Interesting Astronomy Facts

The 200-inch mirror for the telescope on Palomar Mountain weights over 14 tons and is 27-inches thick. The telescope gathers 640,000 times as much light as the human eye.

If there were a bathtub big enough, Saturn would float in the water.

If a marshmallow were dropped from a foot above the surface of a neutron star it would have the energy of a modern atomic bomb

The star Betelgeuse is so large that if it were placed where our sun is, the surface would be just over half way to Jupiter .

The reason Venus is so bright is because the clouds are so dense that light bounces off them, making Venus appear bright to us on Earth

Suburu is Japanese for “Pleiades” (the official name of the constellation nicknamed The Seven Sisters).  Next time you see a Suburu, take a little closer look at the emblem, you’ll see it has 7 stars.

There are over a billion asteroids in our solar system of a diameter of 100 meters or more.

The largest known crater, the Chixulub crater in Mexico is 112 miles (180 km) across and is believed to have been caused by the asteroid that caused the dinosaur extinction 65 millions years ago.

The asteroid that killed the dinosaurs was over 6 miles long, taller than Mount Everest. For scale, 6 miles is 31,686 feet. Airplanes typically fly at 30,000 feet.

Humans can only see roughly 4,000 stars with the unaided eye

Every star you can see in the sky with your unaided eye is part of the Milky Way Galaxy.

The North Star, Polaris, is NOT the brightest star in the sky, that title belongs to Sirius.

Polaris will not always be the North Star. The Earth wobbles on its axis, just like a spinning top, every 23,000 years. This wobble is called precession and at the end of our current precession the Earth’s northern axis will be pointed at the star Vega.

My Life With Scopophobia

Have you ever had the feeling that somebody is looking at you? You look around and see nobody, but you just knowyou’re being watched? That’s how scopophobia feels every minute of every day.

For most of my life I’ve felt like I was always being watched. It isn’t a malicious feeling, I don’t feel like “whoever” is watching me is trying to harm me, or spy on me, or that they even care about me. I don’t think they are judging my actions, or my body, or my house, or my hair, or the fact that I’m not wearing shoes. It’s just that they are looking at me. Right now, from somewhere.

For a long time I didn’t recognize this disorder as anything but “normal”, but a couple years ago, when I moved into a new house that had a lot of windows (and very few window coverings), I began to realize that there was no room in my house in which I felt like I could relax. Even though I lived alone, I didn’t feel comfortable even changing my clothes unless I was in the bathroom or bedroom, with the blinds drawn. When I cooked dinner I felt like there was somebody right outside the window, or in the house next door looking out his window into my kitchen, watching me cook. Again, I never felt scared, they were just watching.

Most days, the feeling is mild and barely noticeable. When I’m at my desk at work, it’s the people outside my window, or in the apartments across the street, that are watching me, even though my building has mirrored glass that you can’t see into from outside. It might also be the hidden security cameras, even though there aren’t any. When I’m in my car, it’s everybody. People may be watching the road when I glance at them, but as soon as I turn away they are looking at me. Even the person in the car in front of me is watching me in his rear-view mirror. On most days this “attention” is normal and I barely notice it.

Sometimes, though, the feeling is worse. Not the intent of the “watchers”, they are still harmless and peaceful, but the number of watchers and the amount of attention they are giving me sometimes gets intense. On these days I have a strong desire to retreat into a nice, windowless room, undetectable by anybody. I think of the movies I’ve seen where some filthy rich person has a hidden panic room. From the outside you can’t even tell there is a room, but inside, the owner sits and watches the world go by on video screens while in perfect seclusion. Even then, I couldn’t be sure the contractors that built the panic room didn’t install a hidden camera that was currently watching me hide. So burying myself under, oh, a pile of rags or towels while inside the panic room, that might do it.

