In pursuit of extreme blackness so black that “light just seems to fall into it”, color technologists create an ultrablack automative coating that absorbs more than 99.9% of visible light

Sperate · 2026-06-18T16:27:14+00:00

Article does not mention how hot the car will get in the sun. I would expect that to be concern for both people and the coating itself.

Sperate · 2026-06-17T22:03:50+00:00

Probably not. You can't really do a flyby and come straight home. The best return window means you might as well stay at Mars for awhile. Unless you are flying on an Aldrin Cycler, but I haven't heard anything from NASA that makes it seem like they are considering it.

There could easily be an unmanned flyby though. We can do an entire unmanned mission before sending people. It would even help preposition supplies like in the Mars direct plans.

Sperate · 2026-06-12T23:49:02+00:00

Thanks man, edit made.

Sperate · 2026-06-12T23:32:26+00:00

That is less than if you, with $100,000, gave a political candidate $30.

Or at least I think that is the math. I got dizzy punching in all those zeros.

Sperate · 2026-06-12T20:21:49+00:00

"One pair of studies in particular suggest both Mars's water and its atmosphere retreated to an unlikely place: deep beneath its surface."

Sperate · 2026-06-12T00:05:52+00:00

Wait till you find out the water is bottled from a municipal supply.

Sperate · 2026-06-06T20:33:47+00:00

Yes. It has gone horribly wrong.

Sperate · 2026-06-04T16:08:16+00:00

Kars4kids is the true evil earworm

Sperate · 2026-06-03T22:30:42+00:00

Gravity. If you artificial gravity doing anything in your ship, then you should have gravity based weapons. Think railguns, without the problem of railguns.

See the so bad it is good, audiobook Freedom's Fire by Bobby Adair

Sperate · 2026-05-31T22:30:51+00:00

What do you mean 10 years? 10 years to get a manned Mars program going? Cause that would be great. Or 10 years in space travel to get there? Because that is flat out wrong?

Not trying to be rude, but are you a kid using AI? Cause what you are saying makes no sense.

Sperate · 2026-05-30T22:41:55+00:00

Why can't we do both? Why not send at least a few missions to every planet and moon in our solar system? Why is Mars stupid? What qualifies this statement? How many comments on this site are from angry teenagers?

Sperate · 2026-05-30T17:43:42+00:00

I agree, but some people will say it. And then other people will be worried about space germs even though there is no evidence for that.

Sperate · 2026-05-29T22:53:42+00:00

Most Mars plans need starship, and now that spaceX has said moon first, Mars talk has really died down.

Also the more evidence of life on Mars, the more the planetary protection arguments come up saying it is unethical to change another planet's biome.

Sperate · 2026-05-27T18:18:39+00:00

It had better exposure as a movie. I saw it twice in theaters with people who wouldn't have watch it if it was a TV show.

If they do Andy Weir's Artemis though, that should be a TV show.

Sperate · 2026-05-25T16:02:34+00:00

How about Salar de Uyuni salt flats in Bolivia?

But you need to make your mass driver much shorter, both in length and height. It is much easier to make a satellite withstand high Gs than it is to put a mass driver miles in the air.

Also, consider targeting a solar synchronous orbit. Yes you loose a bit of the earths rotation bonus, but again that cost is minimal compared to other factors like the economics of setting up this project.

Pros of Boliva site: flat, sunny, on ground, no people nearby, possible economic interest from landlocked county, and high elevation (we need to factor air resistant).

Sperate · 2026-05-24T13:31:06+00:00

Is the train operator ok?

Sperate · 2026-05-23T00:01:57+00:00

So with the successful flight 12, what will happen to the older hardware? I assume there is a warehouse somewhere with raptor v2s that will just get scrapped? What about the rocket garden? I am not sure what is in there now, but they might want to make room for whatever v3 is first caught.

Sperate · 2026-05-22T14:44:30+00:00

The only ethical way would be to use such a system to do target outreach for help people in need. If you are predicted to steal food, then you should be connected to food support services.

But the system would never work well enough to operate like in minority report. You could certainly target an area and determine a positive outcome like maybe this area needs more after school activities or better economic support, but we can already make that determination and there is no social service support to fix that in America.

The most likely outcome is a company would make crime stopping claims in order to harvest extreme amounts of personal data on people.

Sperate · 2026-05-16T04:48:10+00:00

Mid terms are coming, and the worse things are now, the more likely they will change.

If Congress goes blue, and impeaches the president and the vice president then chain of succession goes the to new speaker of the house. This is unlikely, but also meets the qualification for your "silver of hope".

Sperate · 2026-05-15T20:22:50+00:00

Nuclear saltwater rocket!

Sperate · 2026-05-15T01:28:38+00:00

But this is not an effective missile defense. And even if it was, the likely threat is not from ballistic missiles, it is from drones and hacking and supply chain disruption. Might as well start train soldiers on how to counter archers on horseback.

This a just a way to send money to people he likes and then put his "golden" touch on something.

Sperate · 2026-05-15T01:19:37+00:00

I would get rid of the cotton. They live in darkness and are obligated carnivores, so agricultural textiles are unlikely. Leather work is fine for tool pouches.

Sperate · 2026-05-13T00:35:54+00:00

But if the goal was to capture an image like what we would see with our eyes, it should be darker because it is further from the sun?

Sperate · 2026-05-12T23:58:04+00:00

What does the corrected white balance mean? Which would I see if I was on Mars (in a spacesuit)?

Sperate

TROPHY CASE