Star Images

[scapermoya]

i don't know how astronomically-savvy the people who are making this ARG are, but you really have to consider the speed of light when it comes to images of stars. the closest star to our sun is proxima centauri, at a distance of around 4.2 lightyears. no matter what happens to that star right now, we wouldn't know squat about it for that long. most stars in the night sky are orders of magnitude further. the prospect of many different stars at different distances disappearing simultaneously from view is a stretch at best.

as others have pointed out, these are not likely planets either. no extra-solar planets reflect anything near this amount of light.

i'm willing to suspend disbelief as much as the next guy, but we are dealing with a group of highly technical professionals, so we should keep reality in mind.

[PapaStu]

Yes but you have to take the 'Halo' reality into thought with all this. All the talk from ilovebees and from this ARG have revolved around rogue AI's or other computer entities talking to us and the like. Not to mention that in the 'Halo' world of things, there is Slipspace (for travel) and all forms of means of communication that make lightyears seem like light minutes or light seconds so the loss of a Solar System woud be known relatively quickly. Also going by the books (and games), the caretaker on Delta Halo knew that first Halo (5 I think) had been tripped, and all the stuff that happened on Reach (in GoO) came about AFTER Master Chief and Cortana tripped the first Halo. I'd venture the guess that when they are talking about these losses they are meaning colonies/worlds in that sed solar system that have been breeched/over-run by the Flood and thus have fallen or been 'Lost'.

[thebruce]

taking it a step further though, when it comes to pictures of the sky from earth, they're still bound by light speed. So while something may happen on a star 10 light years from earth the same time a photo of that star is taken on earth, the photo will still show the start as it was 10 years ago... so yeah, there is slipspace, but that's for travelling, moving of objects. Photos are still bound by light years

[scapermoya]

Yes but you have to take the 'Halo' reality into thought with all this. All the talk from ilovebees and from this ARG have revolved around rogue AI's or other computer entities talking to us and the like. Not to mention that in the 'Halo' world of things, there is Slipspace (for travel) and all forms of means of communication that make lightyears seem like light minutes or light seconds so the loss of a Solar System woud be known relatively quickly. Also going by the books (and games), the caretaker on Delta Halo knew that first Halo (5 I think) had been tripped, and all the stuff that happened on Reach (in GoO) came about AFTER Master Chief and Cortana tripped the first Halo. I'd venture the guess that when they are talking about these losses they are meaning colonies/worlds in that sed solar system that have been breeched/over-run by the Flood and thus have fallen or been 'Lost'.

that's all well and good, but these pictures aren't taken in 'slipspace' or whatever. i'm just saying that if this is indeed a picture of the night sky at any wavelength, then it has to follow some rules. forerunner technology may allow faster-than-light communication, but it can't make light from distant stars travel faster or more in sync. then again, for all we know, these are out of focus pictures of christmas tree lights.

[Maimbot 9000]

The images are called "starimage1" and "starimage2," yes? Wouldn't that preclude them being images of planets, Christmas lights, etc.? We're looking at stars. I know everything in this game is up for grabs and open to interpretation, but the idea that "starimage1" is an image of stars seems like a pretty solid assumption.

We can't be sure how much time has passed between snapshots. Or even if they're snapshots. If they're simply, ah, maps rather than photos, then the Forerunner/AR/whoever could simply be erasing stars they know have been infested or wiped out or whatever (via slipspace travel, colonies/stations throughout the galaxy, etc.).

[Dalthanas]

The physics and science of light and photography aside, why are you assuming that the pictures were taken anywhere NEAR the same time. You're saying we wouldn't know about a star disappearing for years... well for all we know this images were taken decades apart. There's really no indication as to time, so I think dismissing theories based on the speed of light is premature.

[Camth]

The physics and science of light and photography aside, why are you assuming that the pictures were taken anywhere NEAR the same time. You're saying we wouldn't know about a star disappearing for years... well for all we know this images were taken decades apart. There's really no indication as to time, so I think dismissing theories based on the speed of light is premature.

Very true, if we assumed a long period of time between images then distances wouldn't really matter (at least not to the same degree). The only tricky thing is WHY are the stars vanishing. Normally, if I star is going to "go away" it doesn't do it peacefully... In such cases I would have expected violent (and visible) outbursts, replacing the stars. Even years afterwards they should still be visible. We don't get that so something else is going on... either blocking the light from the star or otherwise disposing of it. I can't imagine the flood being able to do anything of that magnitude. Heat up a planet, sure, but block out a star, not going to happen. Even throwing an entire planet into a star would do next to nothing (well, it would do a lot but not the result we are looking for). So I think this has to be a result of Forerunner interference. They are the only ones that have this sort of capability.

^my two cents

[scapermoya]

i guess i have been taking this too literally. forgive me, i work on supernova images at school and i'm always in this 'mode' of thought when i see pictures like this.

i like the map idea, it makes sense that one could just erase a part of an image once it's known to be infected/glassed/whatever.

one other possibility is that the stars have been occulted by something. the forerunner clearly had the expertise to build very large structures (although we haven't seen any the size of stars yet). they wouldn't necessarily have to be that large though. something could be just getting in the way of these stars, blocking their view.

this is a very common phenomenon in astronomy. if you look up at sagittarius, you may not realize it, but you are looking almost directly at the center of the milky way. yet it looks only a little bit brighter than the rest of the night sky. a huge amount of dust is in the way, blocking our view. if it wasn't there, you would see a proper (and very very bright) 'center of the galaxy'.

[Camth]

That would be a very interesting method to contain the flood... Just blow up the star... and if you waited long enough to take a picture if might very well have become too dim to see... Interesting...

On your other point, wonder how many shield worlds there are?

[EliteSniper177]

i think that AdjutantReflex's old symbol, the one in his first avatar, is the forerunner symbol for earth, and each one of these pictures could indicate a certain distance from earth, each snapshot showing the stars when the craft is at a certain distance from earth, and the reason the stars are disappearing, could be that their getting closer