Page 91

Discussion regarding the Outsider webcomic, science, technology and science fiction.

Moderator: Outsider Moderators

User avatar
Arioch
Site Admin
Posts: 4486
Joined: Sat Mar 05, 2011 4:19 am
Location: San Jose, CA
Contact:

Re: Page 91

Post by Arioch »

Resolving a television broadcast from 200 light years away into any kind of viewable detail would be a neat trick. The example in Contact was much closer (Vega, 26 light years away), but I think even that is really reaching... though it certainly makes for a dramatic cinematic moment.
fredgiblet wrote: Could we get an explicit statement regarding Fireblade being on Seren or not?
That seems a reasonable request, but I am sorry, I am not in a position to give you any information on that subject at this time.
NOMAD wrote:I think we can trust Arioch, its was just a quick artistic decision to use Talon, (not Spiral i belief, but I'm sure the spiky haired pilot was out their too).
I put in Talon's bio that she has been transferred to shuttle duty, which is correct; the fact that I put her in a fighter during the Naam battle just means that this transfer happened after the battle. [Obi-Wan Kenobi voice] So what I told you was true, from a certain point of view. [/Obi-Wan Kenobi voice]

User avatar
bunnyboy
Posts: 543
Joined: Sat Mar 05, 2011 9:21 pm
Location: Finland

Re: Page 91

Post by bunnyboy »

Ktrain wrote:Doesn't signal strength diminish with distance... something with photons dissipating at a rate of square of the distance?

Wouldn't the interception of such a transmission give a general idea of where Sol is, but not necessarily a specific point (sort of like we could pinpoint the area of the sky the WOW signal came from but not necessarily the star)? Just looking for clarification.
They don't be ever able to hear it, if they aren't already pinpointed to sun. Because without proper amplification (like 30m disk) the signal is so weak that background noise of universe or one refrigerator on umiak ship will overpower it.
Supporter of forum RPG

discord
Posts: 629
Joined: Thu Mar 24, 2011 7:44 am
Location: Umeå, Sweden

Re: Page 91

Post by discord »

bunny: more like 30 KM dish.....

User avatar
bunnyboy
Posts: 543
Joined: Sat Mar 05, 2011 9:21 pm
Location: Finland

Re: Page 91

Post by bunnyboy »

Calculating.

217 light year is about 100.000 times so far as Voyager 1, whose signal is clearly recorded 2006 by amateur with 20 m disk.
Voyager has 3.7 m disk and it's powersource emit 470w at launch, I don't know how much it is now or how much it is for transmitting.
In 1936 they build in Britain 200kw radar. (Didn't find out how much power was BBC using, but the first radar tests used their signal.)
They need only 100 times better equipments than us to get that signal with 20m antenna.

Edit: We could detect it with this distance with 200 m disk.
Last edited by bunnyboy on Thu Jul 28, 2011 2:39 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Supporter of forum RPG

User avatar
Mjolnir
Posts: 452
Joined: Sat Mar 05, 2011 1:24 pm

Re: Page 91

Post by Mjolnir »

Ktrain wrote:Doesn't signal strength diminish with distance... something with photons dissipating at a rate of square of the distance?

Wouldn't the interception of such a transmission give a general idea of where Sol is, but not necessarily a specific point (sort of like we could pinpoint the area of the sky the WOW signal came from but not necessarily the star)? Just looking for clarification.
If they can detect it at all, they probably have a detector specific enough to pinpoint Earth. Directionality doesn't just let you know where something's coming from, it cuts out interference from other sources in the general direction of the target.

I'm talking about the mass transmissions from the planet as a whole, though. It's very doubtful they'd be able to pick out an individual transmitter at that distance, though, no matter how good the equipment. And high bandwidth transmissions like TV are less likely to be received intact than radio.

NOMAD wrote:a better bet would be radio ( longer broadcasting history, very simple to find). however, would a very advance race be able to notice ( IE recieving the message is fine, but what if, say the com's system on the Loroi ships would fliter out earths messages? )
Their ships aren't carrying antennas nearly big enough to let them receive anything from Earth. We're talking about parabolic dishes multiple km across.

