This is for topical issues effecting our fair world... you can quit snickering anytime. Note: It is the desire of the leadership of SFDebris Conglomerate that all posters maintain a civil and polite bearing in this forum, regardless of how you feel about any particular issue. Violators will be turned over to Captain Janeway for experimentation.
Launched by the SpaceX Falcon. The Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite is expected to find more than 20,000 exoplanets, compared to about 3,800 exoplanets known at the time of launch.
To seek out new worlds and civilisations. Not to boldy go yet but to boldy look for perhaps
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It still floors me that I was alive in a time where exoplanets were technically theoretical and remember the discovery of the first. That now there are not only thousands more but tens of thousands to be discovered in the near future. To have even grown to the position that I look back at those first exoplanets and how they were discovered and think of it as so primitive compared to the current methods.
TESS is exciting, and the abilities JWST will soon bring to the table will make even Kepler look primitive in the future. I can't wait!
As I grew up we had NO evidence of planets outside the solar system. We could speculate at system formation but we had no idea how common planets were. Now we know planets are fairly common, and their discovery is barely news, all in about 20 years. We may not be living on the moon or Mars, but at least we have solid knowledge of the existence of exoplanets.
I can't help feeling miffed that so much progress is in the area of privatized space exploration, given that the Tesla Factory has disastrously low safety standards because Elon Musk hates the color yellow.
"Believe me, there’s nothing so terrible that someone won’t support it."
— Un Lun Dun, China Mieville
I don't see that last thing as an issue, really. Forklifts often travel more often in reverse than they do going forwards because the operator can see better that way.
"Black care rarely sits behind a rider whose pace is fast enough."
-TR
