000MPH, so the outer edge is travelling at 38,000MPH. To continue into space, the payload releases at some place other than directly above earth. To return to earth, you drop off the space station, going zero relative to earth. Minimal need for heat shields, just a parachute suitable for high speed (dual stage maybe).

[@oberonpanopticon]

A space elevator would always be more effective than rockets once it was built. The problem is that we’re still a few centuries away from needing to put enough stuff in space to justify one.

[@SebastianKrabs]

Google "Sky Hook"

[@lookspacethings]

My favorite question/answer was CAIT

[@Dan-Simms]

I've always thought a space elevator was one of the dumbest ideas, imagine the destruction when it inevitably fails.

[@oberonpanopticon]

God, imagine the horror as it carved out a 30000 kilometre long ditch. Seriously it’d be pencil thin and moving as fast as air resistance would allow, what do you expect to happen? It certainly wouldn’t be good, but it would not be devastating. And “inevitable” is debatable. It’d have to be severed in a particular way far above the atmosphere. Also, the cables would probably be nearly as tough as diamond and there’d be plenty of backups and spares.

[@friendlyone2706]

A space elevator that went from high earth orbit to low would avoid that problem, and still lower the cost to access interplanetary space.

[@oldschoolman1444]

Space elevators and habitable planets are wishful thinking. Even if we did find a habitable planet it would take many generations to get to it.

[@oberonpanopticon]

@@oldschoolman1444 Well, space elevators are inevitable if they’re physically possible, it’s just that it’d take several centuries before we have enough of a demand for space stuff that one would be worth building. Habitable planets I agree with you on - if it was 100% earthlike then there’d already be something living there, you’re probably not going to get anything much better than a big mars, and by the time we have the ability to get there the colonists might not even want to live on a planet.

[@bwfvc7770]

Space elevator is a grand idea but I think that it would provide a nucleation point for Magnetic, Gravitational, Electrical, induced Plasma.

[@jtasakorn]

Telescopes assembled in space (unlimited budget): Voyager Station / Orbital Assembly introduced in space construction of rotating ring space stations some 200+ meters in diameter; build 2 rings and put mirrors & lens inside them to have a 200+ meters wide, or however larger, telescope in space, ion/plasma driven, can be placed at any orbit, Lagrange point, or anywhere in our solar system! Such a space station would be a university, space academy, small city, akin to JPL & Berkeley, but not too industrious to disturb its main mission as a space telescope. Give it half a century, maybe just a quarter (in my post retirement lifetime), the way things are moving. If not WW3 before it.

[@tessellator1000]

Question: The interview with Tory Bruno was really interesting. He mentioned that starship was really only optimised for mass to LEO. I was wondering if you could fit an entire existing upper stage e.g the falcon or centaur upper stages in to the starship faring? What capabilities for mass to the moon or outer solar system would that give you? Thank you!

[@OptimusGnarkill]

Has anyone noticed any intense flairs on Trappist-1? I’m praying it’s a more calm red dwarf and these 3 planets are ripe for life.

[@user-lf9hy7hy5u]

Proxima Centauri has two confirmed planets and a disputed candidate for a third planet. These were discovered by doppler spectroscopy measuring the radial velocity from us as it varied due to the gravitational pull of the planets. They could not be detected by the way most exoplanets are found, which is by detecting the change in the light from the star as a planet transits in front of and behind the star. This is because the orbital plane of the planets is tilted from our viewpoint so the planets do not transit the star.

[@geoffhoutman1557]

@fraser So we found 3 planets around Prox Centauri, can we directly image Prox B from JWST? Why was this not very high priority?

[@masterg6754]

that's why the most likely place for et;s and uap's are in our oceans and are USO's that went under the surface after ancient solar storms etc

[@booobtooober]

Space elevator might be theoretically possible, but 🤔 the smallest lateral disturbance would start it wobbling eventually flailing about until it destroyed itself

[@wlhgmk]

Here is a question for you. Why does e = mcsquared. Say we expressed e in BTUs, m in pounds and c in miles per hour. The formula would become e = kmcsquared where k is a constant to make the units come out right. The only way e = mcsquared could be true is if one of the terms in the SI units was defined in terms of the other two. As far as I kinow, each term was independently determined so it would be a great coincidence of the formula came out exactly with no constant needed.

