[HN Gopher] Voyager spacecraft begin to power down ___________________________________________________________________ Voyager spacecraft begin to power down Author : Element_ Score : 175 points Date : 2022-06-17 15:48 UTC (1 days ago) (HTM) web link (www.scientificamerican.com) (TXT) w3m dump (www.scientificamerican.com) | secondcoming wrote: | This article is from the future, July 2022 | lunchpack wrote: | This is a pre-published article from the _July 2022_ magazine | [deleted] | whartung wrote: | This is one of my favorite reasonably recent Voyager anecdote, | from a recent special about the program. | | Paraphrasing, the person said "You carry more computing power in | your pocket than what we have on Voyager. And by that, I don't | mean your smart phone. I mean you car key fob." | linsomniac wrote: | The one I often think about is: Your USB-C charger is more | powerful than the Apollo 11's computer. | | https://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/a30916315/usb-c-... | ElCapitanMarkla wrote: | This blew my 12 year old mind when someone said this about | that Furby toy back in the late 90s. | [deleted] | dry_soup wrote: | If I could decide, I would happily scrap all human missions and | launch one massive science robot with a huge visible light camera | on it per year. Idlewords convinced me of this: | | https://idlewords.com/2005/08/a_rocket_to_nowhere.htm | TheChaplain wrote: | I find the space-age to be super fascinating! The Venera program | is one favourite, where they managed to put a lander on Venus | more than 50 years ago and send back data. | | Just imagine the skills and knowledge with the technology at the | time, to figure out how to land something safely in an unknown | environment. Love it! | pcrh wrote: | Curious that you refer to the "space age" in the past tense. | Though it might be because the enthusiasm for humans traveling | between planets and stars has been somewhat tempered since the | 1960's-1980's. | JoshuaJB wrote: | Very nice overview of the Voyager program. | | I love the words from the President included on the spacecraft: | _"We hope someday, having solved the problems we face, to join a | community of galactic civilizations. This record represents our | hope and our determination, and our good will in a vast and | awesome universe."_ | mistermann wrote: | > "We hope someday, having solved the problems we face, to join | a community of galactic civilizations. This record represents | our hope and our determination, and our good will in a vast and | awesome universe." | | This is a lovely saying, but it feels like fairly strong false | advertising. "We hope X", interpreted literally, implies that | people physically engage in such forms of thinking. I do not | believe this is actually true at ground level, rather, I think | this is more of a story that we like to tell ourselves about | ourselves. | kortilla wrote: | SpaceX is actively working towards that goal. | mistermann wrote: | On a portion of it - I don't see any attention paid to | discovering how to teach human beings how to be better at | good will, which is part of the claim. | Peritract wrote: | SpaceX's own mission statement doesn't mention becoming | part of a community of civilisations [1]. It mentions | making humans multiplanetary, but that is a _very_ | different aim [2]. Further, it 's a good idea to be | skeptical of corporate mission statements generally. | | SpaceX is doing exciting stuff in the field of rocketry; | that's really happening and it's worth being excited about, | but they aren't doing more. It's misguided and dangerous to | treat them as utopian idealists. | | [1] https://www.spacex.com/mission/ | | [2] https://www.gutenbergcanada.ca/ebooks/lewiscs- | outofthesilent... | hansjorg wrote: | That's a nice sentiment. Suprisingly humble, coming from | Reagan. | boulos wrote: | Except it was Carter... | diogenes_of_ak wrote: | People inexplicably hate Carter - not only was he a | fantastic president... albeit unlucky but good, but also a | genuinely amazing human. | mc32 wrote: | Carter is a really nice man. He was not a good president | though. Granted much of the badness was out of his | control, but such is life. | helloooooooo wrote: | I think his presidency is stained by the impossible | geopolitical and economic environment of his era. | Ma8ee wrote: | How was he a bad president? | cpuguy83 wrote: | Mainly record high inflation and the gas crisis (which | was way worse than today's). | | Whether or not anyone could have stopped that doesn't | matter, ppl attribute this to him. | BbzzbB wrote: | Is it one side of the aisle that hates Carter? Because | from what I've seen/read from the outside (Canada) | looking in, I saw nothing but praise for his humility and | humanity. I saw conflicting opinions on what he did or | didn't do during his tenure, but only positive with | regards to his person and character. | Spooky23 