Space

1111214161774

Replies

  • Heres a picture of the Anromeda Galaxy I took from my backyard. jqoifjfhfwnb.jpg
  • cee134
    cee134 Posts: 33,711 Member
    edited December 2016
    John Glenn, American Hero of the Space Age, Dies at 95

    A symbol of the space age as the first American to orbit Earth.
    http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/08/us/john-glenn-dies.html?_r=0

    aq67i5qp4o1m.jpg
  • LittleLionHeart1
    LittleLionHeart1 Posts: 3,655 Member
    edited December 2016
    RIP Brave John. Thank you for your service. You lived a long meaningful life that people dream of. And you really did it. <3

    Motivation to be as fit as possible.
    When many are still living on this planet, that has gone to kitten in sooo many respects, I'm going to move to Mars or any planet with possibility. (Edit: Mars is vicious.... Any better prospects planet wise??)

    @Luke I love your pictures. Especially the Supermoon pic. :o Incredible.
  • NorthCascades
    NorthCascades Posts: 10,968 Member
    I took this pic of the Orion Nebula last winter.


    9rx4kqropfi4.jpg

    Awesome.
  • NorthCascades
    NorthCascades Posts: 10,968 Member
    JaneiR36 wrote: »
    JaneiR36 wrote: »
    Also, I have a question about "seeing" the Milky Way galaxy. Since that's our galaxy, how does one see it? The way I understand it, it would be like seeing earth. Since we're on planet earth, it wouldn't look like a sphere from here, right?

    The galaxy is way less like a sphere than the Earth, it's closer to a dinner plate, but bulging in the middle. At least that's the current understanding. But it doesn't look like a circle from inside, it looks more like a thick line across the sky.

    milky-way-you-are-here.jpg

    I've posted this before but it's probably useful right now. This is the Milky Way from Slate Peak in the North Cascades. The camera is more sensitive than the eye, so it's a little bit dimmer and it's less colorful too, when you're standing there.

    24836980445_5deb5f991b_o_d.jpg

    This is a really gorgeous picture, but I can't quite make out the dinner plate? Could you give me an idea what portion of it is captured in your picture? And thank you, you've been so patient with your explanations, and my questions are really elementary.

    Thanks!

    I'm guessing that the center of the galaxy is down below the horizon, and the edge of the galaxy is up above the top of the frame. Just based on how bright it is. I could be wrong; I think it looks like two bands instead of one because giant dust clouds block a lot of star light.
  • MelodyandBarbells
    MelodyandBarbells Posts: 7,724 Member
    JaneiR36 wrote: »
    JaneiR36 wrote: »
    Also, I have a question about "seeing" the Milky Way galaxy. Since that's our galaxy, how does one see it? The way I understand it, it would be like seeing earth. Since we're on planet earth, it wouldn't look like a sphere from here, right?

    The galaxy is way less like a sphere than the Earth, it's closer to a dinner plate, but bulging in the middle. At least that's the current understanding. But it doesn't look like a circle from inside, it looks more like a thick line across the sky.

    milky-way-you-are-here.jpg

    I've posted this before but it's probably useful right now. This is the Milky Way from Slate Peak in the North Cascades. The camera is more sensitive than the eye, so it's a little bit dimmer and it's less colorful too, when you're standing there.

    24836980445_5deb5f991b_o_d.jpg

    This is a really gorgeous picture, but I can't quite make out the dinner plate? Could you give me an idea what portion of it is captured in your picture? And thank you, you've been so patient with your explanations, and my questions are really elementary.

    Thanks!

    I'm guessing that the center of the galaxy is down below the horizon, and the edge of the galaxy is up above the top of the frame. Just based on how bright it is. I could be wrong; I think it looks like two bands instead of one because giant dust clouds block a lot of star light.

    Awesome intro. I actually wound up squeezing in most of this 1.5 hour documentary on the Milky Way between commercials.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttz4Sr0tZFg&amp;app=desktop

    I thought it was interesting that most or all of the proof points to our galaxy being a spiral galaxy, but since we've not been able to travel outside of it to view it, we can't be 100% certain - or, at least we do not have a picture of it. That was the case when the documentary was made, anyway. Who knows now!

    Finally remembered the chromecast plugged into the TV and I've since watched this and the 'Journey to the Center of the universe' one that came recommended after it. I just might continue doing this for a while rather than searching for ondemand TV shows whenever I have some down time. Good stuff!
  • MelodyandBarbells
    MelodyandBarbells Posts: 7,724 Member
    cee134 wrote: »
    John Glenn, American Hero of the Space Age, Dies at 95

    A symbol of the space age as the first American to orbit Earth.
    http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/08/us/john-glenn-dies.html?_r=0

    aq67i5qp4o1m.jpg

    RIP, John Glenn, American Hero.

