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The Venus Transit and Hunting For Alien Worlds
astroengine writes "Forget simply detecting a slight 'dip' in brightness as an exoplanet transits in front of its star; soon we'll be able to image the event. What's more, by doing this we'll see that exoplanetary transits look exactly like the historic Venus transit that wowed the world on Tuesday. This is according to astronomer Gerard van Belle, of Lowell Observatory near Flagstaff, Ariz., who hopes to use an interferometer to carry out the mind-blowing goal of capturing the silhouettes of exoplanets drifting in front of distant stars. But that's not all: this whole effort may help us track down the first bona fide Earth-like alien world."
In case you missed it, NASA posted a bunch of great footage and pictures of the Venus transit, as did Boston.com's The Big Picture. Phil Plait pointed out a cool shot from Thierry Legault of a transit during a transit.
We shoulda blown it outta the sky before they invade anyway.
Nearly four months ago, I noticed that my internet connection was very sluggish. Eventually getting fed up with it, I began to seek out software that would speed up the gigabits in my router. After an hour of searching, I found what at first appeared to be a very promising piece of software. Not only did it claim it would speed up my internet connection, but that it would overclock my power supply, speed up my gigabits, and remove any viruses from my computer! "This is a fantastic opportunity that I simply can't pass up," I thought. I immediately downloaded the software and began the installation, all the while laughing like a small child. I was highly anticipating a future where the speed of my internet connection would leave everyone else's in the dust.
I was horribly, horribly naive. Immediately upon the completion of the software's installation, various messages popped up on my screen about how I needed to buy software to remove a virus that I wasn't aware I had from a software company I'd never once heard of. The strange software also blocked me from doing anything except buying the software it was advertising. Being that I was a computer whiz (I had taken a computer essentials class in high school that taught me how to use Microsoft Office, and was quite adept at accessing my Facebook account), I was immediately able to conclude that the software I'd downloaded was, in fact, a virus, and that it was slowing down my gigabits at an exponential rate. "I can't let this insanity proceed any further," I thought.
As I was often called a computer genius, I was confident at the time that I could get rid of the virus with my own two hands. I tried numerous things: restarting the computer, pressing random keys on the keyboard, throwing the mouse across the room, and even flipping an orange switch on the back of the tower and turning the computer back on. My efforts were all in vain; the virus persisted, and my gigabits were running slower than ever! "This cannot be! What is this!? I've never once seen such a vicious virus in my entire life!" I was dumbfounded that I, a computer genius, was unable to remove the virus using the methods I described. Upon coming to terms with my failure, I decided to take my computer to a PC repair shop for repair.
I drove to a nearby computer repair shop and entered the building with my computer in hand. The inside of the building was quite large, neat, and organized, and the employees all seemed very kind and knowledgeable. They laughed upon hearing my embarrassing story, and told me that they saw this kind of thing on a daily basis. They then accepted the job, and told me that in the worst case, it'd be fixed in three days from now. I left with a smile, and felt confident in my decision to leave the computer repairs to the experts.
A week later, they still hadn't called back. Visibly angry, I tried calling them countless times, but not a single time did they answer the phone. Their negligence and irresponsibility infuriated me, and sent me into a state of insanity that caused me to punch a gigantic hole in the wall. Being that I would require my computer for work soon, I decided to head over to the computer repair shop to find out exactly what the problem was.
Upon entering the building, I was shocked by the state of its interior; it looked as if a tornado had tore through the entire building! Countless broken computers were scattered all about the floor, desks were flipped over, the walls had holes in them, there was a puddle of blood on the floor, and worst of all, I saw that my computer was sitting in the middle of the room laying on its side! Absolutely unforgivable! I soon noticed one of the employees sitting behind one of the tipped over desks (the one that had previously had the cash register on top of it); he was shaking uncontrollably and sobbing. Despite being furious about my computer being tipped over, seeing him in that state still managed to make me less unforgiving. I decided to ask him what happened.
A few moments passed where the entire r
It made me wonder when I started to see pictures and video of the transit where I had seen something similar before. In Danny Boyles 'Sunshine', they have a CG scene of Mercury passing between them and the sun. It looks exactly like what we saw this week.
Maybe I am looking for another excuse to wear my tinfoil hat, but what happens if in order to get attention companies like NASA start simply releasing artistic impression as real ones? 50s through 80's saw drawings and artistic work used to help us gain a prospective of Science. Now it can fool us into thinking things exist.
It's generally a warning to readers that either there is no substance to what you're going to tell us, or we're about to hear the breathlessly-excited gossip of a 13-year old.
Try to stick to concisely telling us the facts, and let the story is be impressive on its own merits.
Moderately off topic...
