Manifesto of the Committee to Abolish Outer Space

[lajoswinkler]

15 hours ago, Bill Phil said:

You'll never see a nebula like that out of your spaceship, unless you're lightyears away and have an awesome telescope.

Galaxies, on the other hand, if you're far away enough... Andromeda would look bigger than the Moon if it's light wasn't drowned out by the rest of the solar system and our own Galaxy.

Yeah it does. It's black. A lack of color.

You're contradicting yourself right there.

[Bill Phil]

2 hours ago, lajoswinkler said:

You're contradicting yourself right there.

Black is a color, that is a lack of light.

[0111narwhalz]

On April 13, 2016 at 3:23 AM, lajoswinkler said:

Infrared has no color.

Could one not take a small spectrum of nIR and blow it up and translate it onto the visible spectrum? Would that be consided a "color" image?
I agree with the need to annotate your photos with "false color" or "exaggerated to show contrast," by the way.

Also, is reconstitution of a color image from a set of grayscale images shot through filters not the way we percieve color images anyway? Just point of argument.

[Camacha]

So people here are saying that the images you see through a telescope are false too? Your eyes cannot gather the amount of light captured by these telescopes, so any resulting image is as false as photographs are.

[lajoswinkler]

11 hours ago, Bill Phil said:

Black is a color, that is a lack of light.

No, black is not a color, physically (no EM radiation human eyes respond to) and physiologically (no retina reaction) speaking. Artistically, yes, but science beats art. LOL

 

10 hours ago, 0111narwhalz said:

Could one not take a small spectrum of nIR and blow it up and translate it onto the visible spectrum? Would that be consided a "color" image?
I agree with the need to annotate your photos with "false color" or "exaggerated to show contrast," by the way.

Also, is reconstitution of a color image from a set of grayscale images shot through filters not the way we percieve color images anyway? Just point of argument.

We could do that with anything. We could use gamma rays. Or even neutrons, ascribing color to their "temperatures" which is something it's actually done.

It doesn't change the fact that human eyes are our measure for what color is, and that is the effect an average human eye sees when eyposed to EM radiation with wavelengths of 390-700 nm.

Those grayscale images you're talking about aren't really grayscale because grayscale is just a neat way (using intensities of white) to show "this part of image has more/less information about radiation". We're just using grayscale for our convenience.

 

5 hours ago, Camacha said:

So people here are saying that the images you see through a telescope are false too? Your eyes cannot gather the amount of light captured by these telescopes, so any resulting image is as false as photographs are.

The image is not false. The claim that "this thing looks like this" is false because it does not look like that to human eyes. It's like drawing atoms and saying "atoms look like this". They don't. We can draw their models, but can't see them because they don't even respond to visible wavelenghts as they're not macroscopic objects.

 

I don't want people to get the idea this is a philosophical question because it's not. It's just a question of definitions and consistency.

[Camacha]

2 minutes ago, lajoswinkler said:

The claim that "this thing looks like this" is false because it does not look like that to human eyes. It's like drawing atoms and saying "atoms look like this". They don't. We can draw their models, but can't see them because they don't even respond to visible wavelenghts as they're not macroscopic objects.

Again: you are saying that things through binoculars or a telescope do not look like what you see.

[lajoswinkler]

39 minutes ago, Camacha said:

Again: you are saying that things through binoculars or a telescope do not look like what you see.

Yeah, those optical devices gather much more light and we're the measure.

[Camacha]

2 minutes ago, lajoswinkler said:

Yeah, those optical devices gather much more light and we're the measure.

That has massive implications, you do realize that? For starters, which specific human or percentile do you take as the measure? Also, photographs are in no way representative, as sensitivity, exposure time and perspective are all not the same as the measure. We have two eyes, photos are taking by one lens, so photos are out. Suddenly your range of accurate representations shrinks to almost nothing.

[Plusck]

3 hours ago, Camacha said:

Again: you are saying that things through binoculars or a telescope do not look like what you see.