As you might imagine, this feeling can get frustrating. I get tired of being on display at all times, in all scenarios, without even being able to imagine a time when I would be 100% sure nobody was watching me. However, for me, it’s not debilitating. Even though it’s annoying, it doesn’t reallyprevent me from doing anything I want to do. OK maybe I can’t skinny dip in my hot tub when it’s anything but pitch dark night, but I would probably refrain even without my disorder. My neighbors to the rear have a two story house after all. For the most part, though, I’m fully functional. Hopefully I always will be.

If I ran this zoo

I would

• Abolish the electoral college – I would give the power to elect to the people.
• Ban lobbyists from giving even a single dime to anybody in a position to influence laws – laws should be passed on their merits alone, not on the depth of corporate purses.
• Ban “riders” on bills – One law per bill. Laws should be passed because they are right, not because it has some hidden provisions and back room deal attached to it. If you like it, vote for it. Otherwise vote no.
• Severely restrict the FCC – I would put the responsibility of raising children back on the parents and stop dictating what the entire population can see, hear, or say simply because some parents choose to use the tv as a babysitter.
• Stop abuse of “executive privilege” – prosecute those that break the law no matter what office they hold. And when the court says you are required to produce documents, you produce them, no excuses. Failure to comply has strict consequences.
• Remove the church from the state – I don’t care how many people believe in creation, it’s not science, it’s religion. As such, it doesn’t belong in our schools. Same with abortion. Keep your invisible sky wizard to yourself.

I would give this country back to the people, and reintroduce freedom to our culture. We may still live in the greatest country on Earth, but those in charge are doing everything they can to ruin it.

Be sure you vote in November. And make sure you vote your conscience, not just along your party line.

“…from my cold dead fingers.”

Today the US Supreme Court will be hearing a case that will put the 2nd Amendment to the test. What’s happened is the District of Columbia has banned handguns in an attempt to get some control of their ridiculously high murder rate. Their position is that 80% of the murders in DC are done using handguns, therefore we need to ban handguns. The subjects citizens of DC are allowed to have other guns in their house, so long as they are disassembled or trigger-locked. The controversy in this case stems from the differing interpretations of the 2nd Amendment itself, which reads:

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

Those against gun control see the words “right of the people” and say this means every individual has the right, as one of those “people” to arm themselves. Those for gun control see the words “a free State” and say this means the State, with it’s collective people, has a right to arm themselves; in other words, the right to keep an armed militia, but individuals are not covered by this amendment. As a proud owner of a number of guns, handguns included, I am firmly on the side of the former.

As part of their fear campaign, anti-gun supporters love to throw around statistics about the number of death attributed to handguns. They like to tell us how dangerous they are to police and, especially, children. They would like us to think that nothing good has ever come of handgun ownership, and they love to say “Look at England, it has a a tiny murder rate because of its gun controls!” So let’s look at England. In 1997, England passed the Firearms (Amendment) (No. 2) Act 1997 which, with some exceptions, banned the private ownership of all cartridge ammunition handguns, regardless of caliber. In 2005/2006 there were 50 reported firearms murders in England. This means that gun control laws stop firearms related murder, right? Well, no. Let’s look at some other numbers for England.

• 1990: 661 homicides. 60 from firearms, 22 (36%) from handguns
• 1995: 753 homicides. 70 from firearms, 39 (55%) from hanguns
• 1997 (year of the new law): 753 homicides. 59 from firearms, 39 (66%) from handguns
• 1998: 731 homicides. 49 from firearms, 32 (65%) from handguns
• 1999: 761 homicides. 62 from firearms, 42 (67%) from handguns
• 2000: 850 homicides. 73 from firearms, 47 (64%) from handguns
• 2001: 858 homicides. 97 from firearms, 59 (60%) from handguns
• 2002: 1045* homicides. 81 from firearms, 40 (49%) from handguns
• 2003: 858 homicides. 68 from firearms, 35 (51%) from handguns

 * 172 homicides from 2002 are attributed to Harold Shipman.

So the gun ban had no effect on firearms related murder, in fact the rate increased by 14% between 1997 and 2003.

