Wednesday, August 10, 2011

An Egregious Invasion of Jovian Privacy!

When I first heard that those poindexters down at NASA were planning to launch another one of their cornfangled probes at the planet Jupiter, I was concerned. We've bugged the giant planet quite a lot in recent decades, with those Voyager flybys and the Galileo intrusiveness.
But all of that pales in comparison to the interplanetary indignity of the Juno probe. This elliptically-orbiting robotic voyeur will literally be looking at Jupiter where the sun don't shine.

This outrage is simply outrageous!

If the planet Jupiter wanted us to see its poles, it would show them to us with a nice sideways orbit. Like Uranus. But the giant gas giant obviously values its privacy, keeping its nether regions far from the ecliptic.

When Juno arrives in July 2016, it will be taking the most invasive images of Jupiter ever made. Sure, these Jovian upskirt photos might tell us all about the planet's magnetosphere and internal structure and auroral activity, but the astronomical indecency is most definitely going to piss the gas giant off. Mark my words.

It's going to take the astrologers years, perhaps decades to atone for this iniquity. If they can calm Jupiter at all. After we've embarrassed the planet like this, we might just lose the protection of its gravity well forever. It may even decide to throw a few excess trojans at us, out of red-spotted spite.

If we manage to survive the coming apocalii in late 2011 and 2012, come 2016 our doom may be cooked!

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