Nemo
Posts: 277
Joined: Tue Apr 26, 2011 1:04 am

Re: Page 91

Post by Nemo »

I think folks might be projecting a bit here. We use such techniques to find signals because we can't just drop in and say "Hello! Anyone home?" Folks in Outsider-verse can. Consider, how much funding will SETI get with the Scout Corp buzzing around?

dfacto
Posts: 118
Joined: Thu Mar 31, 2011 10:50 am

Re: Page 91

Post by dfacto »

I think we can safely assume that interstellar signal detection is a non-issue in this story (as in, it doesn't exist) or else humans would have known about the rest of the factions long ago.

fredgiblet
Moderator
Posts: 983
Joined: Mon Mar 21, 2011 4:02 pm

Re: Page 91

Post by fredgiblet »

Arioch wrote:
fredgiblet wrote: Could we get an explicit statement regarding Fireblade being on Seren or not?
That seems a reasonable request, but I am sorry, I am not in a position to give you any information on that subject at this time.
Hmmmmm...*strokingchin.gif*

User avatar
Trantor
Posts: 780
Joined: Sun Mar 06, 2011 1:52 pm
Location: Hamburg, Germany

Re: Page 91

Post by Trantor »

Cy83r wrote:
NOMAD wrote:As for old radio messages: unfortunately, the first tv broadcast is a Hitler at the 1934 olympic games :( ( according to the movie contact)
Waaat? That is both scary as hell and freaking awesome.
Don´t worry. German TV "quality" hasn´t improved much since...

:mrgreen:

Edit: The olympic games in Berlin were in ´36, btw.
And somewhat "regular" TV-"programme" was broadcast from spring 1929, a few hours a day around Berlin.

Hitlers TV-speech "only" was the first one with the then-new "high definition"-TV @ 375 lines, 25Hz (not interlaced).
Last edited by Trantor on Thu Jul 28, 2011 7:58 pm, edited 1 time in total.
sapere aude.

discord
Posts: 629
Joined: Thu Mar 24, 2011 7:44 am
Location: Umeå, Sweden

Re: Page 91

Post by discord »

bunny: unless voyager was significantly outside pluto orbit when they did that test, the number you are looking for is probably over 5.7 MILLION times longer...you might have dropped a zero and some change somewhere along the line.

the solar system is only 7 light hours diameter....to pluto. 217 light YEARS is quite a bit longer

User avatar
bunnyboy
Posts: 543
Joined: Sat Mar 05, 2011 9:21 pm
Location: Finland

Re: Page 91

Post by bunnyboy »

dfacto wrote:I think we can safely assume that interstellar signal detection is a non-issue in this story (as in, it doesn't exist) or else humans would have known about the rest of the factions long ago.
Actually they got somekind of signal in 1977, but it lasted only a couple of minutes, before earth rotation got it away and it was never get back.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wow!_signal

And seti can only search of couple of frequences, because most of them are ful off noice from television, mobile phones, radars, home appliances like remote controlled carage door openers etc.
discord wrote:unless voyager was significantly outside pluto orbit when they did that test, the number you are looking for is probably over 5.7 MILLION times longer...you might have dropped a zero and some change somewhere along the line.

the solar system is only 7 light hours diameter....to pluto. 217 light YEARS is quite a bit longer
Distance to Pluto is 1/3 of distance to Voyager and distance to Voyager is 0.0018 light year (16.12 light hour), in current speed it was 0.00146 on 6 years ago. I did made some roundings, but it don't change the result very much.
So real distance 157.000 times longer.

So umiak can find us easily, if they have shipsize disk pointed on right direction and they are using different frequences than us in their communications & radars and listening right frequences.
Supporter of forum RPG

User avatar
Trantor
Posts: 780
Joined: Sun Mar 06, 2011 1:52 pm
Location: Hamburg, Germany

Re: Page 91

Post by Trantor »

discord wrote:bunny: unless voyager was significantly outside pluto orbit when they did that test, the number you are looking for is probably over 5.7 MILLION times longer...you might have dropped a zero and some change somewhere along the line.

the solar system is only 7 light hours diameter....to pluto. 217 light YEARS is quite a bit longer
217 x 365 x (24 / 7) = 271560 times. That would be with Voyager @ 55AU.
Today Voyager is @ 116AU. That would be ~130000 times.

Edit: Too late. ;)
sapere aude.

discord
Posts: 629
Joined: Thu Mar 24, 2011 7:44 am
Location: Umeå, Sweden

Re: Page 91

Post by discord »

must have been smoking or something to mess up the math that bad....still a huge amount longer, and inverse square law should apply...somehow.

bah, i blame lack of sleep.

