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Galaxy Zoo Produces a Rare Specimen
We discussed the Galaxy Zoo project soon after it launched last summer. Science News is now following developments about an odd celestial object
that is fueling a lot of excitement among astronomers around the world. In August, a Dutch schoolteacher named Hanny, in the process of characterizing galaxy images, noticed a peculiar object and posted a query about it on the Galaxy Zoo blog. She called it a "Voorwerp," which Science News says is Dutch for "thing" but which Google translates as "subject." Hanny's Voorwerp emits mostly green light (the earlier report said blue). The best guess astronomers have now is that the Voorwerp is emitting "ghost light," i.e. it is "lit by the ultraviolet light and X-rays from a quasar that has vanished in the last 100,000 years," to quote astronomer Bill Keel. "As far as we can tell, it's an unprecedented thing," Keel added. Researchers are scrambling to book time on the Hubble and other major telescopes to get a closer look.
this is the first time I've ever seen slashdot put an image in the post- welcome to 2001, guys!
Username taken, please choose another one.
Voorwerp is 'thing' in Dutch. But when you would like to say 'thing' in Dutch, you would obviously use 'ding'.
Support Eachother, Copy Dutch Property!
The correct translation would be 'object'. I can understand the confusion with 'subject', but Dutch people would then say 'onderwerp', never 'voorwerp'.
That's my taxi-ride home. Thank Xenu!
Careful What You Wish For....
..and we're about to have an Outside Context Problem
Free the Quark 3 from asymptotic confinement! Bring your charm! Don't get down! All colours and flavours welcome!
That's no moon.
My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my Father! Prepare to die!
I didn't know that was a word.
That was the sound I made last time I threw up.
Whodathunkit.
If "disco" means "I learn" in Latin, does "discothèque" mean "I learn technology"?
W00t! Another one bites the dust!
I would translate "Voorwerp" as "Object".
It's weird. That thing, whatever it might be, is probably quadrillions times bigger than our Earth, it's looking at us, and we have no idea what it is.
I for one welcome our new Voorwerp-overlords.
As long as there are slaughterhouses, there will be battlefields.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy!
Invenio via vel creo
How far away is this 'thing' and what sort of red shift should we be factoring into its true color?
Once that has been answerd, what sorts of atoms would emit that wavelength when excited by a radiation source?
Have gnu, will travel.
Andy
Where is the "Don't feed the Voorwerp" sign?
Did anyone else see Kermit the Frog in this image?
I'd say it's God's booger.
To follow the story of the Voorwerp see the following entries in the Galaxy Zoo Blog: http://www.galaxyzooblog.org/2008/01/18/more-on-the-voorwerp http://www.galaxyzooblog.org/2008/01/31/the-mystery-of-the-voorwerp-deepens http://www.galaxyzooblog.org/2008/03/20/voorwerp-fever http://www.galaxyzooblog.org/2008/05/30/whats-an-astronomers-favourite-birthday-gift
No.
Its because those pics only use 3 of the 5 colour channels.
As there are no R/G/B sensors, everything is an approximation.
Some of the early ones looked blue, even though green would be a better optical equivalent (most likely because they weighted some near UV radiation as blue)
HI O WISE PRINCE. WHT TOOK U SO DAM LONG?
'Voorwerp' would be most accurately traslated as 'Object'.
Dutch does have this distinction. Green is 'groen' and blue is 'blauw'.
Morality is usually taught by the immoral.
Well thanks. I was trying to look this up but obviously my google-foo has failed me.
"object" is indeed the most appropriate translation in this case.
I recommend photon torpedoes.
Thing at sector 5, 7 : "AAAAAIIIIIIIEEEEEEEAAAAAAAUUUUUUGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!!!"
Thing at sector 5, 7 : "HACK! HACK! COUGH! *CHOKE!*"
Mr. Spock : "FASCINATING!"
Let's start running away now. greenfly
http://www.astr.ua.edu.nyud.net/keel/research/voorwerp.html
Looks more like a Quagaar to me.
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
Quite an experience to live in fear, isn't it? That's what it is to be a slave.
T
Laws are horrible moral guides, moral guides make even worse laws.
That's a Dangerous.
And that one?
That's also a Dangerous.
All Voorwerps are Dangerous.
"Kill 'em all and let Root sort 'em out"
I suppose that's talking semantics but then again, it is the more accurate translation.
Oh yea; ghost light, cool!!
really should have turned the extractor fans on in the bathroom.
