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How big are Honorverse Asteroid Belts?

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Re: How big are Honorverse Asteroid Belts?
Post by Grashtel   » Sat Jun 14, 2014 9:32 pm

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Lord Skimper wrote:Latest hypothesis is that the asteroid belt is a captured nebula where most of the material was sucked into the sun. Obviously nobody knows where it came from.

Are you referring to the Nebular Hypothosis? Because if so you are completely misinterpreting it
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Re: How big are Honorverse Asteroid Belts?
Post by SWM   » Mon Jun 16, 2014 1:52 pm

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Lord Skimper wrote:Latest hypothesis is that the asteroid belt is a captured nebula where most of the material was sucked into the sun. Obviously nobody knows where it came from.

What they do know it that it is nothing like it is portrayed in the movies. A few large pieces some smaller ones and a hole lot of dust. Kind of like the rings of saturn or perhaps one should say the ring of Sol?

Makes one wonder if Jupiters and Saturn rings are related to it.

[putting on planetary scientist hat]
Where do you get this idea?

In answer to your last question, no, the rings of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune were all created by different processes than the asteroid belt. (Actually, there are at least three different processes involved in forming those ring systems, for different planets.)
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Re: How big are Honorverse Asteroid Belts?
Post by SWM   » Mon Jun 16, 2014 2:00 pm

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Cheopis wrote:How big the belts are is pretty unimportant. The useful material content is what matters.

If an asteroid belt is formed by accretion of minerals that never formed a planet, it might have very few dense collections of heavier minerals.

If a planet formed, minerals settled, and than the planet was catastrophically torn apart somehow to form an asteroid belt, then there might be some very high concentrations of dense minerals present.

Earth's asteroid belt is something of a mystery. We know very little about it, how it was formed, and what the useful mineral content might be. We know enough to understand that there's potential for industry in the asteroid belt, with no doubt.

Not true. We know quite about about the overall composition of the asteroid belt--which tells us how much total iron we could find there, for instance. What we don't know is how it is distributed. We don't know where to find concentrations of specific elements, or how abundant such concentrations might be. But overall total amounts, we have a good handle on.

As Namelessfly says, the percentage of heavier elements (including most metals) in the asteroids is actually higher (on average) than in the Earth's crust. Much of the metal in the Earth sank to the center, leaving the crust metal-poor. So the crust is depleted in heavier elements relative to the average in the original planetary disc.
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Re: How big are Honorverse Asteroid Belts?
Post by wastedfly   » Mon Jun 16, 2014 9:55 pm

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I would not state emphatically anything about the core of our planet, the asteroid belt(s) or rings on planets with any authority. Every other year a new "hypothesis" gets trotted out. Why? Because we simply do not have more than a couple clues. Are we utterly clueless? No. But, do we know enough for any certainty.

Saying we have more than a single clue about Saturn's rings is frankly laughable at this point.

:lol:
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Re: How big are Honorverse Asteroid Belts?
Post by Lord Skimper   » Mon Jun 16, 2014 10:23 pm

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It's a theory and as all philosophers know scientists hold theories as facts.

Theories are educated guesses.

Facts are true knowledgeable beliefs.

This is why String Theory is a Theory, and not a fact.

The Big Bang Theory is a Theory, and not a fact.

Not all facts stay facts either. They get modified and changed. Often modified by theories.
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Re: How big are Honorverse Asteroid Belts?
Post by SWM   » Mon Jun 16, 2014 10:51 pm

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wastedfly wrote:I would not state emphatically anything about the core of our planet, the asteroid belt(s) or rings on planets with any authority. Every other year a new "hypothesis" gets trotted out. Why? Because we simply do not have more than a couple clues. Are we utterly clueless? No. But, do we know enough for any certainty.

Saying we have more than a single clue about Saturn's rings is frankly laughable at this point.

:lol:

I'm not sure what you are saying. Sure, there are new hypotheses about planetary creation every so often. But that has nothing to do with the measured ratios of elements which we have observed in the asteroids and meteors. We DO have a pretty good idea how much material and what kind of material can be found in the asteroid belt, and those values have not been changing with every hypothesis. Instead, the hypotheses must conform to the observations.

Similarly, we have numerous observations of Saturn's rings from flyby missions, and from occultations. My own research group gathered some of that data. Yes, I can say emphatically that we know quite a bit about Saturn's rings.
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Re: How big are Honorverse Asteroid Belts?
Post by wastedfly   » Mon Jun 16, 2014 10:58 pm

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Observations, about. How came to be... Not a clue. How prevalent in the galaxy? Not a clue. Ergo the discussion at hand and how relevant to the Honorverse.

In short, can postulate anything one wishes as we know so little it is embarrassing.

SWM wrote:
wastedfly wrote:I would not state emphatically anything about the core of our planet, the asteroid belt(s) or rings on planets with any authority. Every other year a new "hypothesis" gets trotted out. Why? Because we simply do not have more than a couple clues. Are we utterly clueless? No. But, do we know enough for any certainty.

Saying we have more than a single clue about Saturn's rings is frankly laughable at this point.

:lol:

I'm not sure what you are saying. Sure, there are new hypotheses about planetary creation every so often. But that has nothing to do with the measured ratios of elements which we have observed in the asteroids and meteors. We DO have a pretty good idea how much material and what kind of material can be found in the asteroid belt, and those values have not been changing with every hypothesis. Instead, the hypotheses must conform to the observations.

Similarly, we have numerous observations of Saturn's rings from flyby missions, and from occultations. My own research group gathered some of that data. Yes, I can say emphatically that we know quite a bit about Saturn's rings.
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Re: How big are Honorverse Asteroid Belts?
Post by SWM   » Mon Jun 16, 2014 11:12 pm

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wastedfly wrote:Observations, about. How came to be... Not a clue. How prevalent in the galaxy? Not a clue. Ergo the discussion at hand and how relevant to the Honorverse.

In short, can postulate anything one wishes as we know so little it is embarrassing.

Prevalent in the galaxy? We've been talking about the asteroid belt in our Solar System, about which we know quite a bit. And I should know, because I am the one who made the claim that the asteroid belt in our Solar System has enough material to build billions of superdreadnoughts. Please reread the thread.

[edit]As for how the asteroid belt came to be, no one has said that we know how it came to be. And that is irrelevant to the discussion of using the asteroid belt for raw materials, anyway. So I'm not sure why you are bringing it up.[/edit]
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Re: How big are Honorverse Asteroid Belts?
Post by wastedfly   » Mon Jun 16, 2014 11:29 pm

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SWM wrote:Prevalent in the galaxy? We've been talking about the asteroid belt in our Solar System, about which we know quite a bit. And I should know, because I am the one who made the claim that the asteroid belt in our Solar System has enough material to build billions of superdreadnoughts. Please reread the thread.

[edit]As for how the asteroid belt came to be, no one has said that we know how it came to be. And that is irrelevant to the discussion of using the asteroid belt for raw materials, anyway. So I'm not sure why you are bringing it up.[/edit]


Erm, oops missed something early on. :oops:

Yea, billions of SD's worth for the Sol Asteroid belt. Not going to run out of materials any time soon.
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Re: How big are Honorverse Asteroid Belts?
Post by Annachie   » Tue Jun 17, 2014 1:08 am

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Lord Skimper wrote:It's a theory and as all philosophers know scientists hold theories as facts.

Theories are educated guesses.

Facts are true knowledgeable beliefs.

This is why String Theory is a Theory, and not a fact.

The Big Bang Theory is a Theory, and not a fact.

Not all facts stay facts either. They get modified and changed. Often modified by theories.


Have you ever actually studied philosophy or science?
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