Let’s look at some other numbers

• 1990: 3,939 armed robberies, 2,233 (56%)with handguns
• 1995: 3,963 armed robberies, 2,478 (62%)with handguns
• 1997: 3,029 armed robberies, 1,854 (61%)with handguns
• 1998: 2,973 armed robberies, 1,814 (61%)with handguns
• 1999: 3,922 armed robberies, 2,561 (65%)with handguns
• 2000: 4,081 armed robberies, 2,700 (66%)with handguns
• 2001: 5,323 armed robberies, 3,841 (72%)with handguns
• 2002: 4,776 armed robberies, 3,332 (69%)with handguns
• 2003: 4,117 armed robberies, 2,799 (67%)with handguns

(source)

After an initial decline, the number of armed robberies skyrocketed. Once again, the gun control laws had zero effect on the crimes commited with guns, with armed robberies increasing 35% over 6 years.

• In 1997 in the USA, there were an estimated 10,137 firearms related murders of which 7,904 (78%) were with handguns.
• In 2003, there were 9,659 total firearms homicides, with 7,745 (80%) from handguns. Over the same time period as above, the US homicide rate dropped almost 5%.
• In 1997 in the USA there were 175,710 firearms related armed robberies (no breakdown on number of handguns)
• In 2003, there were 172,802 firearms related armed robberies, a drop of 1.6%

(1997 source) (2003 source)

 The bottom line here is that gun control does nothing to prevent violent crime. Think of things this way, murder is already banned. Has that stopped criminals from murdering people? No. Robbery is against the law, but it still happens. Gun laws won’t reduce the number of deaths, in fact, as has been shown, they don’t even decrease the number of gun related deaths. We have a right in this country to carry guns. We have the right to defend our selves, our family, and our property from individual criminals as well as safeguard our freedom from an aggressive government. Our country was founded by rebels and revolutionaries and they made sure those behaviors would not only be allowed, but encouraged by our constitution. Don’t let them take our guns. An armed person is a citizen; an unarmed person is a subject.

Well what are you doing about it?

The other day I was talking to my girlfriend about some of the things that bother me in regards to our administration and the apathy my generation takes towards it. Towards the end of one of my rants she asked me “Well what are you doing about it?” My answer was simple. I’m doing what I wish everybody else would do. I’m talking about it, I email my congressman and senator about it, I send messages to my governor, I send stuff to the newspaper, I write to the President, I write to the majority and minority party leaders, I write to the DNC and the RNC. I also write a blog and try to reach people here on the web. In short, I’m doing what I can to make noise. The problem is not enough people are joining us.

I find it amazing that there are people out there, adults, with children of military age, that have no clue about the war. If you were to ask them how many Americans have died on the battlefield of an illegal war they couldn’t do anything but guess. We need to wake up! Yes, it’s unpleasant to think about. Yes, it’s frustrating because it doesn’t seem like there is anything we can do. But we can. Listen to the news, do some research, read some books, form an opinion, and tell you government to obey you. I’ve said it before and I know I will say it again: We the People control this country, not the group of would-be-dictators sitting on their over inflated wallets in Washington. Tell your government what to do, and if they refuse, FIRE THEM! It’s not just our rights as Americans, it’s our duty.

Log off, hang up, tune in, and make some noise.

For anyone that thinks NASA is too expensive

NASA’s budget: $17 billion annualy

The War in Iraq: $12 billion per month

That is all.

