this post was submitted on 15 Jun 2024
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[–] [email protected] 20 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (11 children)

Yes the data is valuable for research. You and I may not understand any of it, but its useful to someone. As for repairing from a distance, that thing has been traveling for 46 years and gone far. For reference, it passed Neptune back in 1989.

It would take many years for a new probe to reach those distances, so if it can be repaired, it shall.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voyager_2

Hypothetically, lets say it only takes 30 years for a new probe with updated tech to reach where Voyager 2 is now. If V2 died today, thats half of someone's career spent waiting for the new probe to arrive. Multiply that by everyone using the probe for research and you have a ton of wasted potential.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 5 months ago (9 children)

I'm aware that sending something to do the repairs isn't an option, my question was whether it's worth it (and apparently it is) or if it's more an experiment about long distance repairs which by itself is very expressive already.

I'm not sure why I'm downvoted. Maybe I worded my question badly or it's because it was a question I could have googled on my own. I don't know and neither do I care. I don't think you downvoted me, if it sounded that way. Just now saw it and wondered why

[–] [email protected] 6 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

Remote software repairs are definatly good, pretty cool and worth bragging about. If you have to do a physical repair, you're probably better off just sending a new probe [citation needed], but as I said the time investment is huge.

It is a legitimate question, however the way it was asked has a negative vibe, intentional or not. You pretty much gave a good option and bad option and said "pick one" - generally when that's asked, we assume the asker assumes the negative is true (it's hard to explain). To me, it could be interpreted as "just curious, I assume this probe is only taking pretty pictures, so why do you bother repairing it?".

Personally, I've been trying to avoid jumping to those types of conclusions, but its not easy. Text has no tone, and phrases sometimes have a secondary tonal meanings that people will insert. "Just curious....was it you that didn't refill the coffee machine this morning?"

[–] [email protected] 4 points 5 months ago

Thanks, I'm not good at tone in my native language already and even less in English. I didn't give the comment much thought, I could have found a better phrasing.

About the coffee machine: I refilled it today so it must have been someone else who didn't

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