No, because even if you look at them through a telescope they don't look like the pictures. The only time they ever look like the pictures is when you direct the results onto some light-sensitive substance for long enough to form that sort of image, then process the result to get something that looks nice. In real time, with the largest optical telescope in the world, you'd still not see much other than blobs of white or blue/white and an occasional red tinge.

But still, this question is a bit beside the point, since the article is talking about outer space as part of our culture. If something is truly to be part of our culture, it has to be something that can be experienced by the masses. And one thing is most definitely true - the masses will never, ever see outer space other than blobs of white or blue/white and an occasional red tinge. Artistic impressions (including official space agency filtered time-exposure artist impressions, a.k.a. Hubble or Gran Telescopio Canarias pictures) are all well and good, but are in many respects no different from medieval alter-pieces.

[lajoswinkler]

3 hours ago, Camacha said:

That has massive implications, you do realize that? For starters, which specific human or percentile do you take as the measure? Also, photographs are in no way representative, as sensitivity, exposure time and perspective are all not the same as the measure. We have two eyes, photos are taking by one lens, so photos are out. Suddenly your range of accurate representations shrinks to almost nothing.

If we dig down like that, we'll get to solipsism and that's useless. You're turning it into a philosophical issue. Plusck said it right.

 

10 minutes ago, Plusck said:

No, because even if you look at them through a telescope they don't look like the pictures. The only time they ever look like the pictures is when you direct the results onto some light-sensitive substance for long enough to form that sort of image, then process the result to get something that looks nice. In real time, with the largest optical telescope in the world, you'd still not see much other than blobs of white or blue/white and an occasional red tinge.

Thank you.

[Plusck]

Personally, I find the article both amusing and profound, which basically qualifies it for an Ig Nobel prize (though that would be stretching it a bit).

It doesn't take itself seriously (I particularly liked the phrase, in discussing Zubrin's Case for Mars: "Columbus is mentioned four times in the book, Marx only once; this is always a bad sign").

However it makes a lot of valid points about capitalism, colonisation, and our place in the cosmos (and the comos's own, extremely limited place in the cosmos...). I find it odd that some people are managing to get upset about it, though I can understand that some might be annoyed by the difficulty of understanding some bits of it.

[Bill Phil]

Except that black is defined as a color.

[Plusck]

45 minutes ago, Bill Phil said:

Except that black is defined as a color.

If you want to define black as a colour, then black is the colour that reflects no visible light.

If you want to define black in terms of light, then black is the absence of light.

Colour is defined as the wavelength (or apparent wavelength, or combination of apparent wavelengths) of visible light, or as a property of an object which reflects the same or appears to do so by a complex interplay of reflection, refraction, diffraction and radiation.

So if you start talking about invisible electromagnetic radiation (which by definition, when talking about colours, is not light because it is not visible) then you cannot say that it has a colour. Infra-red is therefore most certainly not red.

So yes, you have to choose what you're talking about:

• if you're talking about the colour of an object, then black is indeed a colour but no object can be the "colour" of infra-red;
• if you're talking about the colour of the light that hits your retina, then black is not a colour and infra-red has no colour.

[p1t1o]

Not sure if its particularly relevant, but it is interesting.

The human eye can respond to X-rays of sufficient power/intensity, apparently appearing blue. It is not known if it is due to excitation of retinal structures in the same way as visible light or some other mechanism, mainly due to not many people wanting to beam intense ionising radiation into their face to test it - but it was repeatable.

http://www.orau.org/ptp/articlesstories/invisiblelight.htm

[Bill Phil]

Black is defined as a color.

Color just happens to have wavelengths, they're not defined as those wavelengths. Color is the perception of light. If infrared is being emitted, and there's no visible light, then it's black. It's black because that's the absence of visible light. Thus the color of any part of the spectrum except visible light is black.

Color itself is an illusion. It lets us perceive the light objects reflect. But they don't have a color. It's reflected.

Now, radiation of high enough energy can cause reactions that give a color to our brains.

