The Titanic is on a perpetual news cycle. How every decade it somehow manages to make news is interesting.
woleium 9 days ago [-]
i like the story about how it was found. The search was cover for a secret military operation, and they kinda actually found it by mistake after the mission:
I'm curious why there aren't drone cameras that can explore the interior.
shadowgovt 10 days ago [-]
Undersea drones are a remarkably (and fascinatingly!) complex field.
Ignoring all the mechanical challenges (airtight, watertight machine that can operate under crushing pressures and still has a way to separate delicate, saltwater-sensitive electronics and actuators from external-facing motive devices), the communications are also a challenge: radio does awful under water (VLF can go 100 feet, but now you're trying to control something inside the Titanic with radio signals that bounce off all the still-existent metal in wild ways; problem is a bit harder than "get full WiFi coverage of your house"). Sound would actually probably be a great tool, but sound also behaves strangely under water that deep. The most well-researched, well-tested solution is a long cable back to the control ship, but that constrains how deep you can get into the Titanic (one idea I've never seen floated: attach a fleet of robots to the cable, a main one for exploration and observation and multiple wire-managers who's full job is to anchor to something and manage the cable slack... But now you're anchoring to the wreck, so that's also not good).
Fully-autonomous robots might actually be the best option here, and the only thing stopping that is the actual research and development to build a machine that can make independent decisions exploring an environment with unknown shapes, dangerous sharp edges, and possible currents, in full 3D. We've put more research into rovers on Mars than into this problem.
WalterBright 10 days ago [-]
Since there are already submersibles and cameras that work at that depth, that cuts down the size of the problem space quite a bit.
bluGill 10 days ago [-]
> exploring an environment with unknown shapes, dangerous sharp edges,
We know the original blueprints. We can program that into a robot, along with existing known differences. Then the robot needs to just detect anything that isn't like expected and photograph it and return. After a few rounds of that you would get most of the interesting areas explored.
Currents are handled just by comparing expected return signals to what you really see.
OF course worth it is questionable.
The above fails in the general case only because generally in navigation we also have safety considerations. Your self driving car cannot run over a child no matter what. However there is much less to worry about in the Titanic. (don't confuse that with this is easy, only that if you don't worry about safety it is much easier)
Anything you're remotely sending down there is going to be attached to a long wire and rather big. Also navigating tight spaces underwater can be challenging even for a human, in person. Navigating them with a brick remotely is much harder.
Some setups have smaller ROVs launched from another submersible, like ROV ROBIN.
snickerbockers 10 days ago [-]
Take your pick:
* Difficult to navigate in a narrow underwater structure without crashing
* Signal penetration, or lack thereof, in an iron hull at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean
* Extremely niche technology that would have few practical uses in other contexts since most of the seabed does not suffer from the same complexities as a shipwreck
* Can't see for shit underwater in general
* We already know whats down there and why it's down there, therefore unlikely to lead to significant new information
* This could actually be considered desecrating a mass grave under maritime law
shadowgovt 10 days ago [-]
One does wonder precisely how many decades (or centuries) have to pass before "desecrating a mass grave" becomes "archaeology" (... "he ruminates while thinking about that fascinating Pompeii exhibit that toured through town one year...").
throwup238 10 days ago [-]
It's not usually time based. Some countries have laws like NAGPRA in the US that protect the graves of specific groups regardless of age but otherwise it's a very fuzzy line to draw. The two extremes are:
- If the polity that the person belonged to still exists, then it's a very sensitive issue - like US civil war graves. Likewise if there is a clear cultural continuity - for example France's first republic to the modern era. Both of which are themselves fuzzy criteria but largely fall into the desecration camp (although there are exceptions, not all cultures view it as taboo when done for scientific/historical purposes).
- If neither the polity nor the culture - often delineated by writing system or state apparatus or other semi-arbitrary line - still exist then the grave is pretty much fair game ethically speaking (legally it depends on the jurisdiction).
That fuzziness in the middle is very problematic but modern archaeologists have a whole process for reaching out to governments and getting consent from any descendant communities if applicable, and then coming up with an ethical plan to rebury/preserve the remains afterwards. IME the majority of such communities are very cooperative because it helps them answer questions about their past.
snickerbockers 10 days ago [-]
oh man, idk if you've ever been to the metropolitan museum of art in NYC, but they have dozens, maybe even hundreds, of dead bodies that were removed from their burial sites without consulting any next-of-kin (not that you'd be able to figure out who that is) on display in glass cases. But apparently its alright since nobody's left to argue on behalf of whatever pagan religion or cult they participated in.
bluGill 10 days ago [-]
There is a museum near me with an Egyptian mummy on display and notes that the Egyptian government now wants it back even though it was legally bought from Egypt 100+ years ago. Last I heard it wasn't going back, but I suspect just a matter of time.
mschuster91 10 days ago [-]
> even though it was legally bought from Egypt 100+ years ago
One might ask - particularly in a colonial history case - if that "legal purchase" was made under fair conditions and not by exerting undue pressure, as it often happened.
ahmeneeroe-v2 10 days ago [-]
Cultivating unfair conditions and exerting pressure is just good negotiation.
