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Venus Transit Finished
KjetilK writes "Venus is just about to cross the solar disc.
Direct from the control room in the Frogner Park in Oslo, I'm pleased to inform you that we have a great webcast, and as far as we know, it is the only webcast that still stands upright... Slashdotters, do your worst! ;-) A Venus transit is one of the most unique astronomical events in our time, in fact, no living person has witnessed it before today. And today, more people have seen it from the park where I'm sitting that in the rest of human history. Also, it had tremendous importance for the development of science, as it gave the first absolute measurements of distances in the solar system. Especially in 1769, a transit made science take huge leaps forward. And BTW, New Zealand and Australia were 'discovered' in the process" Some nice photos from the UK, photos from vt-2004.org, and if you missed it, it'll be eight short years till you can try again.
If you were lucky, you may have been able to see the ISS transit the sun at the same time. Details on Thomas Fly's site: http://iss-transit.sourceforge.net/IssVenusTransit .html
It could be worse, it could be Monday.
Just wanna share with you folks some pics I took using nothing but the most basic equipment, including using a piece of Epson inkjet paper for projecting the image...
www.rexguo.com - Technologist + Designer
We'll have bigger concerns in 8 years than some passing planet...
`it'll be eight short years till you can try again.' now, this is truly significant event in astronomy.
A few years ago I bought a book that mapped all of the voyages that Cook had undertaken. It also showed copies of all the maps that he had with him when he went on his voyage of "discovery" when he visited Oz in 1770.
..
Cook knew there was a continent there from all of those maps and also from the accounts of all the other sailors that had been tooling around the area during the previous century. So he never really discovered it per se, more just claimed it for England. In fact as he was running around the Sydney area, the Frenchman La Perouse was also in the same area at the same time.
If anything the discovery of Oz by westerners should be credited to the Dutch, who ran into the west coast when they forgot to turn left on their trips around South Africa, and up to the East Indies. Google for Dirk Hartog and the silver plate he nailed to a tree well before Cook was a glimmer in his fathers eye. If the areas the Dutch had seen had a been a little bit more fertile, instead of bordering on major desert, then they might have wanted to spend a bit more time there. But when you are colonising sort of chap, a very dry west coast is not really all that appealing.
Of course if you want true discovery you have to go back to Aborigines who have been here for more than 40,000 years. And before you discount them as primative stone age relics, have a read of Guns Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond, and consider that their society was STABLE for 10s of THOUSANDS of years. Anyone want to take bets if western society can remain stable for another 100 years?????
Finally we have to thank you Yanks for the actual colonisation of Oz by the Brits. If you hadn't had that little war of independence back a few years ago, the Brits would not have had to find a new location for their crims. And I would have grown up speaking with a North American accent
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Though it is certainly true that astronomers of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries spent a great deal of time and energy travelling to the far corners of the Earth to observe transits of Venus, these rare events were NOT their only chances to measure the absolute size of the solar system. Simultaneous or near-simultaneous measurements of Mars or certain asteroids also allow one to derive absolute distances via parallax; although the targets are more distant than Venus, they provide significantly better observing conditions and references for astrometry. Cassini, for example, used measurements of Mars in 1672 to calculate the Astronomical Unit (the distance between Earth and Sun) to better than 10 percent.
Still, transits of Venus were certainly a major focus for the astronomical community. I wrote up material on the geometry and history of transits for a seminar: read it for yourself . There are links to other good sites at the end of my lecture.
Michael Richmond "This is the heart that broke my finger."
mwrsps@rit.edu http://stupendous.rit.edu
Here is the best photo you'll see of this morning's transit. Taken by Jerry Zhu a member of the Amateur Astronomers Association of Pittsburgh.
LINK
Look down the page to see the "ring of light" images which prove Venus has an atmosphere (as if we didn't already know).
-berek halfhand
I wake up to the voice of my girlfriend mentioning the Venus transit. "Yeah, hon, I heard about that." She has begun looking for some strong sunglasses, as she isn't at all blonde. Actually she put 3 different sunglasses in parallell (or series?) and is off outside to check it out.
Back in she comes, excited having seen it. I begin to feel obliged to give it a go myself, so I borrow the wierd 3X-sunglass montage and head out to the window.
AAAAAAAAAAH! SWEET HELL, MY EYES!