[Plusck]

2 hours ago, p1t1o said:

Not sure if its particularly relevant, but it is interesting.

The human eye can respond to X-rays of sufficient power/intensity, apparently appearing blue. It is not known if it is due to excitation of retinal structures in the same way as visible light or some other mechanism, mainly due to not many people wanting to beam intense ionising radiation into their face to test it - but it was repeatable.

http://www.orau.org/ptp/articlesstories/invisiblelight.htm

And the man that seems to have done the most testing of the phenomenon, George H. Stover, wrote the highly Kerbal: "A few dead or crippled scientists do not weigh much against a useful fact."

 

12 minutes ago, Bill Phil said:

Black is defined as a color.

Color just happens to have wavelengths, they're not defined as those wavelengths. Color is the perception of light. If infrared is being emitted, and there's no visible light, then it's black. It's black because that's the absence of visible light. Thus the color of any part of the spectrum except visible light is black.

Color itself is an illusion. It lets us perceive the light objects reflect. But they don't have a color. It's reflected.

Now, radiation of high enough energy can cause reactions that give a color to our brains.

I think you're confusing the definition of "light" and "colour" by saying colour happens to have wavelengths. Then you contradict yourself and say "color is the perception of light" which means that black cannot be a colour because black is the absence of perception of light. Then you refer to invisible radiation as being of the colour black, which again contradicts what you were saying about colour being the perception of light, and then you go on to refer to radiation colouring our brains, which is a bit macabre but still not really correct (unless you consider the retina to be "part of the brain", in which case any perception of light is "lighting up our brains") since the effect of radiation appears to be on the eye itself not on the visual centre.

Edited April 15, 2016 by Plusck

[Bill Phil]

Color is the perception of light. If there's nothing there to perceive, it's the color black. But even if there's nothing, it's still perceived.

No, I was trying to say that it can cause reactions that cause a perception of color, when there's no visible light.

[Camacha]

13 hours ago, lajoswinkler said:

If we dig down like that, we'll get to solipsism and that's useless. You're turning it into a philosophical issue.

We simply follow the path you put us on. I am glad we agree: going there is simply a philosophical issue. There is no well defined boundary where you can say things are false, so either everything is false, nothing is, or we define it as something arbitrary. Either way, saying the images presented to us are in some way false is as true or untrue as any other observation is. The picture I have taken from my lunch is as false as an image of The Pillars of Creation.

13 hours ago, Plusck said:

If something is truly to be part of our culture, it has to be something that can be experienced by the masses.

This is another statement that has far reaching implications if we suppose it to be true. A lot of modern science goes right out of the window, as the masses, as you so lovingly choose to call them, has no way to experience atoms, or the finer points of physics. Also, anything virtual is eliminated instantly, as is anything that actually exists but is not widely known. Let us not even get started on religion.

If your statement were to be true, the world would be in turmoil.

[insert_name]

17 hours ago, Plusck said:

Personally, I find the article both amusing and profound, which basically qualifies it for an Ig Nobel prize (though that would be stretching it a bit).

It doesn't take itself seriously (I particularly liked the phrase, in discussing Zubrin's Case for Mars: "Columbus is mentioned four times in the book, Marx only once; this is always a bad sign").

However it makes a lot of valid points about capitalism, colonisation, and our place in the cosmos (and the comos's own, extremely limited place in the cosmos...). I find it odd that some people are managing to get upset about it, though I can understand that some might be annoyed by the difficulty of understanding some bits of it.

what part of "Abolish the sun" is profound to you?

its main argument against mars colonization is that we might fail, if that is a valid argument then there is no reason to do anything

also pretty sure discussions on the nature of capitalism violate the no politics rule

[lajoswinkler]

19 hours ago, p1t1o said:

Not sure if its particularly relevant, but it is interesting.