NOMAD
Posts: 457
Joined: Mon Mar 07, 2011 5:34 am

Re: Page 91

Post by NOMAD »

Arioch
I put in Talon's bio that she has been transferred to shuttle duty, which is correct; the fact that I put her in a fighter during the Naam battle just means that this transfer happened after the battle. [Obi-Wan Kenobi voice] So what I told you was true, from a certain point of view. [/Obi-Wan Kenobi voice]
Hum, funny, this sequence of events, is ;) Well I guess she deserved the transfer ( despite any ill-feelings on talons behalf of being considered not yet expendable yet until she trains the next cadre of rookie pilots)

@ mljonir

true, really big dish are required, but couldn't an advance planetary com system do the trick ? or would they have upgrade to a different methods ( IE how FM is used mostly now for music station instead of AM)

@ Trantor: don't get much German TV here in the Great White North, so no idea and thanks for the correction, couldn't find the right date.
I am a wander, going from place to place without a home I am a NOMAD

User avatar
Trantor
Posts: 780
Joined: Sun Mar 06, 2011 1:52 pm
Location: Hamburg, Germany

Re: Page 91

Post by Trantor »

NOMAD wrote:@ Trantor: don't get much German TV here...
That´s not a loss. German TV programme is like a huge pile of sh*t with only a few scattered gems.
;)
sapere aude.

javcs
Posts: 179
Joined: Thu Mar 24, 2011 10:05 pm

Re: Page 91

Post by javcs »

Trantor wrote:
NOMAD wrote:@ Trantor: don't get much German TV here...
That´s not a loss. German TV programme is like a huge pile of sh*t with only a few scattered gems.
;)
That description applies to most TV programming.

User avatar
TheUnforsaken
Posts: 178
Joined: Wed Apr 06, 2011 6:42 am

Re: Page 91

Post by TheUnforsaken »

Trantor wrote:
NOMAD wrote:@ Trantor: don't get much German TV here...
That´s not a loss. German TV programme is like a huge pile of sh*t with only a few scattered gems.
;)
Not much different from everywhere else then :D

Edit: Ninja'd...
Rage, rage against the dying of the light. - Dylan Thomas

[A] book need never die and should not be killed; books [are] the immortal part of man. - Robert A. Heinlein

Oops. - Shannon Foraker

Incursion RPG
IC Thread
OOC Thread
Character List

User avatar
Trantor
Posts: 780
Joined: Sun Mar 06, 2011 1:52 pm
Location: Hamburg, Germany

Re: Page 91

Post by Trantor »

javcs wrote:
Trantor wrote:That´s not a loss. German TV programme is like a huge pile of sh*t with only a few scattered gems.
;)
That description applies to most TV programming.
TheUnforsaken wrote: Edit: Ninja'd...
:D

Yes, but you have no idea.
They´re copying EVERYTHING from UK or the States. Not necessarily a bad thing in itself, but they (try to) copy EVERYTHING the really really cheap way, even stage-scenes or - far worse - puns.
That doesn´t work. It´s painfully embarassing. Niveaulimbo. On German.
:?
sapere aude.

javcs
Posts: 179
Joined: Thu Mar 24, 2011 10:05 pm

Re: Page 91

Post by javcs »

They're swiping puns? That ... how does that even ... WTF?
I mean, I can understand swiping concepts and ideas for shows - ie, CSI-type ... though ... damn, I just realized something - in terms of broadcast TV (where I live), almost all the prime-time shows are either "reality shows" or police procedurals/dramas, and there are going to be a few more brand new series of the type starting in the "fall viewing season".
No science fiction anymore. Bring sci-fi!! And, almost as importantly, first air it when people are available to watch it - not in some stupid time-slot that no-one watches - and don't shift the first-air times around during a given season, in between seasons is one thing, but in the middle of the season? c'mon, are you trying to kill the ratings? And using a series that is at least decent wouldn't hurt either.

User avatar
Mjolnir
Posts: 452
Joined: Sat Mar 05, 2011 1:24 pm

Re: Page 91

Post by Mjolnir »

NOMAD wrote:true, really big dish are required, but couldn't an advance planetary com system do the trick ? or would they have upgrade to a different methods ( IE how FM is used mostly now for music station instead of AM)
You said communication systems on ships. It's not completely far fetched that a scout/survey vessel might carry a big deployable radio telescope (you might take a survey ship around blasting a high precision time signal at nearby stars, returning to those stars a few years later to listen for your signal and get high precision distance/location measurements), but it's something with very specialized uses.

There's no reason a planetary or even system-wide communications network would be able to pick up signals across hundreds of light years. That's kind of like standing in LA and thinking you might overhear a conversation between two people in a crowded, noisy room in Paris. Modulation and encoding are issues, but the big one is just simple distance. (Plus, the interstellar medium absorbs some decent sized chunks of the radio spectrum. There's not much there, but when you add it up over a couple hundred light years...)

Post Reply