After drying out the gallons of putrid liquid that was once my right eye, she is off to find the clip-on sunglasses for my driving glasses, giving us a 4X-sunglass montage.
UUUUUUUUUNGGH! I CAN'T SEE!
Similar fate bestown upon my other orb. I try adding shaded anti-static plastic bags (those you keep hard disks and RAM chips in) to our quad-shades, but now everything is so blurry I can't tell whether its the plastic, continous pouring liquid or permanent eye damage. And I've yet to see the darn Venus. Bummer.
On the plus side, I've been feeling like I'm in a FPS all day, due to the newly aquired crosshairs burned eternally into my retina...
Actually, where I was observing, for the first few minutes after sunrise, the sun was behind some very thick haze/thin clouds and you could see the transit happening with the naked eye and no filter!* We even had it in an 8" telescope without a solar filter for a few minutes!* It was amazing!!
*Kids, don't try this at home! And adults too for that matter... unless sanctioned by professional observational astronomers
Here's a few other pictures from a photography message board I frequent:
e .jpg
Nice color:
http://www.pbase.com/image/29906625
Impressive quality:
http://cakeru.image.pbase.com/image/29912804/larg
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Venus Transit of June 8, 2004 - A Breakthrough of Intuitive Awareness.
Sure it's not the end of the world but superstitious lunaticism nevertheless...
The owls are not what they seem
Astronomers can then compare these four timings as seen from different locations, a known distance apart. Using some fairly simple geometry the distance between the Earth and the Sun can be calculated.
The method described apparently requires the astronomers to have synched clocks spread out over the globe. Since NTP was not in widespread use in 1716, how did they manage to keep the clocks in sync despite the long distances, different time zones and slow rates of travel back then?
Not saying it's impossible, but it seems like it would be an interesting problem. Anybody know the answer?
It was a great event :)
Our norwegian, super-enthusiastic astrophysiologist, Knut Jørgen Røed Ødegaard, really made my day. Props to him for being who he is, a real geek without being afraid of showing it. And he thinks these things are so extremely fun, that I think so myself.
And the best of it all was that he asked his girlfriend to marry him, in the middle of the whole set. Mad, mad, mad man. But still so great, and so much fun.
Well, and to argue against those just saying "What the heck, it's just a black spot": Well, if I only had the chance of singing "Amazing Grace" once every century, I'd probably do it. Not because it's a good song, but because it's special. After all, it just happens once every seldom time. And the last time, it gave us many answers to astroscientific questions.
Phew, no getting up at 5:30 for astrological events the next few weeks.
In a documentary on the origins of the chronometer, they mentioned the use of observations of Jupiter's moons, along with a set of tables, as a method of determining time.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
A short reminder should be enough. In this case something like, "DO NOT LOOK AT THE SUN!" (said throughout the presentation) should be enough. If they start to explain the reasons, then the warning gets lost.
Reminds me of the heat wave in France, I think it was last year. The government gets blamed for the weather - or at least not re-telling people that it gets hot in the summer and you could dehydrate and die.
The interesting thing is that some people haven't yet learned the when-the-frying-pan-is-hot-it-burns concepts and need a reminder every sunny day.
In years past, I used to get amused that the weather forecaster would give the reminders, but now understand that there are many who haven't made the connection yet - and probably never will.
My brother in the UK snapped a few pictures using a pair of binoculars and a bit of cardboard.
Worst BBC News Stories
I posted this when Slashdot ran the previous Venus transit story, but I'm afraid that not many people had the chance to read it, because I was pretty late into the discussion. Anyway, you don't get to read something like this every day, and the quote can be read in context now, this month, and never again.
"There will be no other [transit of Venus] till the twenty-first century of our era has dawned upon the earth, and the June flowers are blooming in 2004. What will be the state of science when the next transit season arrives God only knows." - William Harkness, USNO, 1882.
http://tech.pomfretschool.org/~jl/images/venustran sit.jpg
This website has ready-made movies for your downloading convenience.
Sadly, no.
Check out this article that links the Transit of Venus to the Islamic prophecies of the Black Winds of Death, an al-Qaeda plot to attack on the 1,000th day of terror and setting off a volcano in Yellowstone with a nuke.
I'd say that pretty much defines "lunatic."
In Soviet Russia, sig types you!