wrote: | Maybe now, but Carter was handed a bag of poop that | soured the public. | | His election was like Clinton and administration like | Biden. | linsomniac wrote: | I'm not really sure, but I do remember my parents *hated* | Carter. I remember distinctly sometime in the '90s | thinking "Look at all the amazing things Carter has done | with himself after being president. I always thought he | was an asshole!" | StevePerkins wrote: | Well, he DID face a 1980 primary challenge from Edward | Kennedy, and barely won his own party's re-nomination | with 51.1% of the popular vote as a sitting President. He | was pretty well eviscerated by both the left and right a | decade or two back, when he published a book labeling | Israel's policy toward Palestine as "apartheid". | | Speaking as a left-leaning resident of Georgia, it seems | obvious to me that Jimmy Carter is not all that well- | loved by his own political party: | | * Part of this is because he made the mistake of bringing | his own people when he went to Washington, instead of | populating his administration with more federal insiders. | | * Part of it is because he lost, and no one likes a loser | (I'd say that Carter's place in the Democratic Part is | similar to that of George H.W. Bush, without the legacy | of an heir going on to serve two terms). | | * And I believe that part of it is because, on the heels | of the Civil Rights Act and the re-alignment it ushered | in, Democrats were never all that genuinely enthusiastic | about having a white Southern leader. It took 12 years of | futility for them to embrace Bill Clinton (see point | above, about how people more fondly remember Presidents | who win re-election). And even Clinton's legacy has | picked up a lot of tarnish over the past decade. | sixothree wrote: | Yes. Even to this day, high praise for Nixon and Reagan; | and nothing but utter contempt for Carter. More telling | of the people laying the condemnation than of the man | himself. | christophilus wrote: | Not sure. I was raised by conservatives (albeit somewhat | middle of the road) and they and most conservatives I've | chatted with really admire Carter as a person; just | thought he was an incompetent president. | | My childhood church group (all Republicans, I'd guess) | used to build houses with Habitat. It's kinda hard to | think poorly of Carter when he built something that does | so much good. | | I wonder if the loud, vitriolic right wingers make it | seem like the right thinks as a united, extreme block, | when maybe there's a large, quiet group that is not well | represented? Not sure. I may also just be in a bubble of | reasonable centrists. My left wing and right wing friends | are pretty centrist in my estimation. | zizee wrote: | > maybe there's a large, quiet group that is not well | represented | | Often referred to as the "silent majority". | | > My left wing and right wing friends are pretty centrist | in my estimation. | | I think this is many (?most?) people's experience, whilst | media (social/traditional) are geared towards demonizing | both "sides", to increase engagement. I say "sides", | because most people's opinions skew left/right depending | on the issue in question, rather than fitting perfectly | into the stereotypical archetypes. | MandieD wrote: | As my very conservative, East Texan father says, Carter | is too good a man to have been any good as president. | [deleted] | kortilla wrote: | Genuinely amazing human sure, but terrible President. He | didn't get anything done and nearly lost the nomination | from his own party for a second term, which is rare. | qbasic_forever wrote: | There's a good PBS documentary series on all the modern | presidents and it's worth a watch if you haven't seen it | already. The Carter episode dug into how he was | technically well qualified and capable, but just did not | have the connections and support of Congress at the time | and that ultimately doomed his administration to failure. | None of his ideas were able to get funding or support in | Congress so his administration just flailed. | ajmurmann wrote: | The big problem. Policy is super interesting and fun and | touches on so many diverse and stimulating areas. | Politics though is awful and puts sociopaths at an | advantage. | pengaru wrote: | In case you haven't noticed, a substantial portion of | Americans favor assholes. | johnohara wrote: | Agree. The past 59 years have been particularly notable. | smitty1e wrote: | There are copious fine individuals one could name. This | doesn't make them great Presidential material. | | Nor should we care. It is of far greater significance to | be a good parent or a Gary Flandro than to be President. | cjbgkagh wrote: | It's not inexplicable, it was a manufactured consensus by | the media. | | I was a Carter fan before it was cool, seems like more | and more people are coming around and revisiting his | legacy. | [deleted] | srvmshr