Fascinating local radio program today: "A Professional Taste Tester Tells All"

[xanalog]

I've had the youtube ArtemisII Live mission coverage on, since the launch.
I am coming to the conclusion that it seems like a 10-day safari to the DSotM, in an old LandRover(SeriesII), with 4 of your "closest" friends.
And those mission-control commentators -using HRT/upspeak- have gotten annoying enough that I mute them out.

 

[mhardy6647]

They have definitely been talking up the context of the trip.

I would like to hear one commentator say. Hey, look. We just repeated something we could do relatively routinely* over 50 years ago!

________
* Apollo missions 8 to 17, with one Oops.

 

[Timcognito]

I would like to hear one commentator say. Hey, look. We just repeated something we could do relatively routinely* over 50 years ago!

Hey I often think about surfing again after a forty year hiatus from something I did 3-4 time a week. The thought of what could happen and a good chance would happen prevents me from doing it. NASA is using all new tech, equipment and astronauts but yeah an unmanned ship could do what they are doing now.

 

[mhardy6647]

Hey I often think about surfing again after a forty year hiatus from something I did 3-4 time a week. The thought of what could happen and a good chance would happen prevents me from doing it. NASA is using all new tech, equipment and astronauts but yeah an unmanned ship could do what they are doing now.

But "they" are saying that cameras aren't as good as human eyeballs (and that grey goo processor they use), though.

 

[xanalog]

Would I be wrong in my opinion that faster, cheaper, .... and w/better accommodations, could have been had; if we had just let that [ahem...] other guy w/bigger visions/aspirations to have at it?
Going beyond the moon seems (2 brown-bag) tacky, when you are traveling in a Yugo!

 

[mhardy6647]

Remember what I said (from NPR and other media) about eyeballs vs. cameras?
Revisionist history moves really fast in the Information Age!

source: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive...nasa.html?nl=from-the-times&segment_id=217874

oy vey.

 

[xanalog]

I've recently read that the four travelers were trained on some iceberg to hone their live, descriptive explanations of what they were seeing, so that they were prepared.
You had to hear it live, where the crew members were being congratulated for being so detailed.
Yes, they had to play musical-chairs [screen time?].

 

[mhardy6647]

yeah... I am kind of befuddled by the whole Artemis thing. I mean, I was big into space in the 1960s, as was (virtually) all of my generation.
Toto, I don't think we're in the '60s [any more]...

 

[xanalog]

Toto, I don't think we're in the '60s [any more]...

Dorothy, Toto, you and me may not be but Houston has not moved an "!

 

[pablolie]

wow wasn't expecting this topic to take the Artemis twist... how does that make sense?

 

[xanalog]

wow wasn't expecting this topic to take the Artemis twist... how does that make sense?

To me, I am on the live (audio/video) link to Artemis/Orion since launch; so I would like your mercy, Sir!

 

[pablolie]

To me, I am on the live (audio/video) link to Artemis/Orion since launch; so I would like your mercy, Sir!

All I can say is that - rationally or not I hang on to it and I find it super exciting.

 

[mhardy6647]

wow wasn't expecting this topic to take the Artemis twist... how does that make sense?

It only came up here because I heard one of those "human senses are more discerning than technology" claims on both NPR & the BBC yesterday:

Artemis II has 10 science objectives for the flyby. One is to observe color variations on the lunar surface. Changes in color can indicate the composition of the minerals on the surface. These changes are hard to detect with satellite images.

"This is something that human eyes are just incredibly good at teasing out nuances about," said Young.

source: https://www.npr.org/2026/04/06/nx-s1-5773187/nasa-artemis-ii-moon-lunar-flyby
... and then, today, NYT published this:

source: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive...nasa.html?nl=from-the-times&segment_id=217874

Which left me... a little... confused.

Eyes or cameras? Which is (ahem, are) better? I.e., do we need human eyes in space?

Do we need noses sniffing the effluent from GC-mass specs? Do we need ears listening to loudspeakers?

 

[xanalog]

It only came up here because I heard one of those "human senses are more discerning than technology" claims on both NPR & the BBC yesterday:

That is not true, @pablolie,
He originally came here to advertise for his state's maple syrup.
gulp.gif

 

[mhardy6647]

That is not true, @pablolie,
He originally came here to advertise for his state's maple syrup.
gulp.gif

Well. there is a heated rivalry between NH and VT vis-a-vis maple syrup.
And then there are the Canadians... but I certainly don't want to get into international politics.

Our daughter's father-in-law* flew on a space shuttle mission in the 1990s -- just to tie this all up into a nice Gordian knot.


___________________
* or our son-in-law's father -- the two expressions are mathematically equivalent.

 

[JeffS7444]

Our daughter's father-in-law* flew on a space shuttle mission in the 1990s -- just to tie this all up into a nice Gordian knot.

Did he say anything about the underside of the world, and whether it's really turtles all the way down?

 

[JeffS7444]

I like to think that some of the bad or puzzling current events could wind up having useful, if unintended, side-effects. For example, what if:

Increased energy uncertainty -> Accelerated adoption of renewable energy.
Moon/Mars missions -> Greater prestige and funding for scientific endeavors. (Can't wait to see India do it for a fraction of the price though)

One can hope.

 

[xanalog]

You are thinking BIG;

Increased energy uncertainty...

But to not get in trouble you have to start your post with:
"While I was listening to FM radio, I heard that...[for example and while thinking small]...":

The Xi-cc-plus (Ξcc⁺) is a newly discovered heavy proton-like particle confirmed at CERN's Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in March 2026, composed of two charm quarks and one down quark.

See, how that works?

 

[GGroch]

-- but the notion (claim) that a human nose can be a more sensitive detector than a quadrupole MS (EDIT: umm... mass spectrometer -- I reckon most know what an MS is, but maybe not everybody ) caught my attention.

Thanks for this, it surprised me too. Looking further into the topic, Desrochers is correct, the physiology of human smell/taste is quite sensitive, as is human eyesight compared to most animals, our hearing is much less comparatively sensitive. In all cases, the quality of the "sensor" is just half of the story. Desrocher's methods, involving years of training, widely spacing taste tests and cleansing the palate with tomato juice does not simulate normal taste/smell experience.

The "processor" (predictive brain) is the other half of the story. An accurate sensor does not ensure accurate assessment. A 2008 study (since repeated many times) of test subjects were served glasses of identical wine but told one was cheap/box and the other was fine vintage, consistently chose the expensive one as far superior, and were able to describe in detail the differences they tasted. Brain scans showed the subjects were indeed experiencing far more pleasure from the identical "expensive" sample, it was not imagined, or rather, all sensed experience IS imagined. Desrochers has spent years fine tuning his processor to curb bias and more closely match objective reality.

 

[Keith_W]

In Hells Kitchen, some professional chefs can't identify common food items blind. Think you could do any better? I asked this question at my dinner party a few years ago. My guests got nearly all the items correct.