Category Archives: astronomy

Cassini and the Enceladus Plume

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I know it sounds like the title from a children’s book about a young lad named Cassini who has to run through the magical hair-gardens of the kingdom of Enceladus, but it’s way cooler than that.

On November 2, the Cassini spacecraft successfully flew through that really cool¬†plume of what is currently thought to be “water vapor, sodium, and organic materials” from previous flybys. While it was doing so, it was relaying information back to the NASA scientists involved in the project who are now knee deep in new information about this incredibly interesting moon of Saturn. They took some distant pictures capturing some incredible photos of the planet from afar, but also flew about 100 kilometers above the surface, all the while snapping pictures and analyzing the surface of the planet with VIMS, their Visual and Infrared Mapping Spectrometer. There’s great information up giving a higher level view of the findings at ScienceDaily, and a really great description with more detail on NASA’s page written by Bonnie J. Buratti, one of the scientists involved in interpreting the data.

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Judge Not Lest Ye Be Judged Ridiculous

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I believe in objective and thoughtful dialogue as a means to further the understanding of the world, and that is why I wanted to write a post here sending my readers to an entry from Pharyngula for one of the most well-put, thoughtful, and understanding emails that PZ has ever received. Please read this before you continue, although I’m fine if you skip the quotations section in the middle.

Done? Okay, good. I’m sorry I did that to you.

I want to know what it is that makes the faithful (and I am not taking any one faith to task here) so entirely difficult to deal with. I am a patient man. I respect the fact that not everyone sees the world as I do. In the words of the mighty prophet Ice T, if you’re thinking what I’m thinking then only one of us is thinking. I have disagreements with the other Meddling Kids. It is through disagreement that we can discuss alternative viewpoints and hopefully grow in our understanding, either from learning a new perspective or reinforcing our own thoughts.

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It Wasn’t Dystonia, It Was Evil Mercury!

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This woman is seriously starting to piss me off. I won’t bother rambling about the lunacy of Desiree Jennings and her claims of dystonia, or her sudden and amazing woo-covery. Both Orac and Steven Novella have done a fabulous job of deconstructing her fantasy here and here. But I’d like to suggest you read both these explanations of her treatment, and the person responsible for it.

I post this because it’s important to me that my friends (and really, society as a whole) understand that this snake-oil is an insidious lie. I’m not saying that the believers don’t believe, but belief hardly makes truth. There are people who believe that we never landed on the moon. There are even people who believe a righteous and good father figure created everything there is, was, and ever shall be and infused within us through words written by barely literate savages a morality that only the father figure can shit all over.

And in case you want to know more about psychogenic illness and what it really is rather than the dismissive “it’s all in your head” answer, you can read Steven Novella’s excellent article on the topic.

Please, understand that this is a miraculous claim for a miraculous cure, and that miracles are never what they seem to be on the surface.

Jim

NASA Replicator: Not quite Star Trek, but Scotty would be proud

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replicatorMy dad first introduced me to the world of Star Trek, and opened my mind to a world of communicators, dark matter, and replicators. These days we all own mobile devices so advanced they would make a Cardassian jealous, the existence of dark matter has been proven many times over, and now at long last it looks like the replicator is about to make its debut.

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An Unexpected Surprise From The Moon

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Well the interesting news just keeps on keeping on today. Another article at Science Daily details the means by which the moon is producing it’s own water.

Yeah, you read that right.

There are a variety of interesting outcomes of this which the article explains. What I love, though, is that this was a totally unexpected phenomenon. I find it truly amazing just how much new information we are learning.

Jim

…And While I’m Updating…

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I talked about the Giga Galaxy Zoom project here last week. Well, they’ve released the second of the images, and there is some breathtaking stuff in there.

I have to give credit where credit’s due… This is probably the most interesting interactive science site I’ve seen in a long time.¬† There are so many pictures and so much zooming throughout that you just can’t help but be amazed.

The explanation on the project is on their about page. Essentially, there are three images:

The first image by Brunier aims to present the sky as people have experienced it the world over, though in the far greater detail offered by top-notch stargazing conditions and with the view from both hemispheres. As such, the image provides a magnificent 800-million pixel panorama of the whole Milky Way.

Guisard, an ESO engineer, made the second image of a smaller area of the sky, containing 400 million pixels, using a hobby telescope at Paranal. This second image directly benefits from the quality of Paranal’s sky, one of the best on the planet, and from his professional expertise as an optical engineer specialising in telescopes, a unique combination in the world of astrophotographers. This second image will be released on 21 September 2009.

The third GIGAGALAXY ZOOM image illustrates the power of professional astronomy. It covers a one-degree field of view and was obtained with the Wide Field Imager attached to the MPG/ESO 2.2-metre telescope at La Silla. This camera has already created several of the most iconic pictures produced by ESO. The third image will be released on 28 September 2009.

Jim

More Mars Images

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NASA has released thousands of new images of Mars, including the one pictured to the left. This one shows is entitled Gullies at the Edge of Hale Crater, Mars. They were taken by the HiRISE (High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment) camera aboard the MRO (Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter).

If I’m reading the site correctly, then there are 1512 images of the surface of the Red Planet.

Jim