- #1
DaveC426913
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I just finished Stephen Baxter's Manifold: Space. Great writer. Vast worlds he builds.
In it, he has a project to deflect a star (a neutron star, to be exact) using a colossal mirror-sail placed on one side of the star. The idea is that the solar radiation bounces off the mirror and is reflected back.
The sticky point here is that the mirror is stable and ostensibly bound to the star by gravity.
There's really not much more to it, as he describes it.
That seems wrong. Sure, the mirror-sail could remain bound by gravity while being pushed away by radiation, but I can't see how that could set up a net movement in the whole system.
Are my instincts wrong?
In it, he has a project to deflect a star (a neutron star, to be exact) using a colossal mirror-sail placed on one side of the star. The idea is that the solar radiation bounces off the mirror and is reflected back.
The sticky point here is that the mirror is stable and ostensibly bound to the star by gravity.
There's really not much more to it, as he describes it.
That seems wrong. Sure, the mirror-sail could remain bound by gravity while being pushed away by radiation, but I can't see how that could set up a net movement in the whole system.
Are my instincts wrong?