[@denmaroca2584]

SI units were defined in such a way that the constant of proportionality in E=mc^2 is 1 and the formula is always quoted given SI units.

[@-Thauma-]

I am all ears 😊❤️

[@loft82]

"Remus" My wote for this weeks Q&A .

[@NewGoldStandard]

I like your style.

[@unicorn12345]

I second traveling to see the total eclipse. I went to South Carolina for the 2017 eclipse and it was well worth it. I’d seen partial eclipse’s before and there was just no comparison being in totality. Not just what it looked like but how it felt. To say it was awe inspiring was an understatement. It was as if someone had poked a hole in the sky. Videos don’t do the experience justice.

[@ginniechristopherson]

Why such effort to basically just duplicate the Apollo 8 mission from a half century ago? Why are we reinventing the wheel with Artemis?

[@blackwolfe638]

The Voyager missions were never supposed to return to Earth. Big reason the gold records where put on them. Let them go, that was there destiny, to keep going forever.

[@Liferestart6969]

The real question should be what are we going to do with all of the space debris there in 10 years could literally preclude us from sending anything into orbit without causing damage or having a collision

[@CeresKLee]

Question, Fraser!!?? You think that a advanced star-faring civilization might build some mega-structure to contain a red dwarf star to make it safe to mine the planets like the TRAPPIST-1 system? Then build prefect cities in that space about this tamed flare star i.e. O'Neill Cynlinders?

[@code4chaosmobile]

Good Morning. Love your channel! I have a question for you. What are your thoughts on manufacturing in space? what will be the first things created in orbit and Moon for export to earth and used for off world project?

[@iambiggus]

Instead of trying to build up with a space elevator, wouldn’t it make more sense to put some kind of manufacturing system in geosynchronous orbit, and then build down?

[@friendlyone2706]

Yes! Especially if the raw materials came mostly from lunar mines.

[@frasercain]

Absolutely. It's really the only way.

[@nevyngould1744]

Arthur C. Clarke wrote a fairly good novel about a space elevator.

[@darkguardian1314]

Cleveland Ohio is in Totality!! April 8 Come for the eclipse; stay for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame 😊

[@Chris.Davies]

I did the math. Or rather, Chat-GPeter did the heavy lifting. :P The very slow rotation of the moon means that a Lunosynchronous orbital altitude is ~117,000 kilometres above the surface. And so we can easily dismiss this as so completely inefficient as to be a total nonsense. In fact, I had a tremendously engaging conversation with Chat-GPT, where it got quite a few things wrong; trying to tell me the L1 point was 1500 klicks above Earth, for example. When I pointed out the errors, it dutifully corrected itself, and then we had a great chat about how stupid the idea of a Dyson Sphere is. Chat-GPT and I definitely see eye to eye on that subject. :)

[@aubreymacleod2618]

Dont know how i lucked out, but i live in the line of totality for the upcoming eclipse. I will literally be able to stand outside my front door to experience it. Im in Rochester, NY... im really looking forward to it!🎉

[@frasercain]

I'm jealous, enjoy the show.

[@jackdaniel4446]

CAIT Thank you for an excellent show Fraser, I always enjoy catching up with these, but as i'm in the UK, the 5pm Pacific timeslot for the live show isn't very practical. My question is about space elevators: How exactly do they add angular momentum to the payload as it rises? It would have to be extremely rigid, or very strongly braced to prevent it buckling as any payload rose up, surely? You get the energy into the payload by taking it from the rotation of the Earth. And if you have a counterweight, you would have to keep adding energy to it to prevent it from losing orbital speed over time, which might end up just being less efficient than using rockets anyway.

[@maverickbingham5995]

Hey Frazier, Love your work! Thank you. Question: Has the moon always been tidally locked to the Earth? If not, then what made it stop, and what if any effects on the earth have changed in the difference of it being tidally locked or not?

[@denmaroca2584]

No the Moon has not always been tidally locked to the Earth. The Moon hasn't stopped rotating - it rotates once per orbit. The Earth's gravity slowed the Moon's rotation until it became locked. The Moon has also been slowing the Earth's rotation, but the Earth is much more massive so it has not become tidally locked to the Moon, but it will be given time.

[@micheallee9793]

Orion flight SW Programmer here, Lockheed employee, there is a delay as of right now, there are some delays due to the Heat shield issues, and some other software problems. So currently looking at 2025. But possibly delayed again, Artamis 3 and 4 are currently on track with no delays.