The human eye can respond to X-rays of sufficient power/intensity, apparently appearing blue. It is not known if it is due to excitation of retinal structures in the same way as visible light or some other mechanism, mainly due to not many people wanting to beam intense ionising radiation into their face to test it - but it was repeatable.

http://www.orau.org/ptp/articlesstories/invisiblelight.htm

Human eye can respond to a train hitting it, travelling at 150 km/h, but it doesn't mean that "being hit by a 150 km/h train has color".

Being blasted by ionizing rays will cause destructive phenomena to occur in both out sensoring and processing units.

 

12 hours ago, Bill Phil said:

Color is the perception of light. If there's nothing there to perceive, it's the color black. But even if there's nothing, it's still perceived.

No, I was trying to say that it can cause reactions that cause a perception of color, when there's no visible light.

You're contradicting yourself there. If the color is a perception of light, then its absence can't be color. It's like saying bald people have a type of haircut, or atheism is a religion.

 

Color is our brain's reaction when its input device is exposed to light. If there is no light acting, there is no response. Therefore it can not be called a color in a physical or physiological sense.

I repeat, it can be called a color in artistic sense, but that's art and not applicable to science.

[Plusck]

On 16/04/2016 at 6:17 AM, insert_name said:

what part of "Abolish the sun" is profound to you?

its main argument against mars colonization is that we might fail, if that is a valid argument then there is no reason to do anything

also pretty sure discussions on the nature of capitalism violate the no politics rule

Actually "abolish the sun" is quite profound, since the absurdity of the idea of abolishing something which plainly exists naturally leads (well, for some of us, naturally leads) to questions about what exactly is being abolished. Abolition clearly can only ever apply to a concept, and even more specifically it can only ever apply to a socially accepted concept. You can abolish the death penalty or slavery, since they are both legal constructs and you can deny their legality. More factual situations make abolition harder - you can abolish gun ownership but not gun possession, sexual discrimination but not sexism.

So I quite like the demand, "abolish the sun", because it begs the question: what is the social construct of the sun?

Unfortunately delving deeper into that question would certainly elicit notions of religion (which would then inexorably degenerate into comparisons between sun-worshipping and more modern mainstream monotheistic religions). Given that a mere mention of literary references discussing the nature of capitalism elicits a somewhat defensive reaction about not discussing politics, I would have to agree that this is not the place to get into that sort of philosophical discussion.

Still, I'm not sure that the argument against Mars colonisation was just that we might fail. It wasn't even that we would most certainly fail. Rather, I took the whole article as being an extension of the fundamental truth behind Shelley's sonnet: "My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair"

[p1t1o]

On 4/16/2016 at 10:29 AM, lajoswinkler said:

Human eye can respond to a train hitting it, travelling at 150 km/h, but it doesn't mean that "being hit by a 150 km/h train has color".

Being blasted by ionizing rays will cause destructive phenomena to occur in both out sensoring and processing units.

Hey i didn't write it, Wilhelm Röntgen did.

It should also be noted that it is not caused by fluorescence within the eyeball and there is some evidence that suggests it is likely caused by direct action on the pigments within the retina.

[lajoswinkler]

1 hour ago, p1t1o said:

Hey i didn't write it, Wilhelm Röntgen did.

It should also be noted that it is not caused by fluorescence within the eyeball and there is some evidence that suggests it is likely caused by direct action on the pigments within the retina.

Destructive action only. Are you sure there isn't any fluorescence involved?

[p1t1o]

Just now, lajoswinkler said:

Destructive action only.

How would you know this? He didn't go blind.

1 minute ago, lajoswinkler said:

Are you sure there isn't any fluorescence involved?

"A low flux of X-rays below the Cerenkov energy threshold generates a phosphene by direct action on the retina without a fluorescence in the ocular media." 

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2205976

["Phosphene" is apparently some kind of field-specific term for "visual phenomena"]

Nobody's saying "Look! Humans can see into the X-ray spectrum!", its just an interesting aside that we aren't that far away from being able to do so.

And even if we could, it wouldn't exactly be game-breaking, pigments can respond to frequencies outside of their optimum range no problem.

Comparing X-rays to runaway trains is a bit of a stretch though.