Re: Questions (Space)

Ric Locke <warlocke@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Tina Hall wrote:

[...]

How are signals transported through space? I know radio bounces
around in the atmosphere (another one of those vague snippets), and
there's nothing to bounce in space. The folks that went to the moon
had contact with earth, so how did the data get from there to here?
(Link to simple information also welcome.)

I'm sorry, I don't have any links.

That's fine. Some people just like to dump links on me, and for this I'd
even reboot and look at sites. :) (My usual answer to such is known to
at least some people, so I add that it's welcome whenever it is.)

Light and radio are the same thing;

Hang on there; huh?

the general term is "electromagnetic radiation".

So you mean that it's in the same broad category, not that a radio
starts playing music if someone points a torch at its antenna.

(Electromagnetic radiation is something I can't picture.)

Radio gets here from the moon the same way light does -- in straight
lines, through spacetime.

Waves? Those things with frequency in Hertz? (I can follow that, even
that light and radio look the same, perhaps with different frequencies,
but I can't wrap my mind around the idea that what lights stuff so I can
see it is the same that is transmitted by radio.)

You only need to "bounce" radio, or light, when there's something in
the way (perhaps a planet, such as the one you're standing on) and you
need to get it around the corner.

Makes sense.

You can't see the moon from everywhere on Earth at once, so the space
guys have radio receivers scattered around that are connected to
telephone lines. Whichever receiving station can see the moon can
also receive radio from there, so it receives the signals and
converts them to a telephone call back to HQ. Sometimes the receiving
stations are satellites, but the concept is the same.

Interesting.

And radio waves don't really "bounce" off the atmosphere. That's a
simplification sometimes used as jargon;

Which is just right for me. Get any more complicated and I am lost. I
need something I can picture. Shapeless theories and naked formulas
produce no image, and thus no comprehension.

people also say "hop" for the same concept.

Well, I chose 'bounce' because it sounds funny. (Think flummy. I don't
think the actual signal is anywhere ball shaped, not even a tiny dot
kind.) I could have said 'reflects back from' or something else. :)

The reality is much more complicated. I can try to explain if you
like, but it may be too much information.

If you can create a coherent image without complicated words. I doubt
that that's likely, though. (The path of comprehensive explaining
something to me is very narrow, the chance is much bigger that you miss,
I get a headache trying to understand, and both end up frustrated.)

Right now I picture a wave, which looks out of place if I mentally place
that 'bouncing' off the atmosphere, or even just travelling straight,
because I don't think it physically moves that way (instead of
straight). But I can imagine (and understand) a current getting bigger
and smaller (also a wave), I just don't know what it is that gets bigger
and smaller with the radio thing (or even just sound, what it is that
hits the ear and does something in it so I interpret it as sound).

My main interest is a signal in space.

For the aliens I'd like one that's sort of stationary, covering a
certain (very, very large) area (a thick-shelled sphere, no signal
inside, no signal outside). (The weird theory thing that needn't be
humanly doable. Better understanding would of course be an advantage.
Not that I need to write an explanation, the characters aren't supposed
to find out the mechanics behind it anyway, it's just some mysterious
alien thing. But I'd like some kind of alien signal type. :) )

This 'how did they send something from the moon' is for the spacefaring
human crew. I assume that travels at the speed of light. Not because you
say it's the same (I still don't get that), but it's one of those
snippets floating around in my head.

Anyway. Thanks! :)

--
Tina
WIP: Space: 1123 words
WISuspension: Seasons & Elements trilogy | Magic Earth series
Posted to Usenet newsgroup rec.arts.sf.composition.

.

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