Naked Science Forum

Non Life Sciences => Physics, Astronomy & Cosmology => Topic started by: neilep on 18/09/2016 13:53:57

Title: How High Is Space ?
Post by: neilep on 18/09/2016 13:53:57
Dearest Science Peeps who Know Klevur stuff,


Space as ewe know was invented in 1924 by Mr Ray Cosmic, who was well and truly fed up of looking at clouds at night so he banged his head on the wall in a big way till he came up with the idea of Space.  Well done Ray. This is true because someone told me !

As a sheepy It's important to know such things as where space begins, ewe just never know when ewe might need that bit of info.So, as a firm believer in empirical study I climbed up the highest tree I could find and as ewe can see in the true non-doctored-bona-fide picture I made it into Space. I used my tape measure and I reckon, as confirmed by tapey measure that it's about 16cm to the edge of space.  I'm not entirely convinced because I've since heard that yellow tape measures  are proven to be inaccurate.

What someone else did tell me is that there is something called the Eggsopshere (probably because it's made from eggs) which 'chortle' apparently extends to something like 'guffaw' 300-500 miles LOLOLOL !!!....and that 'hysterical laughter' there is something that extends to even further maybe 10000 miles  ROFL !!!!!......

so,

HOW HIGH IS SPACE ?, where does true Space begin and atmospheric stuff from Earth end ?

Hugs et les shmishes

mwah mwah

neil
xxxxxxx

Space is big it's rather large
The bus fare there is quite a charge
Do what I did and save the fee
Look around and climb a tree






Title: Re: How High Is Space ?
Post by: alancalverd on 18/09/2016 22:44:45
Since there are bits of stuff hurtling around everywhere, it's most useful to define space as the region where the atmospheric friction on an orbiting body is negligible, or at least comparable with the probability of colliding with nonterrestrial molecules.   

This turns out to be about 100 miles up, the level at which meteors become visible and re-entering spacecraft ballistics invoke a drag factor. 
Title: Re: How High Is Space ?
Post by: neilep on 04/10/2016 18:47:32
Thank ewe alancalverd  but what of the exosphere which extends further ? would we not be still experiencing some form of earth influence whilst within the exosphere ?
Title: Re: How High Is Space ?
Post by: alancalverd on 04/10/2016 20:47:43
You can detect the effect of the earth's magnetic and gravitational fields a long way up, which is why the moon is where it is and we don't get fried by cosmic particles, so it all depends on what you mean by space. Beyond a couple of hundred miles, I think that any atom you come across is just as likely to have come from somewhere else as it is to have come from earth, which is the aerodynamic definition.