[@frasercain]

I thought Artemis 3 was pushed back to 2026.

[@micheallee9793]

@@frasercain Artemis 3 is slotted for 2026. No delays at this time

[@milescunha5286]

“If all of Humanity” lol That’s crazy talk but we’re thinking it.

[@oberonpanopticon]

You could also make an orbital ring around earth and hook the lunar elevator onto some kind of rail on the outer edge of that. It’d need a lot of repairs though.

[@michaeljames5936]

You reckon? Probably a lot of really shoddy, Orbital Ring builders out there. Now, my sister was getting a new orbi...

[@RWMAirgunsmithing]

Pretty sure you can't have solid objects like that in orbit, you'd have to continuously propel it and control it. Same reason you can't make a Dyson sphere, only a Dyson swarm, as a sphere would inevitably collide with the sun.

[@oberonpanopticon]

@@RWMAirgunsmithing It’d certainly require some serious RCS thrusters, or maybe a lot of tethers, but it is hypothetically possible. There’s always a way around pesky physics - like how you can actually make a Dyson sphere by floating microscopically thin solar panels/mirrors on the solar wind.

[@RWMAirgunsmithing]

@@oberonpanopticon ohh, orbital in the colloquial sense, sorry my brain was in science mode after watching a science video. So yes, i agree, we could make a giant earth sized ring shaped rocket and continuously propel it 24/7 so it wouldn't crash into the earth....

[@oberonpanopticon]

@@RWMAirgunsmithing There’s always active support too. But a thin ring / incredibly wide and thin torus around the earth, whilst unstable, wouldn’t be all that unstable. For the most part it’d just stay in place.

[@chrisw1462]

@12:40 Any 'telescope' that distance from the sun would have to be orbiting around it, since it couldn't carry enough fuel to keep it stationary long enough to be useful. At that speed, objects in the gravitational lens far enough away to be exoplanets would go by SO FAST, you'd be lucky to see them at all.

[@anthonycamilleri7297]

hi frazer.my vote is for vulcan

[@rosedruid]

With light taking so long to leave the core of a star, what does the initial start of a star look like? Do we expect that a stars core would ignite under its pressure a significant time before we’d be able to tell on the outside?

[@bradwise1005]

Hi Fraser, I have a few questions for you about space elevators and the ionosphere. Given that they would have to pass through the Earth's ionosphere and its plasmasphere, is that even possible? What would be the dangers of passing a tower or cable connected to the ground, with its own electronics, all the way through this highly charged environment into space? How well do we even understand this region of the atmosphere? Moreover, do you think we could ever draw energy directly from the ionosphere? If so, how would that be possible? Is there a way of connecting a current to and from the ambient plasma and draw power from it? I am thinking of a NASA space tether experiment on the shuttle in 2001 that failed. What exactly happened to it and why? What other space tether experiments to study the ionosphere and magnetic field have there been and what is planned for the horizon?

[@deutschchad1399]

With unlimited funding I would want to build the Alcubierre Warp Drive. If it was successful we can only imagine what we could do.

[@doncarlodivargas5497]

Perhaps spend some of the unlimited funding on some futuristic weaponry so we could conquer new words? Collect gold and silver, spices and strange fruits, it could make us to rulers of the universe

[@oberonpanopticon]

@@doncarlodivargas5497people like you are why I worry about us going interstellar

[@doncarlodivargas5497]

@@oberonpanopticon - why? It have worked perfectly before?

[@oberonpanopticon]

@@doncarlodivargas5497 I really, really hope you’re being sarcastic and it’s just going over my head.

[@frasercain]

Sadly, military has advanced technological development in the past. There are better ways, though, like just investing in technology as opposed to investing in technology for war that happens to provide side benefits.

[@MarkFrankowitz]

Is it possible we could revive or terraform planets to stabilize life there if not for our species but for all.

[@richiebricker]

Do they plan on any "Time Lapse Photography" of the movement of clouds or anything

[@artlinwood4348]

Apollo 8 did not "fly by" the moon. It braked into a sixty mile orbit, did ten orbits, then boosted itself back to earth. This is something Artemis cannot do due to the lower performance of SLS compared to the Saturn V, despite its greater liftoff thrust.

[@ninatolfersheimer]

Does the neutrino "early warning" work for type Ia supernovae as well? If so, wouldn't that make for a great additional distance measurement, independent of the rest of the cosmic distance ladder?

