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The Strangest Moon In the Solar System
StartsWithABang writes Moons in our Solar System — at least the ones that formed along with the planets — all revolve counterclockwise around their planetary parents, with roughly uniform surfaces orbiting in the same plane as their other moons and rings. Yet one of Saturn's moon's, Iapetus, is unique, with a giant equatorial ridge, an orbital plane that doesn't line up, and one half that's five times brighter than the other. While the first two are still mysteries, the last one has finally been solved.
Viewed from which side? Counterclockwise does not apply here.
Yet one of Saturn's moon's, Iapetus, is unique
Aren't they all unique?
"Total destruction the only solution" - Bob Marley
We aren't all using tablets or phones. Looks like crap on my laptop.
As for the article, if you are going to casually use words like "sublimate" without definition, it means your target audience is sophisticated enough that you don't need to write using a breathless, made for reality TV, annoyingly *excited* tone.
I guess the people that used to read Time Magazine and Readers' Digest are the new target audience of Slashdot.
After all, we could have links to scientific papers or at least their abstracts written by actual scientists who studied the phenomena.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
Derp!
Technically, the moon isn't *yet* a planet, but will be in a few millions of years.
There is no "technically" in this case, as there is no formal definition of a double planet. Some people think the barycenter moving above the surface is the definition of a double planet, but that is in no way formal or "technically." Plenty of astronomers think that definition is not very useful, because changing distance between two bodies can always move the barycenter out of the surface of the larger one, while not changing the dynamics in any qualitative way. Jupiter already moves the barycenter of the solar system out of the Sun. Given the current objects known in the solar system though, there is no need for a formal definition of a double planet, because there is no need to specify such a category when naming one or two examples is enough.
The moon has been receding from the earth since its creation. The coincidence is that we are here to observe the moon during the time when the visual sizes are so similar.