Make Some Noise

The more news I listen to the more depressed I get. This country has been taken over by greedy, power hungry, tyrants. I, of course, use the term “taken over” somewhat loosely. The reality is we have allowed these people to keep their jobs. The founders of this country had a brilliant idea for government. It even worked for a while. Those days, however, are dead and gone.
Back in the early days of the USA the people loved their leaders. There was passion and love for their congressmen and presidents. Today kids can name more rock bands and sports stars than senators. No, that’s not true, it’s tax paying, voting adults, not children, that can’t name their own district’s congressman. Our goverment is breeding complacence and apathy. They are doing this because it makes their job of subverting our civil rights much easier. If we don’t care, we won’t stop them. And the media, one of the only ways people get their information, makes sure they toe the company line, staying on target (Britany Spears, the War on Drugs, the Surge is working) because if they don’t they might lose their almighty advertising dollars.
How do we get people to put down the xbox controller and find out what their government is actually doing? How do we get our country back on track? Do we vote for Hillary? Do we vote for Obama? Do we vote for McCain? Does it even matter which talking head we put in office? Every single elected official has made a promise to forget bipartisan politics and work for the greater good of the people, and then every single bill that comes across the table, the lines are clearly drawn. If a Democrat wrote the bill, the Republicans vote NO and vice versa. If, by some miracle, a bill is passed by both the house and senate, it dies on Bush’s desk.
Speaking of the President’s veto practice, lets take a look at his record. For his first term, with a Republican house and senate, Bush vetoed a total of one (1) bill. In fact, for the first 6 years of his Presidency, he did not issue a single veto. Not one. In November, 2006, the Democrats took control of the House and Senate. Bush met with top Dems and said “My attitude about this is that there is a great opportunity for us to show the country that Republicans and Democrats are equally as patriotic and equally concerned about the future and that we can work together.” By the end of 2007, he had issued 7 vetoes, a 600% increase. Perhaps he misunderstands what “work together” means.
Our country is off track, it has lost the moral high ground that we used to be able to wave proudly. We are allowing liars and tyrants to destroy our homeland and walk all over the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. We allow the President to get away with outright criminal behavior without so much as a blink. Nobody seems to care. If this were happening 30 years ago, the people would have stood up and taken to the streets. My generation, however, can’t be bothered. That has to change. We need to show those in charge that we won’t allow this to happen anymore. We need to change it. We CAN change it. Log off, hang up, tune in, and make some noise.

No More King Bush

This week President Bush asked Congress to make permanent a bill that will allow government agencies to perform wiretapping on American citizens without the need for a warrant. It seems the President has forgotten one of the most important parts of the government dreamed up and put in place by the founders of our country: checks and balances. We, the people, through our congressional representative, make the laws which bind not only us, but those that run the government as well. As such, we have created laws which make it necessary for any law enforcement agency to require a judge to approve any request to spy on, or in any way violate the right of privacy of, a citizen of the United States of America. Bush is now trying to remove this “barrier”, making it perfectly legal for his agents to spy on the citizens without judicial oversight. This is the Black Diamond of slippery slopes.

After the collapse of socialist Germany in the early 90’s, the free world was stunned to learn of the amount of documentation that government had held on individual citizens. In the offices of the secret police there were dozens of rooms containing hundreds of cabinets of documentation obtained by spying on the everyday activities of thousand upon thousands of citizens that were not under investigation for any actual crime. The German police were tracking these citizens for the sole purpose of making sure they were behaving as they were told. This is the same thing that is happening now in the United States.

Congress has already allowed this President to perform warrantless wiretapping. While uncomfortable, it wasn’t a surprise based on the mood and panic felt in this country post-9/11. Think, however, what it means that the wiretapping has to be done without court approval. It means the government does not have the evidence required for judicial approval. It means the agents of this government are obtaining and storing information on citizens that have done nothing wrong. They are violating the Privacy Act, a law put in place by us to protect ourselves and our freedom, for no other reason than because they think these citizens might be doing something the government doesn’t like.

As American citizens it our duty to ensure our President doesn’t forget his role. His job is to serve the people of the country. This President has been working very hard since 9/11 to change the meaning of the Presidency. It seems that instead of a tie, he believes he should be wearing a crown. He has abused the powers we granted him many times over. He has broken dozens of our laws and, when our representatives tried to question him and his agents about those violations, he abused his powers again to keep those agents from talking. He is violating our rights, he is violating our trust, and he is trying to take away our freedom. Our representatives must not allow him to take advantage of the American people any longer.