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
It's the coolest name for a celestial object yet! And you just know that they'll try to slide it into a future Doctor Who. I can't wait to see David Tarrent try to keep a straight face whilst talking about the Vishnish aliens inhabiting the local Voorwerp.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
I grew up in South Africa, speaking mainly English, but also Afrikaans (a derivative of Dutch) and Zulu. My father and I would often mix all three in one sentence to get the words we wanted.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
Folks ask, "Why the rush?" to get time on the Hubble and other instruments.
Simply put, astronomical events can be extremely short lived. Yes, it happened millions of years ago. And it could continue for millions of years. But just as it appeared, it could go out.
Think what happens to novas and super novas. They blink into existence and then disappear. The same could happen here. Having never seen this class of voorwerp (object, thing, etc.), it is possible it could go out tomorrow or change dramatically in way which would make baseline data of the current status incredibly valuable.
Going a bit off topic here, I have to say it is totally cool to see a reference to my old friend and fellow Geek, Bill Keel here on Slashdot.
Bill and I attended UC Santa Cruz in the 1980s. I entered as a Freshman while Bill was finishing up his Phd in Astronomy (by the way, UC Santa has the top graduate program in Astronomy).
Even then he was the galaxy nerd and his dissertation was on the topic of, if I remember correctly, formation of spiral galaxies. I remember helping him with nroff and troff as he put his dissertation together.
During his Post-Doc years, he would come back frequently to perform observations at Lick Observatory (above San Jose) and to crunch data using a program written in Forth that ran on a handful of systems in the world (one of which was at UCSC).
Our friendship continued over the years (I was even one of his groomsmen).
Bill is a passionate teacher and researcher. He is very supportive of amateur astronomy (one of the few fields left where a non-professional, non-academic can have a major impact).
If you want to learn more about galaxies, check out one of his many web pages here: http://www.astr.ua.edu/keel/galaxies/.
Obviously. I can't believe that we're the only two people to see it. Mod parent up!
cat sig >
Astronomer1: Oh my God! It just disappeared. It's a ghost-light! [reels away from the telescope] There are ghost-lights all over these skies, you know.
Astronomer2: [timid] Hold me.
Astronomer1: [conciliatory] Only if you hold me.
Voorwerp? Sounds something like the Juffo-wup the Mycon were interested in.
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
Does anyone know why the image Slashdot and Science News choose to display depicts the "Voorwerp" as Green while a Google Image Search depicts the "Voorwerp" as blue in all of the top results?
We must evacuate to a near by pulsar quickly!
Better to regret something you have done, then something you haven't.
It looks like mozilla to me
Can someone tell me what colour it is in hex codes? Cheers.
You can't really see this from a static picture, but I think I have figured out the true nature of this object. Subsequent pictures should show the lower half (the part that looks like an open mouth) is actually a pair of huge legs in a seemingly closed position. These legs actually open and close in a predictable rhythm. Also not shown in the picture is the turret moving around attempting to track this thing as it rapidly zips back and forth across the cosmos, getting ever closer to the turret below.
If we had captured this picture millions of years ago, we would have seen a tight formation of these objects moving across the galaxy in perfect unison. Alas, the turret has eliminated all but one of these things, so we missed out on a great spectacle.
So, to sum up, it's either a thing or an object, and it's green, blue, ultra-violet or x-ray. Luckily astronomer Bill Keel leaps to the rescue with a more comprehensive explanation: "it's an unprecedented... thing."
It's Vulcan! Or perhaps that's where little green men com from.
Quite possibly the first time in history that a joke became MORE funny after being explained. Kudos.
The hi-res version looks like Gumby making a basketball hoop with his arms.
Tiller's Rule: Never use a word in written form that you've only heard and never read. You will end up looking foolish.
Clearly it is a galaxy full of Slashdot readers.
* Insert here joke about our new Voorwerp Overlords. *
The Dutch word 'voorwerp' means object, thing you can touch and move(a book, a pen, a tree, a desk, a computer, ...).
Sometimes it's used for the subject line for email (though 'onderwerp' would have been the better translation).
Thus the google translator confusion.
Pieter Jansegers
pieterjansegers.ning.com
Did anyone else read this and think: Oh no, it's the Ghost Light!
It is the "thing" that should not be.
"Without curiosity and knowledge, the mind is a vast void. Without the mind, curiosity and knowledge are nonexistent."
Galaxy Zoo was an interesting concept. Kind of like Mersenne Prime searching, only using wetware instead of software.
The trouble with wetware is that it is time-sensitive, knows that time on earth is finite, and the count always goes backward.
When it seemed that the same damn photos were appearing over and over, I gave up.
I am glad to see something of interest was found.