Timeline for What can the KSP game actually teach about spaceflight and orbital mechanics, and what are its limitations?
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
22 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Jan 23, 2020 at 21:10 | comment | added | Emil Bode | Obligatory 2nd xkcd reference | |
| Sep 5, 2017 at 0:33 | comment | added | Matt Lacey | "It makes you ponder engineering challenges" Usually immediately before trying to land on the Mun. | |
| Sep 2, 2017 at 2:39 | comment | added | uhoh | @Shane similarly to my comment to Darren (above), if there is still some room to expand on the "intuition" aspect not completely addressed by other answers, consider adding an answer expanding on that? | |
| Sep 2, 2017 at 2:38 | comment | added | uhoh | @Darren Reading the phrase "...apply the knowledge in an improvisatory way in chaotic situations." was an aha! moment for me. While situations like that are not currently happening (to my knowledge) very often, the future is another question entirely. Analogous to aviation where air traffic controllers and pilots rely on intuition when encountering and reacting to complex situations, future space "situational awareness" needs 3D intuition about trajectories in gravity fields. If it's not covered yet, maybe you can expand on that in an answer? | |
| Sep 1, 2017 at 19:58 | comment | added | Shane | tl;dr version In the 60s NASA engineers could do ALL the math. But without the intuition of seeing how that math actually applies to real life, the math was useless to dock. KSP is phenomenal at providing this intuition. | |
| Sep 1, 2017 at 18:42 | comment | added | Darren | @uhoh It's one thing to be "book smart" about a subject, able to answer even the most esoteric questions, but it's quite another matter to be "street smart" and be able to broadly apply the knowledge in an improvisatory way in chaotic situations. There's also a huge difference between a few top scientists who dedicated their lives to understanding something having a grasp of it, and everyone in the control room having that grasp. | |
| Aug 31, 2017 at 15:24 | comment | added | Polygnome | @uhoh Aldrins thesis about orbital rendezvous - which turned out to be an important cornerstone for NASA - is from 1963, just two years prior. So I think its at least probably that not everyone was familiar with it. I think they were knowledgeable about orbital mechanics, but the quote is about rendezvous - which can be very counter-intuitive. Aldrins thesis is about exactly that factor ;) I think its more that they didn't have the proper procedures, not that they couldn't figure it out in theory. They would probably have absolutely loved a simulator like KSP just to learn procedures ;) | |
| Aug 31, 2017 at 10:50 | comment | added | riodoro1 | Not only docking and rendezvous are good examples but also the reaction control system. Right now kids are comfortable piloting their lunar landers without atmosphere, back in the 60's NASA had to build the Iron Cross | |
| Aug 31, 2017 at 10:23 | comment | added | Weckar E. | 1. Not just kids. Many adults play and enjoy this game. 2. Mods can add to the realism factor, allowing for advanced flight planning, delta-v management and improved physics. | |
| S Aug 31, 2017 at 8:27 | history | suggested | Rob | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
Explain the acronym CG, and small grammar improvements
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| Aug 31, 2017 at 7:21 | review | Suggested edits | |||
| S Aug 31, 2017 at 8:27 | |||||
| Aug 31, 2017 at 5:44 | comment | added | uhoh | @Antzi I see. Well the Wikipedia passage seems to be fairly well supported, so I guess it really is possible that with everything going on in 1965, someone had not thought this through because they were too busy doing something else, and not having thought something through might be construed as not understanding. But if you stopped someone in the hall and asked them "True or false, to change from one orbit to another orbit, all I have to do is point where I want to be and push go, right?" most engineers wouldn't agree. | |
| Aug 31, 2017 at 5:33 | comment | added | Antzi | @uhoh to be fair, the quote is only about rendez vous and docking, not about the rest. | |
| Aug 31, 2017 at 4:53 | comment | added | uhoh | @Polygnome can you point to even one example? How familliar are you with what NASA engineers did and did not know about orbital mechanics in 1965? I think this will turn out to be false, but it would be really interesting to be proven wrong. If you'd like me to ask a question about it to give you more space to answer, let me know. (People like Lyapunov and Oberth were born in the late 1800's for example, Lagrange in the 1700's). | |
| Aug 30, 2017 at 20:45 | comment | added | Polygnome | "Kids playing KSP now have a better understanding of orbital mechanics than NASA engineers and astronauts from 1965." This is probbly true, and absolutely amazing when you think about it. | |
| Aug 30, 2017 at 16:08 | history | edited | Nathan Tuggy | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
Fixed spelling/grammar; formatted; fixed mis-assertion
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| Aug 30, 2017 at 15:05 | comment | added | JiK | The failed rendezvous was Gemini 4, not Gemini 6, says Wikipedia. | |
| Aug 30, 2017 at 12:49 | comment | added | DarkDust | Obligatory XKCD | |
| Aug 30, 2017 at 10:31 | history | edited | Antzi | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
added 421 characters in body
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| Aug 30, 2017 at 6:05 | history | edited | Antzi | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
added 406 characters in body
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| Aug 30, 2017 at 4:49 | comment | added | uhoh | Wow, that was fast! This is a well written and knowledgeable answer; this is clearly something you've thought about before. | |
| Aug 30, 2017 at 4:33 | history | answered | Antzi | CC BY-SA 3.0 |