If that happens, we had better get the Enterprise built! 🚀

https://www.wired.com/story/nasa-is-getting-serious-about-an-interstellar-mission/#:~:text=The basic idea for the,system like any other probe.

 

On a side note.....I would argue that Voyager 1 and 2 are currently nowhere near interstellar space.

13 minutes ago, Christopher Low said:

On a side note.....I would argue that Voyager 1 and 2 are currently nowhere near interstellar space.

What was their distance??  110 and 120 Billion miles out?  Once past our solar system, isn't that the beginning of interstellar space?

Unlike many people apparently, I thought the first movie was pretty good.  But the second and third were FAntastic!  Khannnnnnn!  hours like days ... minutes like hours  "well what if we don't go anywhere?" Well then this will be your big chance to get away from it all"

1 hour ago, charliearon said:

What was their distance??  110 and 120 Billion miles out?  Once past our solar system, isn't that the beginning of interstellar space?

The entire orbit of the hypothetical Planet 9 is well beyond the current positions of the Voyager spacecraft, and the Oort Cloud is way beyond that.

Interstellar space is usually defined as the space between the stars. Hence "inter" and "stellar". The distance between two stars is usually defined as the distance between the two heliopauses. Given the fact that Voyager 1 is now some 23 billion miles from Earth, and Voyager 2 is out some 19 billion miles, and given that our heliopause is 11 billion miles away, I'd say they are both well into interstellar space and have been for some time.

Voyager is beyond the heliopause, which is usually considered the boundary with Interstellar space.

I disagree, but then I also disagree that Earth has seven continents

41 minutes ago, Christopher Low said:

I disagree, but then I also disagree that Earth has seven continents

That'll largely be because it doesn't have seven continents. 🙂

1 hour ago, Christopher Low said:

I disagree, but then I also disagree that Earth has seven continents

At the edge of our solar system, a fierce battle rages between solar wind and interstellar rays. NASA's Voyager 2 spacecraft has now passed through the frontlines.

22 minutes ago, Chock said:

That'll largely be because it doesn't have seven continents. 🙂

Are you counting Europe and Asia (Eur-Asia) as one because their land masses are connected?

Just now, charliearon said:

Are you counting Europe and Asia (Eur-Asia) as one because their land masses are connected?

I'm ignoring what everyone else says about it and instead following the criteria for what a continent actually is in terms of the meaning of the word, i.e. a big isolated land mass largely surrounded by water.

On most map projections of the Earth, when you squint so that you can make a fair appraisal of how things are bunched together or set apart, there are five (or six, depending on how picky you are about whether the Mediterranean is enough of a gap between Europe and the Middle East or not), but whatever you decide, it's definitely not seven. So that'd be North America, South America, Australia, Asia (including Europe, and possibly even including Africa as well since it isn't separate by much) and Antarctica.

I grew up recognising five continents (America, Asia, Africa, Australia and Antarctica), and that's where it stays as far as I am concerned.

Continents have always been defined by convention rather than any strict criteria:

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

By some of the logic used in this thread there are only 4 continents, America, Australia, Afro-Eurasia and Antarctica.

8 hours ago, Christopher Low said:

I disagree, but then I also disagree that Earth has seven continents

If we hadn’t done what we did at Panama and Suez, there could be an argument for three continents: America, Africa/Eurasia, Antarctica.

After the canals, late 19^th / early 20^th century Redneck geopolitics tried to force the notion of 7.
Europe was a continent: the Urals were where civilisation ended, and Oz was so far away as to be lucky to be classified at all.
New Zealand wasn’t thought about all that much either: but it is bigger than the UK.

But of course there are only five:

Interestingly around here we sit on a submerged continent called Zealandia. Once properly mapped it might be almost the size of Australia.
Being mineral-rich, it could cause us some discomfort in a resource-hungry future world.

 

Edited April 28, 20215 yr by WingZ