Talk:3182: Telescope Types

no vampire jokes 🥀 (1791) TheTrainsKid (talk) 00:08, 18 December 2025 (UTC)

Got down some preliminary descriptions of each telescope type used 185.132.133.218 01:44, 18 December 2025 (UTC)

insert that one mickey mouse meme with the caption "what a fucking narcissist" Yaokuan ITB (talk) 02:33, 18 December 2025 (UTC)

abnormally low joke-to-real ratio for this format of comic! 2601:241:8002:3E0:C0A2:9DA:ED39:D13F 03:21, 18 December 2025 (UTC)

I noticed that... I think this might've originally been 'look at all these cool telescope types', but then he realized he had to put some sort of joke somewhere. --DollarStoreBa'al^Converse 03:27, 18 December 2025 (UTC)

Can someone make a category for The Core (2003)? It's been mentioned often enough. 83.245.251.49 09:22, 18 December 2025 (UTC)

Can you list 4 more comics then I will make the category. I think that is about the limit for when to make a new category. I know there are a few more but is it only 2-3more? --Kynde (talk) 14:00, 18 December 2025 (UTC)

All I can think of is 673: The Sun. --DollarStoreBa'al^Converse 15:09, 18 December 2025 (UTC)

Also mentioned in the title text of 2858: Thanksgiving Arguments. --208.59.176.206 15:24, 18 December 2025 (UTC)

The The Core category was already created, nearly two years ago. This comic is the 7th reference --Deebster (talk) 23:54, 18 December 2025 (UTC)

> This would not […] end well for the drinker.

Would it though? Drinking elemental mercury, while not great on nutritional value, should be mostly safe (and I'm using that word quite loosely). The most danger would be while drinking and expelling it, when there's a danger of inhaling mercury vapors, right? --Coconut Galaxy (talk) 10:29, 18 December 2025 (UTC)

... Agreed. Elemental mercury is dangerous when inhaled, not when drinked. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercury_poisoning 109.81.171.81 21:12, 18 December 2025 (UTC)

(it's ..when drunk.) ;) 88.65.244.212 00:42, 26 December 2025 (UTC)

It wouldn't take much work to make the "Real?" column all contain only "yes" 136.32.133.124 12:05, 18 December 2025 (UTC)

As all others are refractors or reflectors, can cardboard tube be considered a diffractor? As it is the only thing that it does.--Trimutius (talk) 15:43, 18 December 2025 (UTC)

Well, all the others do it as well. Even more so, as they have more objects in the light path. --88.65.244.212 00:42, 26 December 2025 (UTC)

> Children may sometimes use tubes [...]

It's not just children. I've seen "viewing tubes" in at least a couple of places, hard-mounted metal tubes that point at particular points of interest. I'm not finding any good references, but here's a photo showing some at the top of a nearby mountain: https://maps.app.goo.gl/wwnYJ1zEQEXzjyJS8 Jordan Brown (talk) 18:07, 18 December 2025 (UTC)

Is the joke with "Geological" that it's looking at something 'far away' from actual Geology? 64.203.66.182 (talk) 17:14, 19 December 2025 (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

I flunked out of freshman physics, so apologies in advance if this is very stupid, but looking at the designs, and the “reflector” and “refractor” columns, I was wondering if it might make sense to combine the two, have a telescope with a refracting lens at one end and a concave mirror at the other (and presumably a secondary mirror) that would allow for a shorter overall length tube for the telescope. John (talk) 04:42, 27 December 2025 (UTC)

Various designs mix lenses and mirrors (if only at the eyepiece end, as a final adjustable focusing element). But very large lenses have their own issues, e.g.:

• they tend to produce spectral abberations that require careful relensing to mitigate;
• the lens-material will absorb some small amounts of light during passage, especially for rays passing through the considerably thicker bits (whether concave, convex or meniscus) ...any absorption by a chosen material of mirror surface is constant;
• shaping/polishing has to be done equally well on both sides, and can't easily be re-additive of material (only continually grinding it down, as needed);
• it can't be physically supported (or even flexed, to adjust) all across one side, like a mirror;
• necessarily huge chunks of optically-refractive material are heavy, compared to many kinds of similarly proportioned mirrors;

...and a few other issues that you might imagine. You can mitigate/mix these in all kinds of ways, but "a huge primary mirror" at the back end often has various advantages over "a huge (pre-?)primary lens" at the front end, varying a bit depending upon actual intended configuration and use. 82.132.239.191 15:30, 27 December 2025 (UTC)