My friend was very upset that she did not get to see it in person.
It seems a lot of newsspeak organizations were quoting "experts" that "there will be plenty of people with setups to view it", and that "the apparatus to view it is dead simple". But she didn't get to see it /directly/ because there were not sufficiently scientifically inclined people set up in her area to let her see it.
All it required a small amount of optics (binoculars), a mirror, and something to project the image onto. Getting to this point was beyond her, and it was beyond the people she worked with. It really drives home to me how disconnected science programs in schools are from cause/effect in reality.
It makes me wonder how much stuff that is "obvious" to us just doesn't filter down into the impact it makes on humans everyday lives.
This reminds me very much of a discussion I had with someone about "the theory of evolution" when I pointed out that dropping an object was a demonstration of "the theory of gravity". She was appalled that gravity was considered a theory from a scientific point of view -- "You mean you don't know how this stuff works?!?"; I had to explain that yes, we knew *how* it worked, we just didn't know *why* -- the same as evolution.
The idea that people can do science (maybe Science, with a capitol 'S'?) with stuff they have lying around their house is probably not emphasized enough; it made me want to become a science teacher, but of course I'm not qualified, only being a physicist and a computer scientist, and not havig a degree in education, or being a member of a teachers union.
Makes me worry about the future more than I already do.
-- Terry
Don't let some goofy scientist tell you otherwise.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
From TFA:
We're not just trying to take pictures of stars and see them as disks -- which is something we can do
That was new to me, so I did some digging. The Hubble was the first telescope to do this, in 1996. It's quite incredible that we can now do this.
Annoyingly, searching Google for 'image disk star' gives loads of false positives (protoplanetary disks).
There was an intergalactic alignment and so the world just ended!
I was reading an article when the solar eclipse was coming about and the upcoming Venus event on yahoo. I was astounded and dismayed to see the comments below, with so many people asking, "Can someone reply to me and tell me about this? I'm too lazy to read the article." I normally either ignore idiotic comments or try to make reasonable discussion, but in these cases, I replied somewhere along the lines, "Fuck off, read it yourself."
I mean, to think--it's not as if the article was riffed from a super-scientific study that required a master's in science and astronomy to make sense of it. It's one thing if someone DOES read it and wants further information, but to have someone act like they can't be bothered but find it cool anyway but can't be bothered... it actually makes me angry, because you just know how many of them would eat up a stupid report about 'Jersey Shore' without asking for internet Cliff Notes. Maybe I'm just an astronomy snob (I had a coworker say "it's the same thing, really," when I pointed out that astronomy and astrology were NOT the same thing; I gritted my teeth about it all day), but if you want to discover something cool, sometimes you gotta read a few paragraphs. /end rant
You want to know how to help your kids? LEAVE THEM THE F*&K ALONE. --George Carlin
Makes me worry about the future more than I already do.
""Cheer up, Flicka. Always remember that, when things seem darkest, they usually get considerably worse."
Heinlein "Podkayne of Mars", 1953. In a quote that is one of the earliest written references to a cell phone. How's that for going off topic?
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
The last link is just awesomesauce. That is all.
You want to know how to help your kids? LEAVE THEM THE F*&K ALONE. --George Carlin
Using the 'wait until a planet crosses between us and the star it is orbitting" is not a particularly effective way of finding other planets
.
Unless we are in the same plane as the system, we are not going to find anything, and even then its not going to happen very often.
The idea that people can do science (maybe Science, with a capitol 'S'?) with stuff they have lying around their house is probably not emphasized enough; it made me want to become a science teacher, but of course I'm not qualified, only being a physicist and a computer scientist, and not having a degree in education, or being a member of a teachers union.
As entrenched and parochial as the university academic establishment is these days, being a secondary school instructor should seem like a breath of fresh air. Unless you've got an assistant/associate professor's gig at a medium to large university, the pay would be about the same, and there are usually more science teachers needed than research associates. Not to mention the lives you could change, even if you just made a fraction of each graduating class learn to love science more.
They've never been in space. It was a domestic spy drone. It's just another one of the Obamalist coverups, wrapped in a NASA conspiracy.
It's like you don't know anything. ;-)
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
Whats the difference between a planet passing in front of it's star or Colossus flicking a bugar? Please the time spans with a cyclical analysis sounds to intensive.
and I have a picture of a car moving past my house.
image the event
Wrong.
capturing the silhouettes of exoplanets drifting in front of distant stars
Wrong. RTFA before posting a summary, please.
Whats the big deal? Planits are transiting the sun every day: we are just not in the right place to see them, The usefulness of this event ended 200 years ago. Get over it.
Heavy is the head that wears the tinfoil hat.