Since we’ve been talking about snow quite a bit recently, this seems fitting. WUWT reader Tom in Texas tips us to this image:
A composite of archival Hubble data taken with the Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 and the Advanced Camera for Surveys. Like a whirl of shiny flakes sparkling in a snow globe, Hubble caught this glimpse of stars in the globular cluster M13. The cluster is home to over 100,000 stars, packed closely together in a ball approximately 150 light-years across, and is located at a distance of 25,000 light-years. Picture: AFP / NASA / ESA
Click here to see a high-res version of the Hubble snow globe I wonder what the sky would look like from a world in the center of that cluster? Would some of the stars look like bright marbles in the sky?
If you really want to see some interesting things from the HST, have a look at this gallery:
Hubble Space Telescope Advent Calendar 2009
Like the photo above, it gives some perspective about our place and scale in the universe.
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“Danimals (09:42:00) :
No significant rise in CO2 either analzed for last 150 years or for last 5 decades?? ”
see
http://wattsupwiththat.com/?s=bombshell+from+bristol
“KlausB (09:48:34) :
Dirk, costs do only come down when you have multiples to build, especially multiples at the same time. With time lags and technological changes and enhancements, which surely will occure, you allways have a prototype and
the costs of a prototype. ”
Development costs also come down, think CAD , CAE . Two more examples:
– Leisurely communicating across continents in 2009 without paying a dime. What we do here. Contrast that to 1950.
– The examples earlier in the thread for the achievements of modern day amateur astronomers. I like the pics in http://www.yankee.us.com/images2.html .
Taking pictures like that would have been impossible in 1950 without a huge budget.
Well of course you might see where my argument is leading: Technological Singularity, Vernor Vinge, Ray Kurzweil, all that.
Ah well, it’s a philosophical question. Saying a civilization manages to send out exactly 3 huge spaceships and then perishes is a little arbitrary in my opinion… but thankfully the future of mankind doesn’t depend on our disagreement. You say 3, i say as many as we like. Virgin Galactic Interstellar or something.
Happy New Year 🙂
A theoretical question then:
Could “science” as we know it have started on a planet with 100% cloud cover like Jupiter, Saturn, or Venus?
Nothing to look up and wonder (the sun, stars, and planets) to inspire the first scientists; nothing to “measure” about light or gravity to inspire Einstein’s and the nuclear dynamics of stars.
Chemistry? Geology? Biology? Seems they derived (here) from the astronomers’ curiosity, not vice vesa
Photon without a Higgs,
The universe is believed to be about 13 billion years old, and shaped roughly like a football (no kidding). NASA has some amazing photographs and diagrams on their APOD site, see below.
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap050925.html
Just went through the comments quickly, but didn’t see this link:
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/archivepix.html
There are many, many beautiful and educational photos at the link.
RACookPE1978 (12:04:14) :
A theoretical question then:
Could “science” as we know it have started on a planet with 100% cloud cover like Jupiter, Saturn, or Venus?
First, assume that the species spends some amount of time on land, preferably at dry spots. Some lightning is also helpful.
At some point they will discover fire and how to use it.
Then, if they have any curiosity, they will put stuff in the fire to see what happens. Science will proceed from this beginning.
At some point after they notice that heat rises, they may experiment with hot air balloons. If they have creatures that go off into the sky like birds, they may consider flying devices. Once they realize they can get off the ground, then getting up high enough to touch the sky, the cloud cover, becomes a goal.
And when they find out there is something above their sky…
Note that this would apply to a cloud-covered world period, as neither Jupiter, Saturn, nor Venus seem hospitable to “life as we know it” thus the question is moot for them.
Anthony, Tom in Texas, and everyone who posted photo links: Thanks for this present on the last day of the year. I feel like a kid again, full of wonder. May 2010 bring more wonder to us all.
Thank you, something to use our sense of wonder at this year’s end of our tiny planet, just exquisitely beautiful.
Roger Sowell: The universe is believed to be about 13 billion years old, and shaped roughly like a football (no kidding).
