> The Starlink satellites are clearly not responsible for the loss of the starry sky. That process has been underway for more than two centuries and has been the consequence of what are now much more mundane technologies that we hardly think of at all. But I began to think of the ambitions of the Starlink project as somehow amounting to a final twist of the knife. Perhaps this is a bit too dramatic a metaphor, but if we think that the loss of the star-filled night sky is a real and serious loss with significant if also difficult to quantify human consequences, then the final imposition of an artificial network of satellites where before the old celestial inheritance had been seems rather like being tossed cheap trinkets to compensate for the theft some precious treasure.
What's more important, pretty long exposure pictures taken from Earth or internet access? I say internet access. Space telescopes are the future of real astronomy important data comes from anyway.
I have internet access (I am from and live in Nigeria).
Nobody consulted me (or my country, or any of the countries it's purporting to help) about Starlink. Our input is of course never needed - why would it, when America (both the government and the companies) can simply decide what's good or not good for us instead?
In fairness, this is a deep-rooted bitterness that goes far beyond this one project. The sheer fact that an American company can just up and do things that impact the entire globe on a whim (and worse, the power the American government has to approve/"regulate" such projects as though only their citizens are impacted) is unbelievably absurd to me (see also: Facebook, etc).
Nigeria is a signatory of most space treaties other than the unpopular Moon Treaty. These treaties are in need of updates to reflect the current situation but none of that changes that what is going on now is within the stipulations of the treaties the signatories freely entered into.
The Starlink issue is only relevant to streaks on long exposure pictures. You can't see it with the naked eye. The ship has long sailed on general light pollution near urban centers. Nice if it can be reversed but going to unreasonable lengths to preserve everything how it was in the past is reminiscent of people who cover their furniture in plastic.
going to unreasonable lengths to preserve everything how it was in the past is reminiscent of people who cover their furniture in plastic.
Your comment is reminiscent of ageism.
It's also disingenuous to frame this as a "Starlink" problem. It's a Starlink problem plus the 13 other companies also trying to put 50,000 microsats in orbit, plus the 200 companies that will do it after them when prices come down.
In a couple of decades, we end up with millions of microsats in orbit, and by then there's nothing that can be done.
But as long as we can beam social media misinformation into the most remote corners of the planet, heaven and nature be damned.
"The ship has long sailed on general CO2 emissions from industrial societies. Nice if it can be reversed but going to unreasonable lengths to preserve everything how it was in the past is reminiscent of people who cover their furniture with plastic."
If we lose that essence of humanity where we feel wonder and awe looking up into the night sky, then we lose one of the prime movers of discovery and science. Or do you think cat videos can do the same?
> If we lose that essence of humanity where we feel wonder and awe looking up into the night sky, then we lose one of the prime movers of discovery and science.
Do we? Anecdotally, I grew up in the country and mostly didn't give the night sky a second thought, and yet have always been pretty obsessed with space-related fact and fiction.
Some cultural artifacts continue to exist because the experiences of past generations are passed down through teaching and stories. But if not restrengthened, they die out. Right now, we are zero or one generation away from large swaths of human population having interacted with the full night sky. What happens in two more generations when 99% of humans are able to see only a handful of starts at any given time? That is when you start losing, but at that point it is already too late.
Yes, I believe we do. I only need think of the math discovered solely to predict the stars to know that without the night sky, we are different. To say nothing of the poets.
Seeing satellites fly across the sky also fills me with wonder and awe. A tiny little metal bucket that we sent up there, relaying information, unfathomably far away. It's pretty amazing.