    You know, what I found so fascinating about this story is how this man basically made multiple careers from what some may consider passing interests. Oh, I just took flight lessons on the side. . That turns to a career as a military pilot and later an astronaut. Or, how being inspired by his high school civics teacher got him into a very successful political career.
  • cee134
    cee134 Posts: 33,711 Member
    The surface of Venus, taken in 1981 by the Soviet probes Venera 13 and 14.

    rlcznt83fb5o.jpg
  • cee134
    cee134 Posts: 33,711 Member
    The Space Shuttle Columbia passes into a brilliant sunrise scene during the STS-9\Spacelab 1 mission.

    13432hk4ehiq.jpg
  • RunHardBeStrong
    RunHardBeStrong Posts: 33,069 Member
    cee134 wrote: »
    The Space Shuttle Columbia passes into a brilliant sunrise scene during the STS-9\Spacelab 1 mission.

    13432hk4ehiq.jpg

    That would be a most awesome experience!
  • cee134
    cee134 Posts: 33,711 Member
    The distance from the Earth to the Moon is approximately 109 Moons.
  • cee134
    cee134 Posts: 33,711 Member
    Photograph of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s Kounotori H-II Transfer Vehicle as it approached the ISS on Dec. 12, 2016. The un-piloted cargo spacecraft is loaded with more than 4.5 tons of supplies, water, spare parts and experiment hardware for the six-person station crew.

    sv4lkw2ve2v1.jpg
  • Timshel_
    Timshel_ Posts: 22,834 Member
    Was reading an interesting piece on expanded SuperString Theory that talked about going beyond the base d=10 dimensions to an 11th dimension, and I came on some correlated work in black holes and why String Theory is working beyond Quantum Theory...anyway...this is an interesting modelling of how SuperString Theory fills in gaps. Heavy read but very well laid out.

    https://arxiv.org/pdf/1311.5607v1.pdf
  • This content has been removed.
  • NorthCascades
    NorthCascades Posts: 10,968 Member
    54119267eadf44ada3d94f536cfd8b75?fit=max&h=1536&w=1536&s=a1584ae971bbf0e7b378d673ce56676a
  • cee134
    cee134 Posts: 33,711 Member
    Hurricane on Saturn's North Pole.

    2ulxarz53nhz.jpg
  • This content has been removed.
  • Timshel_
    Timshel_ Posts: 22,834 Member
    So which area of space for science do you think holds more value at this point - micro space or macro space?

    For years science look down to find the smallest particles of existence because, I believe, macro space is much more difficult to reach. But have when dug down small enough? Is there still more that is in the microcosms of life? Or is the cosmic frontier out there where the real science is?
  • Timshel_
    Timshel_ Posts: 22,834 Member
    Anywho....Phy Org was posting on the new fifth dimension stuff going around lately and I was thinking about how this year they created a small black hole in a lab for observation. Does that worry anyone else? What if with our limited understanding we create something we cannot readily contain? You see this concept in movie like Green Lantern, Thor, Capt'n 'Merica, etc, where a small anomaly causes havoc. If you think about what a black hole is, it is a ripple space that continually grabs energy from mass around it...feeding it. So you start with this small occurrence, it starts multiplying...maybe exponentially, and we envelop the world as we know it.
  • MelodyandBarbells
    MelodyandBarbells Posts: 7,724 Member
    Timshel_ wrote: »
    Anywho....Phy Org was posting on the new fifth dimension stuff going around lately and I was thinking about how this year they created a small black hole in a lab for observation. Does that worry anyone else? What if with our limited understanding we create something we cannot readily contain? You see this concept in movie like Green Lantern, Thor, Capt'n 'Merica, etc, where a small anomaly causes havoc. If you think about what a black hole is, it is a ripple space that continually grabs energy from mass around it...feeding it. So you start with this small occurrence, it starts multiplying...maybe exponentially, and we envelop the world as we know it.

    Interesting, but that probably won't happen since they've put tin foil over it. It's fine.

    Say, what is micro and macro space?
  • Timshel_
    Timshel_ Posts: 22,834 Member
    JaneiR36 wrote: »
    Timshel_ wrote: »
    Anywho....Phy Org was posting on the new fifth dimension stuff going around lately and I was thinking about how this year they created a small black hole in a lab for observation. Does that worry anyone else? What if with our limited understanding we create something we cannot readily contain? You see this concept in movie like Green Lantern, Thor, Capt'n 'Merica, etc, where a small anomaly causes havoc. If you think about what a black hole is, it is a ripple space that continually grabs energy from mass around it...feeding it. So you start with this small occurrence, it starts multiplying...maybe exponentially, and we envelop the world as we know it.

    Interesting, but that probably won't happen since they've put tin foil over it. It's fine.