The modern Egyptian government doesn't actually want mummies back, they just want to get paid again. They are going to use various means at their disposal to get paid once more. Which is "fair" in the All's fair in love and war sense.
> Cultivating unfair conditions and exerting pressure is just good negotiation.
I heavily disagree. Bullying may work in a short term but in the mid to long term it can have disastrous consequences - we're seeing this play out right now with the US government and all its major allies looking for a way out and divesting from the US.
Decades worth of "soft power" building effort and hundreds of thousands of lives lost in various wars (WW2 alone >400k!), for nothing, all gone in the space of a few months.
shadowgovt 10 days ago [-]
An interesting counter-example is the Museum of Us in Balboa Park, San Diego. They have on display a Mexican mummy (if memory serves, naturally dessicated by a desert burial) that was smuggled across the border from Mexico to the US. At some point, the museum got in touch with Mexican authorities and agreed to repatriation. However, the museum they've worked with in Mexico doesn't really have use for the exhibit, so it's on indefinite loan to the Museum of Us with full understanding that this is a generous privilege provided by the museum in Mexico and the people of the nation.
... All in all, a quite excellent win-win negotiation to mutually-agreeable conclusion, it seems.
WalterBright 9 days ago [-]
In the Ye Olde Curiosity Shop in Seattle, there's a mummy of a cowboy on display that was found in the desert. He died of a gunshot wound. Nobody knows who he was.
refulgentis 10 days ago [-]
I think they're just throwing answers out they would find plausible.
That never made sense to me. Massive efforts are made to retrieve bodies from airplane crashes, sunk boats, collapsed buildings, etc. Why is recovery from some other disaster sites "desecration"?
refulgentis 9 days ago [-]
It's not, its an internet comment with a laymen throwing shit at the wall and seeing what sticks for conversation's sake.
i.e. Thought experiment: in their comment, s/maritime law/aviation law. In your comment s/airplane crashes/sunken ships. It's the same calorie-free conversation with just as much basis in reality.
Lammy 10 days ago [-]
> * Extremely niche technology that would have few practical uses in other contexts since most of the seabed does not suffer from the same complexities as a shipwreck
One of those rare occasions where I can't possibly just salute an excellent comment with a mere upvote. Superbly balanced effort, each bullet point equally devastating and perfectly expressed.
refulgentis 10 days ago [-]
You have inspired me to do a quick Fisk-ing, in homage to rationality, remaining tethered to reality, and preferring some research before free-associating, if only to avoid information pollution.
(note: we can quickly discover footage from inside the Titanic that obviates all these points. Here, we endeavor to cover this from an angle of how you could detect the arguments presented were weak, without that knowledge)
* Difficult to navigate in a narrow underwater structure without crashing
Passenger ship? Too narrow for a drone?
* Signal penetration, or lack thereof, in an iron hull at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean
Wireless signals aren't used for companion submersibles.
* Extremely niche technology that would have few practical uses in other contexts since most of the seabed does not suffer from the same complexities as a shipwreck
The seabed does not have any tight spaces?
* Can't see for shit underwater in general
We are commenting on an article that reconstructed a massive ship as a 3D model via photographs underwater
* We already know whats down there and why it's down there, therefore unlikely to lead to significant new information
We are commenting on an article that reconstructed the ship from the exterior despite this same factor applying.
* This could actually be considered desecrating a mass grave under maritime law
https://spyscape.com/article/how-the-titanic-was-discovered-...
Ignoring all the mechanical challenges (airtight, watertight machine that can operate under crushing pressures and still has a way to separate delicate, saltwater-sensitive electronics and actuators from external-facing motive devices), the communications are also a challenge: radio does awful under water (VLF can go 100 feet, but now you're trying to control something inside the Titanic with radio signals that bounce off all the still-existent metal in wild ways; problem is a bit harder than "get full WiFi coverage of your house"). Sound would actually probably be a great tool, but sound also behaves strangely under water that deep. The most well-researched, well-tested solution is a long cable back to the control ship, but that constrains how deep you can get into the Titanic (one idea I've never seen floated: attach a fleet of robots to the cable, a main one for exploration and observation and multiple wire-managers who's full job is to anchor to something and manage the cable slack... But now you're anchoring to the wreck, so that's also not good).
