The Epistemology of Orientation in Space

There’s this video, and then there’s comments I’ve read all over that go something like this:
1) “So weird to see the Death Star upside down,” or something equally as innocent and merely observational. And someone replies with:
2) “you idiot theres no upside down in space its all relative you probably like the prequels and also Hitler”

The second part of that response—not the prequel/Hitler part, about upside-down being relative—is correct, but its relativity not particular to space, or any three-dimensional context. “Upside-down” is relative to any perspective, since it’s based on the perceiver, or a group of perceivers. We refer to someone standing on their head as “upside-down” because the default “down” direction is towards the ground, and “up” is away from the ground. Nearly everyone won’t experience “up” and “down” in any other context since most of us won’t leave Earth, and I imagine any astronaut who has left would still use Earth (or any planet) as reference point. He would refer to his return voyage as going back “down” to it.

So the Death Star really is “upside-down” because, prior to Rogue One, all we’ve seen of it, is its opposite orientation. The “upside-down” designation is an a posteriori instinctual reaction to something that doesn’t “seem quite right,” kind of like when a commenter throws Hitler into a discussion that has nothing to do with the guy or what his opinions are of the prequels.

2 Comments

  • Ed Hurst says:

    And then we have to wonder whether something that large has it’s own gravity well, so that folks inside it are oriented to sense “down” as the center of the thing — versus an apparent artificial gravity orientation produced by some unknown technology. I don’t recall any spacecraft scenes without the deck being “down.” Yet other space fiction seems to remember that it’s relative, such as 2001: A Space Odyssey.

    • Jay says:

      The Death Stars do have their own grav well, although if you look at scenes where ships come in to dock, the center of gravity isn’t Star’s center but just “down towards one end of the Star. But I’m not so sure. I’d have to pay attention to some of the scenes.

      Kubrick was a…character. I guess it should be expected that someone so talented would have an “off” aura around him, even if the Illuminati theories about him are inaccurate.

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