wrote: | > _Flandro calculated that the repeated gravity assists, as they | are called, would cut the flight time between Earth and Neptune | from 30 years to 12. There was just one catch: the alignment | happened only once every 176 years. To reach the planets while | the lineup lasted, a spacecraft would have to be launched by the | mid-1970s._ | | How many of such startling discoveries get noticed by | bureaucracy/administration nowadays? Back then, it seems ideas | percolated to execution stage pretty fast. I wonder if a part- | time working grad student's serendipitous finds will be taken | seriously to action in today's environment. | samstave wrote: | antihero wrote: | The amount of companies I've worked in where they'd just be | like can we push back on the solar system a bit | samstave wrote: | SOL-utions... | [deleted] | tomohawk wrote: | > if the models were correct, should have pushed the heliopause | farther out than 120 AU. "It was unexpected by all the | theorists," Krimigis says. "I think the modeling, in terms of the | findings of the Voyagers, has been found wanting." | | Uncalibrated and/or unfalsifiable computer models should never be | trusted. | litoE wrote: | I remember having lunch at the JPL cafeteria and watching a TV | monitor showing pictures of Jupiter being beamed down by Voyager. | Exciting times. | enriquto wrote: | Notice that today you can download all the raw data sent by the | voyagers and create your own mosaics and false color composites | (each image was taken with a separate multispectral filter). | This is a very beautiful and inspiring project for tech | students. | | https://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/science/data-access/ | GekkePrutser wrote: | It's the half life of the RTG that is limiting them, right? | Because they're way too far to use any kind of solar power. | | Ps I always thought that record was a bit funny. I mean it's a | good method of initiating communication. Just strapping it to a | can of poison is kind of a mixed message. "Hey buddies we're | peaceful humans, ps here's a can of instadeath" :) Though I | suppose little radioactivity would be left by the time it ever | reached an alien civilization. | knorker wrote: | Meh. Plutonium is safe below criticality. | DylanSp wrote: | Yep. The farthest any solar-powered craft has gotten is Juno | out at Jupiter, with much newer technology (and the solar | panels are still pretty large). | lazide wrote: | Eh, if they can't deal with a little shielded can of death | they're not likely to have made it to space anyway. For anyone | spacefaring, it's about as hard to deal with or unexpected as a | can of gas gas in an old car. | TrueDuality wrote: | Rest now sweet explorers. You've given us more knowledge than we | asked for and inspired untold numbers. Even in your final dreams | you give us beautiful gifts and prove to the universe that we | exist. | nonrandomstring wrote: | When was the launch date? It's been out there for almost my | whole life. Maybe it will turn up in the 23rd century in female | form with a shaved head and calling herself Vega. | ingsoc79 wrote: | ...or suffer a more pedestrian fate of getting vaporized by | bored Klingons. | funstuff007 wrote: | Just as I was tempted to give SciAm another shot, I see they have | this headline on the homepage: | | How Culturally Significant Mammals Tell the Story of Social | Ascension for Black Americans Nyeema C. Harris | Opinion | | Honestly, what the heck is going on there? It's not science, | that's for sure. | dfee wrote: | epgui wrote: | That's called an "opinion piece", it is editorial content. | Scientific American is a popular science publication. Most | people read it for the scientific journalism, not for the | opinion pieces. | | Editorial content is always going to be hit or miss. | jftuga wrote: | When will Voyager 1 become 1 light-day distance away?[1] | | * 1 LD from Earth = November 18, 2026 -- 1,614 days from today | | * 1 LD from Sun = Feb 03, 2027 -- 1,691 days from today | | https://www.quora.com/When-will-Voyager-1-become-1-light-day... | bullen wrote: | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H62hZJVqs2o | dharmaturtle wrote: | StrangeLoop talk: "Uptime 15,364 days - The Computers of | Voyager" by Aaron Cummings | rektide wrote: | > _But if an engineer had a choice to put in a part that was 10 | percent more expensive but wasn 't something that was needed for | a four-year mission, they just went ahead and did that. And they | wouldn't necessarily tell management._ | | Engineers doing good things even though everyone else doesnt want | to care & just wants something cheap. Heartbreaking long tale of | humanity, that opting to do good things is so hard to get buy in | on. | m34 wrote: | I was on the receiving end of numerous support cases caused by | what has to be on the sub-dollar cent savings (per single sku) | region when