It’s true we will replace our President soon, but there is untold damage he can do if he is allowed to break any law he chooses between now and January, 2009. As a country it seems we’ve forgotten who is in charge. Our constitution says this is a country “of the people, by the people, for the people”. This is our country. We need to send a message today that we will no longer allow Bush to run this country as if it were his and his alone. The office of the President answers to us, not the other way around. We exact this control through congress and the senate. It is their job to run the government as we see fit. If they are not doing their job it’s not our duty, it’s our right to fire them and replace them with somebody who will do the job as we say. As such, every citizen in this country that values their privacy and their freedom needs to call or write their representative and senator and, as their boss, order them vote NO on the President’s request. It’s our country, let’s take it back.

The Plutonic Problem

Pluto Gets the Boot

PRAGUE, Czech Republic (AP) — Leading astronomers declared Thursday that Pluto is no longer a planet under historic new guidelines that downsize the solar
system from nine planets to eight.

Ok so yea, there is a little public outcry, but if you actually get down to the nuts and bolts of it this is a good decision. And I’ll (briefly) explain why.

Pluto was found in 1930. It took so long to find because it is really small compared to all the other classical planets in our solar system, in fact is is even smaller then our own moon! For comparison on what this means in Earth terms, our moon has approximately the same Land Area as Africa in terms of square miles. That means Pluto is, essentially, smaller then one of Earth’s continents.
Pluto’s orbit is also at a weird angle compared to that of the inner planets. To visualize, think of a dinner plate. Now put 8 peas, or cherries, or grapes on that plate in a line stretching from the center of the plate to the outer edge. If you were to spin that plate on its center point you would have a very basic model of how the classical planet’s orbits look. They revolve around the sun in the same “plane” Now take a Hula Hoop and put it around the dinner plate, but don’t lay it flat. Instead, you will need to prop one end of the hula hoop up about 2 feet. This is Pluto’s orbit. In scientific terms, Pluto’s orbital plane is tilted 17 degrees off of the System’s ecliptic plane.

One other thing to make note of, Pluto is not alone way out on the edge of our solar system. 2 years ago astronomers found another object that is even bigger then Pluto, and further away. This would be fine, except the region this object was found, and the region of space which is also occupied by Pluto, is known as the Kuiper belt (pronounced Kie-per). The Kuiper Belt is an area filled with small and medium sized chunks of ice that were leftovers from the formation of our system. The problem with calling Pluto a planet, is that the Kuiper already has over 1000 known objects that are regularly tracked by telescopes, and it is probably that it has up to a million objects that just haven’t been discovered yet.

If we call Pluto a planet, what do we call all the objects out there in the same orbital plane and the same general region of space? Do we increase the number of “known planets” in the Solar System to over 1000, or a million? Pluto has been a labeled as a planet since it was found, but in reality this is less then 100 years. In my view we are simply refining our definition based on new evidence. When Pluto was found, nobody knew about the Kuiper Belt. A better understanding of how things work often requires a re-classification of how things are labeled. Remember, in Galileo’s day the Earth was the center of the universe and everything in space was the exact same distance away attatched to a giant sphere known as the firmament, beyond which lay heaven and the gods. Where would we be if the scientific community refused to update their definition?

Speaking of which, the “definition of a planet” as decided by the IAU will very likely be revised as there are terms that don’t make sense. But the exclusion of Pluto as a classical planet will probably remain, and I think rightly so.
Ok I know I said “briefly” but come on, you guys know me. This is brief

 

In space vs. In orbit

Somebody asked me a bit ago why getting into space was easier then getting into orbit. The answer is a little complex and requires us to first define what each one actually is.

