Category / Astronomy
Merry Christmas
And Remember…
Tour the known universe in 6 minutes
The AMNH has put together this amazing tour of the entire known universe based on the most up-to-date astronomical data. Every object is in its correct location, with proper scale and movement.
Here’s the full article to go with it.
Via: Pharyngula
Super powers: XKCD style
They laugh now, but within 10 years the city’s entire criminal class will have quit to work on space research.
I didn’t post anything for Carl Sagan Day or his birthday. I’ve been a little busy lately with a couple of projects. XKCD does a great job as usual. It makes me wonder how many would-have-been criminals are actually working on space research because of Carl Sagan’s amazing influence.
When Galaxies Collide
Felicia Day *swoon* (and Sean Astin) try to educate the public about colliding galaxies in this hilarious NASA PSA for the Spitzer Space Telescope.
There are a lot of great little inside jokes in there. “What in the name of Joss Whedon?” And Felicia makes a wonderful point:
It just goes to show you don’t have to make up explosions or doomsday scenarios to make science interesting. Astronomy is pretty interesting on its own.
Via: The Bad Astronomer
‘A Universe From Nothing’ by Lawrence Krauss, AAI 2009
This is a fantastic and entertaining talk by Lawrence Krauss from the 2009 Atheist Alliance International on current cosmology, the nature and ultimate fate of our universe.
Lawrence Krauss has been one of my favorite speakers since I watched his talk from the first Beyond Belief in 2005. It’s amazing how much information the man can pack into one lecture. My favorite line:
Why is there something rather than nothing? … There has to be. In quantum mechanics, if you have nothing, you’ll always get something.
Via: The Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science
Being godless in the workplace
This is more of a rant than a well-thought out post.
In just a little over one month into my new job (more on that in a bit), the issue of and concerns about my humanism/atheism has already come into conversation twice. I live and work in Tennessee. Every night I’m subjected to christian propaganda in the form of general conversation and apparel (i.e. t-shirts with such witty wording as “Not perfect, just forgiven”). I carry a book with me almost every night to have something to read during my breaks and lunch. So far I’ve steered clear of taking such blatant titles as “The God Delusion” and “The Portable Atheist” with me mostly because I feel the issue of my non-belief is not an appropriate area of discourse for the workplace so I usually take a general science book with me. But “science” itself, it seems, is enough to get the dusty cogs in their brains going.
Twice I’ve had the question put forth to me, “So, do you believe in God?” And twice I’ve answered, “No, I really don’t believe in anything supernatural.” The first person asked an interesting follow-up question, “So.. are you, ya know… happy?” … The second was more down-trodden, “Man, that kind of makes me sad to hear that. Everybody has to believe in something.”
In the two brief discussions I’ve had with these two people, I’ve tried to entertain their personal beliefs without stepping all over them. (I save the stepping for the intertubes.) I’ve even held back a few questions and laughter that would serve no good purpose. One of them kept coming back to the “debate” with questions like, “So how do you explain good and evil?” to which I replied, “What else would there be?” and “We just made all that evolution stuff up.” To which I quickly replied, “No, we just figured it out. There’s a big difference.”
Both seem to be very fond and ignorant of the Bible… “The words in red are what Jesus said.” … as well as ignorant of other religions and modes of spirituality. It’s pretty obvious they’ve never experienced a spiritual moment from anything other than the religion they were brought up in. They’ve never explored the topic of religion in an academic sense and are oblivious to other culture’s religions. I keep wondering what our country would be like if we had comparative religion studies in our high schools. I’ve explained to both of them that I’m a very spiritual person, just not a religious one… I find my spirituality in the awesome mysteries and wonder of the universe. Pictures like this evoke a spiritual response from me. Hell, just thinking about how massive our universe is evokes a spiritual response. I’m reminded of one of my favorite Carl Sagan quotes…
Many religions have attempted to make statues of their gods very large, and the idea, i supposed, is to make us feel small. But if that’s their purpose, they can keep their paltry icons. We need only look up if we wish to feel small.
Putting “Life” into perspective is a humbling and empowering experience that everyone should take part in. It allows you to see life for what it truly is. An amazingly rare and wondrous thing worth saving and worth making it better for all. Viewing the Earth from space allows you to see the made up lines we’ve created to separate ourselves from one another and to see our little insignificant planet as a single organism that must work together in harmony if it is to survive. Realizing there is no supernatural afterlife awaiting you when you die begs the venture of making all there is to make of this life. As Richard Dawkins put it…
The ‘here and now’ is not something to be endured before eternal bliss or damnation. The ‘here and now’ is all we have; An inspiration to make the most of it.
As it stands, I’m going to continue trying to avoid the ‘I’m a godless heathen among you’ conversation while on the clock.
I’ve now broken two principles because I need this job so much at the moment … damn you U.S. economy. Granted, larger paychecks are nice, but they don’t make me feel any better about myself. The whole situation is a bit loony. I’m attempting to be a nobody that stands out amongst the crowd. Does having a contradictory goal affect the outcome? Hmmmm.
Okay… my little rant is over… When I write a real post regarding my new job, some of this will make a little more sense. Right now, after a 12 hour shift… I’m pooped. Lights out.
Congratulations Space X!
A little bit of history was made Sunday evening at 23:16 GMT when Space X’s two-stage Falcon 1 rocket successfully made it into Earth orbit.
After three failed attempts, Space X has become the first privately owned company to send a rocket into orbit. A warm congratulations go out to everyone involved. I can’t imagine how excited they all must feel, but the cheers in the background of the video above give you some idea.
Awesome and utterly awe-inspiring! Keep an eye out around the 3:00 marker (after stage 1 separation) when the edge of Earth appears in the upper-left corner of the screen. I’m almost at a loss for words. This is just amazing.
Seriously… congratulations to everyone at Space X! You’re all heroes in my book.
A Reasonable Alien Discussion
After Apollo 14 astronaut Ed Mitchell went on record as believing in alien visitations to Earth, its nice to know our other astronauts have not lost the ability to think rationally. Mark Kelly, the U.S. commander of space shuttle Discovery, briefly discussed the topic during a Tokyo news conference.
We have seen some evidence that there is a possibility of some life on Mars in the past, so there is probably life all over the universe.
From our experience, it is very difficult to travel through space, and I personally think aliens have not visited our planet.
The Discovery recently delivered Japan’s Kibo orbital laboratory to the International Space Station in June.
Via: Reuters
The Moon Transits The Earth
EPOXI, the repurposed and renamed Deep Impact spacecraft, turned back towards Earth last May and captured images of the Moon passing by. Don Lindler put together an animation (below) of the entire transit.
Wow… Just, wow.
Via: Bad Astronomy