multiple mainboard manufacturers chose to use | capacitors with slightly worse tolerances all of a sudden (~25 | years ago). | | So if the whole process of spec'ing and validating the quality | of sourced materials was within their action space, ofc they'd | choose (potential) fault-tolerance over price, as it was | mission critical. | | So there might be a reason why we refer to it today as space | race and not race to the bottom. | chasd00 wrote: | not understanding and following requirements isn't something | engineers should be doing IMO | marssaxman wrote: | Understanding requirements so _well_ that you give the | customer what they actually do want, even though they don 't | yet know they want it, sounds like really great engineering. | FastMonkey wrote: | There is balance in all things. Engineers shouldn't be | ignored, but we are also not omniscient. | | As an engineer myself, having worked on product and having | been a client of engineers working on products for me, I | can tell you that engineers that think they have an inside | track on what the client "really" wants are often wrong. | The feeling is similar to that false confidence you get in | any field when you have learned just the absolute basics, | and I have felt it myself. That's why you don't just go and | spend 10% of the clients budget without talking to them | first. If clients are saying they don't want a feature, | it's quite probable that the person you're dealing with | actually knows what they want, and what they want is not | what you've come up with. | | A lot of projects that filter their way through HN die | because the engineers are solving the problem for | themselves and not talking to users. That is also the | pattern you see with a lot of "what I wish I had known when | I started my project" posts on here. Avoiding a | conversation with the client because you're afraid they | won't approve the feature you want to add is not really | great engineering. | nonrandomstring wrote: | > not understanding and following requirements isn't | something engineers should be doing IMO | | I disagree, engineers are not robots. Good engineers may | second guess and get technically involved in adjusting badly | written instructions or mangled schematics, and do so all the | time. And no, the "process" for querying and changing | requirements is not always practical. Of course good | engineers should document and report all deviations from the | recspec and talk to the quality manager. Spotting that a | capacitor or diode voltage is under-rated and swapping the | part number, no problem. Upgrading a part if it makes no | other difference seems okay too. I've been very grateful to | fab or pick and place engineers who corrected a silly mistake | I made instead of just sending me back a board that obviously | wouldn't work. But those kind of people who take initiatives | are rare to find these days, | tejtm wrote: | Deciding that the Engineers don't understand is not something | a bureaucracy should be doing, period. | bad416f1f5a2 wrote: | Squeezing in "a little extra" is a time-honored tradition in | engineering. | lkrubner wrote: | Engineer: "Gracious lord and Pharaoh, if we mix this volcanic | ash into the mortar, your Pyramid could last for thousands of | years." | | Pharaoh: "But that would be too expensive right? Don't waste | the treasury's money. Ordinary mortar is fine." | | Engineer: (goes off and mixes volcanic ash into the mortar, | despite the cost) | iJohnDoe wrote: | Great article. Learned something new. The satellites were larger | than I thought. | | Coincidentally, randomly the other day, I thought how much more | advanced our computing would be today as a species if we worked | within the constraints of the computing of available at the time | of Voyager or even the 90s. | | I think we would favor information and communication vs. cruft | and entertainment. Working within constrained computing | environments forces us to make tough decisions about what is | important or pushes us to innovate and be creative with what we | have to work with. | pvg wrote: | Our 'computing' is many orders magnitude more 'advanced' than | what was available at the time. There's no technology that's | advanced faster in the history of technology, a completely | unprecedented rate of innovation even in the industrial era. It | would be very odd indeed if it somehow became more advanced by | not advancing it. | rozab wrote: | This is a good overview of the Voyager program, but did they just | slap that headline on it to try and make it news? I was expecting | some sort of announcement. But there isn't even any definite | plans to shut down any instruments in the near future. | perlgeek wrote: | The title is also very weird, considering that Voyager 1 and 2 | have been shutting down instruments since 1990 and 1991, | respectively: | https://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/science/thirty-year-pla... | Aardwolf