The actual point at which space begins is different depending on your point of view.
(From http://www.space.edu/projects/book/chapter3.html)
-At 18,000 feet, a pilot in an airplane without supplemental oxygen will begins to suffer hypoxia and be rendered unconscious within 30 minutes.
-At 9 miles altitude (47,520 feet) supplemental oxygen is no longer enough and the cabin of the aircraft (or the pilots flight suit) must be pressurized.
-At 15 miles (79,200 feet) the cabin pressurization is no longer efficient. This is because most aircraft compress outside air and pump it into the cabin or suit. At this altitude, there is not enough oxygen and nitrogen in the outside air to compress and still sustain human life. Therefore any aircraft at this altitude must have its own pressure and oxygen independent from the outside air. As far as a doctor is concerned, this is the beginning of space.
-At 20 miles (105,600 feet) turbojet engines begin to fail. There is not enough air to mix with the fuel for sustained combustion. At this point an aircraft must bring along its own oxidizer to mix with the fuel, and we call these rockets. For somebody working in propulsion, this is the beginning of space
-At 62 miles (327,360 feet) aircraft control surfaces no longer function to control the vehicle as there is not enough air pressure to create lift or drag. From an aerodynamic point of view, this is the beginning of space.

Last year Burt Rutan finally won the Space X-Prize. Some of the requirements for this contest was that the vehicle had to achieve an altitude of 62 miles, land back on earth, and then return to that altitude within 2 weeks, therefore producing a privately funded, reusable earth-to-space vehicle and opening the door to commercial space tourism.

And then last week Space Exploration Technologies made their first attempt at launching a spacecraft into orbit. If (more like, when) they achieve this, it will be another worlds first. It also a much more difficult feat. So how how is this different than what Burt Rutan already accomplished? This is where the definition of “orbit’ comes into play.

Being in orbit is basically falling towards the earth, and missing it each time. Isaac Newton once drew a nice diagram that shows this principal pretty well:

imagine a very large mountain poking up from the earth. On top of this mountain is a huge and infinitely powerful cannon. The person firing the cannon increases the amount of powder with each shot, adding velocity to each successive cannonball. Each time, the ball goes further until finally, at a certain velocity, the ball is moving so fast and going so far that it completely misses hitting the ground, and instead makes a complete circle around the earth.

In order to achieve orbit around Earth, a spacecraft needs to obtain a speed of 17,500 miles per hour or roughly 5 miles per second! At that speed a spacecraft will make one complete orbit of the Earth every 90 minutes, and in any 24 hour period it will orbit 16 times. This is what makes getting a space vehicle into orbit so difficult. The amount of energy required to lift even a small payload into orbit is tremendous. For example, the Saturn V used to launch to Apollo missions to the moon produced 7.6 million pounds of thrust (the Shuttle does not produce nearly as much thrust. The 3 main engines on the shuttle produce 1 million pounds of thrust combined, and each of the solid rocket boosters produce 1.5 million pounds for a combined total 4 million pounds) which is massive compared to, for example, the engines on a Boeing 747 which produce about 56,000 pounds each, or 224,000 pounds total.

In fact, the difficulty in achieving the minimum speed need in order to reach orbit with any significant payload is so great that those launching the rockets take every advantage they can. This is why NASA launches from Florida. Cape Canaveral is the closest point in the USA to the equator. The closer you get to the equator, the faster you are already moving because the Earth is spinning. Think of a bike wheel. If you hold onto the axle and give the wheel a spin, you can tell that the rubber part of the wheel is moving a lot fast than the spokes near your hand. The same principle holds true for the Earth. At the equator, the surface of the earth is moving along at over 1000 mph, in Florida it’s closer to 800 mph. The launch designers use this “free” momentum by launching the rocket in the same direction the Earth is spinning, thereby adding the 800 miles an hour to the craft right away.

Compared to all this, just “getting into space” is relatively easy. In fact pilots have been shooting their rocket powered aircraft (in the form of the X-15) into space for many years before we ever achieved a single actual orbit. They just dropped their planes from the bottom of a B-52, lit the rocket engines, and pulled the stick back. This is essentially what they did with Burt Rutans SpaceShip 1 vehicle as well. The only difference between it and the X-15 flights is that SpaceShip 1 was privately funded.

And who knows, maybe someday we’ll all get to travel into orbit aboard a commercial rocket, how cool would that be?