Nooo… it’s not shaped like a football. The map @ur momisugly http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap050925.html is a Hammer-Aitoff projection. For comparison, see: http://earth.rice.edu/mtpe/geo/geosphere/topics/mapping/40_hammer.html
Robinson (06:16:39) :
> What interests me about globular clusters is why they don’t collapse into a single gigantic star/supernova. Are they orbiting a mutual centre of gravity?
One reason is the same as to why the Earth doesn’t collapse into the Sun – our motion relative the sun isn’t aimed at the Sun. (If it were a right angle all the time, we’d have a circular orbit. It isn’t, so we have an elliptical orbit.)
If two stars in a cluster approach each other, they follow highly eccentric, nearly parabolic paths and (nearly always) miss each other. Sometimes a star gains enough kinetic energy from a couple close approaches so that it’s kicked out of the cluster. The lost of energy makes the remaining stars pack a little more closely together.
For some real fun, download the free software found at http://www.stellarium.org/.
You can view the stars as they appear from your locale and time. You can also locate prominent objects such as M13.
This object is also known as the Hercules Nebula and can be easily seen with the unaided eye in dark skies. You’ll need binoculars or telescope within the city.
Hercules is setting now and won’t be visible until about an hour before dawn.
You’ll be able to easily see tonight’s Blue Moon, except in the eastern hemisphere when January 2010 will have two full moons.
See http://www.earthsky.org/tonighthome/2009-12-31/url
Thanks Jack, I plan to do a post on Stellarium, a wonderful program.
Actually, for those interested … we don’t know the shape of the universe or if it is infinite. We only know that space is expanding and what we see in our ‘light speed event horizon’ arose from a very dense region of space. Einstein’s Theory suggests a singularity … I’m just getting into what modified gravity (MOG) says about the beginning of what we see in the light spectrum (not just visible).
Happy New Year, Anthony and all those contributors to WUWT! You are intellectual relief in a Machiavellian Realpolitik Zeitgeist world.
Re: Apparent expansion of the Universe.
The explanation of this purely observational phenomenon is written on every right rear view car mirror in the United States.
Beautiful star cluster, by the way. I made it a screen desktop background.
I wish good health and prosperity to every rationally thinking person on our healthy and prosperous planet!
WE SHALL OVERCOME SOME NIGHT
HAPPY NEW YEAR 2010!
Whether anti or pro AGW, scientist or other walk of life
May the road rise up to meet you.
May the wind be always at your back.
May the sun shine warm upon your face;
the rains fall soft upon your fields and until we meet again,
may God hold you in the palm of His hand.
For those with clear dark night skies, log on to http://www.heavens-above.com/
The sky, satellites, comets can be checked from your location on earth. I find the satellite pass times quite accurate. A fun observation not mentioned is to watch the docking/undocking of the Shuttle from the ISS.
NASA should stick to what it does best, space exploration.
Those of you who don’t know about this free software to facilitate star gazing might enjoy having it.
http://www.skyviewcafe.com/
ORIGINAL SOURCE(S)
http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/image_feature_1552.html
http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/archive/releases/2008/40/
http://www.spacetelescope.org/images/html/opo0840a.html
A nice video on M13 (and other globular clusters).
with more here.
http://astronomy2009.nasa.gov/topics_jun.htm
Ric Werme (06:54:27) :
I’ve long wondered what the night sky looks like to an owl.
Probably the same way it looks through Night Vision Goggles — “amazing.”
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Erik Anderson (09:50:44) :
gtrip: It’s pretty, but can in support life?
Doubtful. Globular clusters are ancient objects formed in the early universe and have very low metalicity (i.e., few elements heavier than Hydrogen and Helium). There has been one planet discovered orbiting a pulsar in another globular cluster, M4. It’s believed to be a Jupiter-like gas giant; perhaps all planets in globular clusters are such.
********
Erik I’d agree, rocky (iron & silicon) planets may be rare to almost non-existent in an ancient dust & gas-free globular. And so might be life, unless it can develop on icy moons of gas-giants.
beautiful pictures, love it