    Say, what is micro and macro space?

    It is general terms for the science of things that are smaller and bigger than our general view. So micro is seen with microscope and macro is with telescopes. Initially the science community look into small particles of life, but as we progressed what is outside of our world became open to investigation. We theorize (Standard Model) in particle physics that elementary particles are quarks, leptons, bosons, etc., and they are the building blocks of everything. But we still are limited by the technology to observe and quantify this. I say these is still a smaller universe left to discover, but the outer, visible universe is also there and we still have no definitive answer to what is out there as well.

    I just find it interesting to talk about which holds greater promise - the building blocks of the universe, or the resulting universe itself.
  • NorthCascades
    NorthCascades Posts: 10,968 Member
    Timshel_ wrote: »
    So which area of space for science do you think holds more value at this point - micro space or macro space?

    For years science look down to find the smallest particles of existence because, I believe, macro space is much more difficult to reach. But have when dug down small enough? Is there still more that is in the microcosms of life? Or is the cosmic frontier out there where the real science is?

    I enjoy reading pop science. I know that a lot of writers and reporters are terrible and I try to be discerning but who knows how good a job I really do. Still, the more I learn about our universe, the more it fills me with wonder.

    When I read about the science of the very small, I keep wondering what the Greeks did. Can we keep subdividing things forever? Does it just go infinitely small? Or is there really a fundamental building block? I've heard a few times that there's a smallest thing and we're getting close to being able to detect it. Why should that be true?
  • cee134
    cee134 Posts: 33,711 Member
    The two galaxies M81 and M82, roughly 11.6 million light years away from earth and "close" to each other

    47rj43zzirm6.jpg
  • SueSueDio
    SueSueDio Posts: 4,796 Member
    Timshel_ wrote: »
    Anywho....Phy Org was posting on the new fifth dimension stuff going around lately and I was thinking about how this year they created a small black hole in a lab for observation. Does that worry anyone else? What if with our limited understanding we create something we cannot readily contain? You see this concept in movie like Green Lantern, Thor, Capt'n 'Merica, etc, where a small anomaly causes havoc. If you think about what a black hole is, it is a ripple space that continually grabs energy from mass around it...feeding it. So you start with this small occurrence, it starts multiplying...maybe exponentially, and we envelop the world as we know it.

    Isn't this why some people were/are concerned about the Large Hadron Collider? I vaguely remember, before it was used for the first time, reading something about the fear that they might accidentally create a tiny black hole or something similar that would keep growing.
  • Jeannie3099
    Jeannie3099 Posts: 61 Member
    kca1kuh97xrh.jpg

    This is Ida from an astroid belt. Only about 16km across but has it's own orbiting moon (Dactyl) :smile:
    Oh God, I passed one of those last night!
  • cee134
    cee134 Posts: 33,711 Member
    First vs. One of the latest images taken on Mars surface.

    e9w4qekve2ln.jpg
  • cee134
    cee134 Posts: 33,711 Member
    The Cartwheel Galaxy.

    8rayjwdev0kh.jpg
  • RunHardBeStrong
    RunHardBeStrong Posts: 33,069 Member
    cee134 wrote: »
    First vs. One of the latest images taken on Mars surface.

    e9w4qekve2ln.jpg

    Very cool. Makes me kinda want to go there....
  • Timshel_
    Timshel_ Posts: 22,834 Member
    SueSueDio wrote: »
    Isn't this why some people were/are concerned about the Large Hadron Collider? I vaguely remember, before it was used for the first time, reading something about the fear that they might accidentally create a tiny black hole or something similar that would keep growing.

    Very, very much. We theorize that the big bang that is said to have born the universe could have been from a concentrated release of energy no bigger than the instance of collided particles like the Hadron Collider. The scary part is, we really don't have all the variables, so using the collider is supposed to help to fill in some blanks, but some of the blanks are there because of the magnitude of energy explosion we need to observe to truly understand the potential.



  • SueSueDio
    SueSueDio Posts: 4,796 Member
    Timshel_ wrote: »
    SueSueDio wrote: »
    Isn't this why some people were/are concerned about the Large Hadron Collider? I vaguely remember, before it was used for the first time, reading something about the fear that they might accidentally create a tiny black hole or something similar that would keep growing.

    Very, very much. We theorize that the big bang that is said to have born the universe could have been from a concentrated release of energy no bigger than the instance of collided particles like the Hadron Collider. The scary part is, we really don't have all the variables, so using the collider is supposed to help to fill in some blanks, but some of the blanks are there because of the magnitude of energy explosion we need to observe to truly understand the potential.

    It's almost like science is saying, "I could tell you, but then I'd have to kill you..." ;)

    I guess pushing the boundaries of knowledge IS scary at times!