wrote: | The Voyager crafts generate a never ending supply of news | articles about leaving the solar system or shutting down, | because there plenty of different moments that are considered | "leaving the solar system" or shutting down, and there are | multiple Voyager crafts as well... | kQq9oHeAz6wLLS wrote: | _They are the first human-made objects to do so, a distinction | they will hold for at least another few decades._ | | Uhh...won't they still be the first? | 333c wrote: | Not once we invent time travel in a few decades. | _0ffh wrote: | We told you, no spoilers! Stop messing with this time line, | or we'll have to start over _again_! | RedShift1 wrote: | Should we give them another chance to avoid the dark | timeline and reset them to pre-Harambe? | hourago wrote: | > They have traveled farther and lasted longer than any other | spacecraft in history. And they have crossed into interstellar | space, according to our best understanding of the boundary | between the sun's sphere of influence and the rest of the | galaxy. They are the first human-made objects to do so, a | distinction they will hold for at least another few decades. | | They will be the ones that have traveled the farthest until | faster objects catch up and surpass them. It may take time | until we send anything faster, and it's going to need time to | catch up, so it will take decades. | wyldfire wrote: | But when they do catch up and surpass them, they won't unseat | the first ones at being first. | hourago wrote: | I know what you mean. What I say is that "distinction" is a | substitute for "have traveled farther and lasted longer" | not "the first human-made". | in_cahoots wrote: | But that's not what first means! You're either first or | you have traveled farther, combining them into one clause | doesn't make sense. | | If I'm the first person to be the fastest runner, then | nobody else can be first. It just doesn't make any sense. | Someone can be faster, but they'll never be first. | aardvarkr wrote: | The full quote with context makes it pretty clear that the | author is talking about crossing into interstellar | space/leaving the solar system. It certainly could have been | better worded though and should be fixed. | | "And they have crossed into interstellar space, according to | our best understanding of the boundary between the sun's sphere | of influence and the rest of the galaxy. They are the first | human-made objects to do so, a distinction they will hold for | at least another few decades." | mokus wrote: | It doesn't matter what it's about though - if they were first | at something then barring time travel they will always be the | first, no matter how many more do it. | lkrubner wrote: | "according to our best understanding of the boundary" -- | they are the first to cross the boundary unless our | understanding of the boundary changes, and then there is | the small possibility that something faster can reach the | "real" boundary faster. | [deleted] | divbzero wrote: | Two bits of history I learned from the article: | | 1. The last human to touch the spacecraft was a physicist | inspecting two detectors -- probably part of the low-energy | telescope system (LET). | | _Although many scientists have worked on the Voyagers over the | decades, Cummings can make a unique claim. "I was the last person | to touch the spacecraft before they launched," he says. Cummings | was responsible for two detectors designed to measure the flux of | electrons and other charged particles when the Voyagers | encountered the giant planets. Particles would pass through a | small "window" in each detector that consisted of aluminum foil | just three microns thick. Cummings worried that technicians | working on the spacecraft might have accidentally dented or poked | holes in the windows. "So they needed to be inspected right | before launch," he says. "Indeed, I found that one of them was a | little bit loose."_ | | 2. Carl Sagan not only commented on the "Pale Blue Dot" but also | persuaded NASA to take the photograph in the first place. | | _Sagan urged NASA officials to have Voyager 1 transmit one last | series of images. So, on Valentine 's Day in 1990, the probe | aimed its cameras back toward the inner solar system and took 60 | final shots. The most haunting of them all, made famous by Sagan | as the "Pale Blue Dot," captured Earth from a distance of 3.8 | billion miles. It remains the most distant portrait of our planet | ever taken. Veiled by wan sunlight that reflected off the | camera's optics, Earth is barely visible in the image. It doesn't | occupy even a full pixel._ | | _Sagan, who died in 1996, "worked really hard to convince NASA | that it was worth looking back at ourselves," Spilker says, "and | seeing just how tiny that pale blue dot was."_ | [deleted] ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-06-18 23:00 UTC)