• Tar_Alcaran@sh.itjust.works
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    9 days ago

    For those doing the maths at home:

    An F35 who obligingly flies top-towards-you (not exactly something you can do, but hey, maybe they’re turning) is all of 10m tall.

    An AIM-120C can very comfortably hit a target at 100km.

    At that range, the F-35 takes up 26 arcseconds, or 0.007 degrees. That’s roughly about the size of this period, at a distance of 3 meters away.

    [ . ]

    Good luck spotting that in a sky of roughly the same colour, full of other objects.

    • jimbolauski@lemm.ee
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      9 days ago

      You can place cameras anywhere, they don’t need to be right next to what is being targeted. Nearer ranges will allow AI to misidentify at much higher rates than max standoff ranges of an AIM-120C.

    • Miles O'Brien@startrek.website
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      9 days ago

      Pffffffff

      I can see that bright white dot against the dark mode background on my maximum brightness screen with ease! Therefore your argument is invalid!

    • Ledivin@lemmy.world
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      9 days ago

      Yeah but what about the AI? Have you thought about the AI that would be running it, which never misses, and would totally be a useful existing thing? 😉

    • chonglibloodsport@lemmy.world
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      9 days ago

      Just for reference: JWST has an optical resolution of 0.07 arcseconds. It’s a mirror 22 feet in diameter though, not something you’d put inside a missile guidance package.

          • reinei@lemmy.world
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            7 days ago

            Well but I am!

            Although, we would still need to get it back here… Okay so first we send two more rockets after it! One to return it on and one with the/a human engineer on board to pack it back up.

            I mean we can hardly have it return while unpacked. That would damage the delicate heat baffles! And we need those to shield it from the rockt engine at the back of our missile so it doesn’t start targeting itself because it no longer knows where it is/isn’t…

      • RiceMunk@sopuli.xyz
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        8 days ago

        Holy shit. I just realised that the reason they’re building the ELT is so they can mount it on a missile and shoot down an F-35 at some point.

    • KillingTimeItself@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      9 days ago

      and then also dealing with the F-35 itself, even if you managed to lock on and target it, it will have anti-warfare capabilities you have to contend with.

    • Comment105@lemm.ee
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      9 days ago

      Yeah, sure. But that doesn’t matter if you point the AI at it with a really good zoom lens, though. And then you have a ton of them, pointed in an directions, like the compound eye of a fly. F35 spotted.