The James Webb Space Telescope has launched!!

Zarathustra

https://www.space.com/james-webb-space-telescope-beyond-moon-orbit

This one definitely deserves a thread of its own! We now have a "new Hubble" in space. The JWST is now sailing past the moon and has successfully navigated its 2nd of 3 course corrections. The unfolding and deployment of the telescope will be tricky--absolutely no margin for error in 1000s of tiny steps. But after that we should be treated to an unprecedented view of the universe.

The JWST will not just look farther into space, and produce clearer images. This is no mere incremental improvement on Hubble. JWST will look farther back in time than we've ever looked, all the way back to the beginning of light itself, when the universe became transparent so that the light of the very first stars could propagate through the universe. This is literally as far as any telescope can look. As such, it will fill in a hole in our understanding of how the universe formed, showing us how the very first galaxies came together.

Because of red shift and the expansion of the universe, the light from this very early stage in the universe is completely red-shifted out of the visible spectrum, into the infrared. That's why Hubble--which looks at visible light--can't see it. The JWST only looks in infrared. This is a huge advantage over visible light, which is scattered by dust clouds. The JWST will be able to peer right through the obscuring dust of our galaxy, into the heart of the Milky Way (and other galaxies).

It will also possess high enough resolution to actually image the planets around other stars and see them in enough clarity to detect the elements in their atmospheres, so that we can SEE if there is life on other planets outside our solar system.

If there is life outside our solar system, the JWST will be able to see it!

Wow. This is an exciting time to be alive!
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Meaning is created internally by each individual in each specific life: any attempt at *meaning* which relies on some kind of external superstructure (God, Satan, the Creator, the Worm, whatever) for its substance misses the point (I mean the point of my story). -SRD

Remain faithful to the earth, my brothers, with the power of your virtue. Let your gift-giving love and your knowledge serve the meaning of the earth ... Do not let them fly away from earthly things and beat with their wings against eternal walls. Alas, there has always been so much virtue that has flown away. Lead back to the earth the virtue that flew away, as I do-back to the body, back to life, that it may give the earth a meaning, a human meaning. -Nietzsche

High Lord Tolkien · Posted: Wed Dec 29, 2021 3:40 am Post subject:

I had seen headlines and my sister was unusually excited about this telescope when it launched but I didn't know why.
Now I do, thanks to you.

Thumbs Up

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Fist and Faith · Posted: Wed Dec 29, 2021 4:25 am Post subject:

I only heard about this the other day. pretty incredible! Can't wait to see it in action!
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Still a man hears what he wants to hear
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Damelon · Posted: Wed Dec 29, 2021 4:21 pm Post subject:

What a project! I was watching an interview with one of the project managers a couple of weeks ago who said that there were around 300 different operations that had to work in order for the telescope to work. A true marvel of engineering.
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But the fact that some geniuses were laughed at does not imply that all who are laughed at are geniuses. They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the Wright brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown. ~ Carl Sagan

Zarathustra · Posted: Sat Jan 08, 2022 7:32 pm Post subject:

JWST has completed both the unfurling of its 5 layer heat shield and unfolded all of its 18 mirrors!

Now all that is left is getting it into L2 orbit and calibrating all of its mirrors to produce a coherent picture. This will take some months. First pictures are expected in June. But the entire team at NASA can now breathe easy. 25 years of work and $10 billion was not wasted! It deployed flawlessly.

On a side note, calibrating the mirrors requires motors that can adjust the mirrors to angles on the scale of a virus! And each mirror is polished so smooth that if you expanded the JWST to the size of our continent, the flaws in its smoothness would only rise to about your ankle!

It's amazing that we can do such things.
_________________
Meaning is created internally by each individual in each specific life: any attempt at *meaning* which relies on some kind of external superstructure (God, Satan, the Creator, the Worm, whatever) for its substance misses the point (I mean the point of my story). -SRD

Remain faithful to the earth, my brothers, with the power of your virtue. Let your gift-giving love and your knowledge serve the meaning of the earth ... Do not let them fly away from earthly things and beat with their wings against eternal walls. Alas, there has always been so much virtue that has flown away. Lead back to the earth the virtue that flew away, as I do-back to the body, back to life, that it may give the earth a meaning, a human meaning. -Nietzsche

Fist and Faith · Posted: Sun Jan 09, 2022 3:20 pm Post subject:

Even NASA is surprised by how well everything went.

Extraordinary stuff. Gotta love details like this:

Zarathustra · Posted: Sun Jan 09, 2022 4:19 pm Post subject:

They spent $10 billion on this. I’m sure they spared no expense. They probably have solar panels that would not be feasible for the mass market. Or the telescope doesn’t really use all that much energy.

Another interesting detail: the launch went so perfectly, they saved enough fuel to greatly extend its expected 10 year mission!

We could learn of extra terrestrial life this year!
_________________
Meaning is created internally by each individual in each specific life: any attempt at *meaning* which relies on some kind of external superstructure (God, Satan, the Creator, the Worm, whatever) for its substance misses the point (I mean the point of my story). -SRD

Remain faithful to the earth, my brothers, with the power of your virtue. Let your gift-giving love and your knowledge serve the meaning of the earth ... Do not let them fly away from earthly things and beat with their wings against eternal walls. Alas, there has always been so much virtue that has flown away. Lead back to the earth the virtue that flew away, as I do-back to the body, back to life, that it may give the earth a meaning, a human meaning. -Nietzsche

Fist and Faith · Posted: Mon Jan 10, 2022 12:04 am Post subject:

Learning of extraterrestrial life would be the ultimate, eh? Very Happy

_________________
All lies and jest
Still a man hears what he wants to hear
And disregards the rest -Paul Simon

SoulBiter · Posted: Mon Mar 21, 2022 1:17 pm Post subject:

Finding out that we are not alone in the universe and/or finding a habitable planet, could change everything about how we approach space and space travel and could give us even more reason to improve space innovation.
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Avatar · Posted: Wed Mar 23, 2022 10:43 am Post subject:

It would certainly reframe the whole nationalist / racist discussion if we're all humans together... Very Happy

--A
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balon! · Posted: Sat Jul 16, 2022 7:39 am Post subject:

Has anyone else seen the first batch of photos!? Beautiful and incredible and just so awesome. I've been waiting for these for so many years I was afraid it would never happen. Absolutely can't wait to keep checking for uploads. These are going to just keep getting better and better
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Zarathustra · Posted: Wed Aug 10, 2022 10:43 pm Post subject:

Hey Balon! I've been enjoying every pic since the first one on 7/11. They are still finding new discoveries in those first pictures! JWST is overturning our understanding of the universe faster than we can keep up. There are a lot of great Youtube videos explaining all the new discoveries.
_________________
Meaning is created internally by each individual in each specific life: any attempt at *meaning* which relies on some kind of external superstructure (God, Satan, the Creator, the Worm, whatever) for its substance misses the point (I mean the point of my story). -SRD

Remain faithful to the earth, my brothers, with the power of your virtue. Let your gift-giving love and your knowledge serve the meaning of the earth ... Do not let them fly away from earthly things and beat with their wings against eternal walls. Alas, there has always been so much virtue that has flown away. Lead back to the earth the virtue that flew away, as I do-back to the body, back to life, that it may give the earth a meaning, a human meaning. -Nietzsche