[@Gregg69420]

What about red giants? Could stars like Betelgeuse have planets orbiting them?

[@NorthernChev]

Being able to detect a dead Voyager probe after you catch up to it would require a realignment of the lateral sensor array…

[@user-zo2pc5lu5q]

Risa, I want to see more space based telescopes and being able to see more than just a single pixel for a planet

[@icaleinns6233]

Great episode. Now, if someone decides to actually bring back one of the Voyager probes, they're gonna have to deal with Carl Sagan's ghost. That shade is going to be throttling the HELL outta them! That is the polar opposite of what he wanted!

[@marenpurves4493]

been in 2 total solar eclipses 1991 in Hawaii (I live here, and in 1991 at least one of the telescopes on Maunakea got its mirror wet)) and 1999 in the south of Germany. I got rained on both times. Solar eclipses make the temperature drop and unless you're in a very dry area you're likely to get rained on.

[@mattduncil]

Vendikar, wouldn’t the earth and moons gravity interfere with the measurements or would there be a way of subtracting out that interference?

[@MarkFrankowitz]

Lasers would be your best product to a non sinking titanic Forest communication.

[@winstonmontgomery8211]

24:00 Remus There might be a future mission to find Voyager to recover the true history of humans on earth.

[@davidross5593]

To Fraser You have done a video or two on Fermi Paradox. What is your own personal conjecture about aliens existing? In the event aliens do not exist, what would you think about that?

[@APurpleSpy]

No travelling for the eclipse for me. The dead center of the totality path cuts directly over my roof.

[@michaellee6489]

Fraser, didn't one of your shows feature someone talking about a Fresnel lens based L2 interferometer?

[@frasercain]

Yep.

[@andriesv8903]

my vote is with RISA

[@jeremiefaucher-goulet3365]

29:25 I don't know how long ago this was recorded before posting, but NASA announced a delay for Artemis 2 a few days ago. Pushed back to September 2025

[@walkingtarget]

Hey Fraser, fantastic video! If we colonize the Moon, how would solar eclipses affect our settlements? Would they only occur on the dark side, or would the Earth's shadow touch inhabited areas? Also, would an eclipse significantly increase harmful radiation? Would we need artificial protection, like a man-made ozone layer? Sorry a few extra questions in there 😅

[@BabyMakR]

What if they took JWST and up scaled it to fit the Starship fairing? How big would it be and how much more effective would it be?

[@Idiotatwork]

Question about time for you. If aliens lived in a system that was orbiting around the milky way at significant faster or slower speeds to our own system would they experience time differently to us. Is it possible that we cant detect techno signatures because they are passing just toofast to register on our current technology?

[@CoraxCatcher]

No, research Special Relativity for why. However, biologically, alien creatures could perceive time differently from us. Think of Mayflies that live 1 day versus Bristlecone Pines that live 5000 years.

[@Idiotatwork]

@@CoraxCatcher probebly a bit complex for me...i just find it hard to understand why a spaceship moving at high speed would experience time at a different rate from earth but a solar system moving a few 100 thousand miles an hour faster around the galaxy wouldnt.

[@roni1451]

My dream space telescope will work on moon as well and that can be large too. But we need a lunar base 1st.

[@mikaelbiilmann6826]

Invasion of interstellar private sphere... niiice! 😁

[@Xostrich12X]

Fraser, what’s the deal with K-type stars? I feel like the community only talks about G-class Sun-like stars and M-class red dwarfs. What’s the consensus on their ability to host habitable planets? Are they flare-y and angry like red dwarfs? Are they favorable targets for near-future exo-planet observations with the newer coronagraphs?

[@frasercain]

K-type stars are great. Long lived and not as fearsome as red dwarf stars.

[@RoryJamesFord-rn9yu]

I have a question for you.. taking into consideration how many launch vehicles are currently in use, being manufactured, and the near future capacity, if we found out tomorrow that a massive, planet killer asteroid whas going to hit the earth say a week from now, how many humans could we theoretically launch into space to save the species? (I realize that we have nowhere to go, nowhere to stay, and no reason to believe it would even remotely "save the species"), but, the exercise is to get people thinking about this, and to point out our weaknesses. Thanks!

[@universemaps]

Solar eclipses are awesome. Totality is worth the effort of getting there! ⭕