Fully-autonomous robots might actually be the best option here, and the only thing stopping that is the actual research and development to build a machine that can make independent decisions exploring an environment with unknown shapes, dangerous sharp edges, and possible currents, in full 3D. We've put more research into rovers on Mars than into this problem.
We know the original blueprints. We can program that into a robot, along with existing known differences. Then the robot needs to just detect anything that isn't like expected and photograph it and return. After a few rounds of that you would get most of the interesting areas explored.
Currents are handled just by comparing expected return signals to what you really see.
OF course worth it is questionable.
The above fails in the general case only because generally in navigation we also have safety considerations. Your self driving car cannot run over a child no matter what. However there is much less to worry about in the Titanic. (don't confuse that with this is easy, only that if you don't worry about safety it is much easier)
Some setups have smaller ROVs launched from another submersible, like ROV ROBIN.
* Difficult to navigate in a narrow underwater structure without crashing
* Signal penetration, or lack thereof, in an iron hull at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean
* Extremely niche technology that would have few practical uses in other contexts since most of the seabed does not suffer from the same complexities as a shipwreck
* Can't see for shit underwater in general
* We already know whats down there and why it's down there, therefore unlikely to lead to significant new information
* This could actually be considered desecrating a mass grave under maritime law
- If the polity that the person belonged to still exists, then it's a very sensitive issue - like US civil war graves. Likewise if there is a clear cultural continuity - for example France's first republic to the modern era. Both of which are themselves fuzzy criteria but largely fall into the desecration camp (although there are exceptions, not all cultures view it as taboo when done for scientific/historical purposes).
- If neither the polity nor the culture - often delineated by writing system or state apparatus or other semi-arbitrary line - still exist then the grave is pretty much fair game ethically speaking (legally it depends on the jurisdiction).
That fuzziness in the middle is very problematic but modern archaeologists have a whole process for reaching out to governments and getting consent from any descendant communities if applicable, and then coming up with an ethical plan to rebury/preserve the remains afterwards. IME the majority of such communities are very cooperative because it helps them answer questions about their past.
One might ask - particularly in a colonial history case - if that "legal purchase" was made under fair conditions and not by exerting undue pressure, as it often happened.
The modern Egyptian government doesn't actually want mummies back, they just want to get paid again. They are going to use various means at their disposal to get paid once more. Which is "fair" in the All's fair in love and war sense.
Edit: Egypt just wants to pivot a subscription model: https://tutankhamunexpo.com
I heavily disagree. Bullying may work in a short term but in the mid to long term it can have disastrous consequences - we're seeing this play out right now with the US government and all its major allies looking for a way out and divesting from the US.
Decades worth of "soft power" building effort and hundreds of thousands of lives lost in various wars (WW2 alone >400k!), for nothing, all gone in the space of a few months.
... All in all, a quite excellent win-win negotiation to mutually-agreeable conclusion, it seems.
They are not reflected by reality. (i.e. from inside, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pun18bi_0-g)
That never made sense to me. Massive efforts are made to retrieve bodies from airplane crashes, sunk boats, collapsed buildings, etc. Why is recovery from some other disaster sites "desecration"?
i.e. Thought experiment: in their comment, s/maritime law/aviation law. In your comment s/airplane crashes/sunken ships. It's the same calorie-free conversation with just as much basis in reality.
This is why the wreck of the Titanic got found in the first place though https://www.nationalgeographic.com/premium/article/titanic-w... (https://archive.is/jibqF)
(note: we can quickly discover footage from inside the Titanic that obviates all these points. Here, we endeavor to cover this from an angle of how you could detect the arguments presented were weak, without that knowledge)
* Difficult to navigate in a narrow underwater structure without crashing
Passenger ship? Too narrow for a drone?
* Signal penetration, or lack thereof, in an iron hull at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean
Wireless signals aren't used for companion submersibles.
* Extremely niche technology that would have few practical uses in other contexts since most of the seabed does not suffer from the same complexities as a shipwreck
The seabed does not have any tight spaces?
* Can't see for shit underwater in general
We are commenting on an article that reconstructed a massive ship as a 3D model via photographs underwater
* We already know whats down there and why it's down there, therefore unlikely to lead to significant new information
We are commenting on an article that reconstructed the ship from the exterior despite this same factor applying.
* This could actually be considered desecrating a mass grave under maritime law
Not even wrong. Just throwing stuff out there.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pun18bi_0-g
Curiously, this reminded me of engineers who are working to make AI better which will one day take their own jobs.