Space debris by the numbers | Hacker News Reader

Space debris by the numbers

esa.int

63 pointsmkl9518 comments

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> Number of these still functioning About 7500

Of which 3500+ of those are now starlink satellites. Really.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Starlink_and_Starshiel...

Estimates of:

> 1000000 space debris objects from greater than 1 cm to 10 cm

> 130 million space debris objects from greater than 1 mm to 1 cm

For high aspect ratio debris, it's not clear whether the given size ranges refer to the long or short axis. I wonder how the Project West Ford[0] artificial ionosphere needles contribute to these estimates. Apparently the remaining needles are mostly in clumps, so they might not be estimated at the individual level.

I hope we can develop a good method for space debris cleanup. It would be a shame if humanity ends up suffering from Kessler Syndrome[1]. Time to brush up on how to use a map and compass, I guess.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_West_Ford

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome

Homo sapiens? no: Homo qui lectica seems more appropriate.

If we are ever to be accepted into the intergalactic alliance of sentient beings we need to adhere to rule number one: leave no trace. It's just a matter of politeness.

If there is an "intergalactic alliance of sentient beings" then leaving trace and debris will be far from humanity's main issue for joining them. We're not very good at playing with others, never have been from our very nature and the way we evolved.

The question being, is that a necessary trait for every species that can reach the stars, in which case do we really want to meet the others just like us, or is it not and it's just us being like that, in which case again do we really want to meet the others who will see us for what we are and hope they don't take the obvious reaction/solution to discovering an invasive parasite ?

I actually prefer to be optimistic about things we don't have a clue about. We can be better. The sentient beings that possibly observe us (without leaving a trace) might also see our potential - we may be selfish and conceited, but we can also adapt and take care. It's not one or the other.

When I was a child, that fjord where we used to swim gradually turned into a sewer. Now the water is clean, the fish have returned, because it became illegal to just flush waste into the environment.

In Japan, I've heard children clean their own classrooms every day. Not sure if it's true, but it could explain why the supporters of Japans national football team clean the stadium after a match, as a tribute.

We can learn.

Our knack for cooperation is what got us to space at all.

Cooperate ... within our group to beat the other group

War and competition got us into space. WWII got German rocket scientists the funding and facilities to get some good ideas going, and after the war the US and USSR grabbed whatever German experts they could find and incorperated them into their own ballistic missile programs. Over the course of a decade those programs looked at launching missiles into space instead of hitting dummy targets. The Soviets were the first to successfully launch a satellite and the Americans were upset at the very thought of a communist country being better at something, which brought us a solid decade of space race with lots of spectacular achievements. Followed by the Russians giving up, and little of note happening over the 40 years (ok, rovers got better, the Russians built a bunch of space stations, and the fall of the Soviet Union got us the ISS. Not a whole lot for 40 years though).

War is a team sport. People have a reason to work for a common goal that is bigger than themselves. And that requires a supresion of a lot of competitive spirit. Not everyone can win a medal, be a general, or an astronaut. It takes thousands of normal people doing boring jobs.

You've got me thinking, as far as cooperation, nobodies gonna compare to ants, but is there a species of mammal that can work in as large as groups as we can? Some avian flocks and mammal herds get pretty big, but I'm only aware of them cooperating in transit, do they do collaborative child rearing and food sharing like we do?

> You've got me thinking, as far as cooperation, nobodies gonna compare to ants

Depends on which you consider the fundamental organism: the ant or the colony.

That's the exact issue.People that point at humans and say we are bad at cooperation are really saying they are uncomfortable with the level of violence we have/are exhibiting. As far as cooperation goes we are clearly the most cooperative species on the planet as we are cooperating across pretty much the entire surface of the planet across diverse kin groups. Most of the insect examples trotted out (i.e. ants) are colonies made up of one kin group. If you put another kin group in the same territory you won't have two kin groups for long because one will kill the other or push them out of the territory.

Human culture is like nothing else on planet earth for cooperation. Although I think a lot of the cooperative behaviour is still based on kin groups, we just aren't particularly precise about who is kin and who isn't. And those instincts get applied more generally than just our family.

I suspect it's more that we can build institutions and those institutions can be imbued with rules we think are ideal and power to enforce said rules. That we can apply concepts like "what rules would I want to apply if I didn't know my starting position?" to decide on desirable rules helps a lot too.

Pack it in, pack it out.

Still waiting to see if we find Voyager 1.

¡Vamos!

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