Blogs / Bad Astronomy

The other day while at the gym, the TV was showing CNN. I couldn’t see the screen clearly, but the segment was about unusual clouds in New York… and how some people saw Michael Jackson’s face in them. At the time I thought the segment was serious, but in fact it was Jeanne Moos doing her gag schtick, as you can see on You Tube:

If you’re wondering about the actual MJ shot, here you go:

That’s a screen grab from the video. I suppose it looks a bit like Jackson, though, like most examples of faces in the clouds, it looks more like Lou Ferrigno. Or maybe a zombie. Take your pick.

Incidentally, the clouds in question here are called mammatus, and are actually quite common here in Colorado, and I’ve taken a lot of pictures of them, like the one shown here. I remember the first time I ever saw mammatus clouds; I was in Maryland and the remnants of a hurricane had swept through. The clouds were like little bulbs hanging down, and I had never seen anything like it before… so I’m not surprised that people freaked out a little.

But I wonder, just how many people really did think this was a sign of some sort?

Sham-on!

Tip o’ the sequined fedora to Skeptical Teacher.

I can rant and rail against homeopathy, how it’s useless, how it’s nothing more than water, how there is no real methodology or mechanics behind it, how it’s been shown over and over not to have any efficacy over the placebo effect…

… but sometimes simple mockery is the best way to sway people’s hearts.

Tip o’ the 30C vial to Bruce hood at SuperSense.

According to Discovery News, NASA has a "Plan B" program in case something happens with the Constellation program. It’s an alternative way to get back to the Moon, and they made a video for it.

There are some obvious advantages with taking Shuttle parts and using them in a new program. For one, the technology already exists and has been tested in well over 100 launches. For another, the machinery and manpower already exist as well, which would save billions of dollars in new development and training.

But I’m a little nervous seeing things like the same external tank being used that sheds foam on launch (in the video, the hardware mounted on the ET is protected by a fairing, but still, that doesn’t thrill me), and is prone to hydrogen vent leaks, like the leak that has delayed Endeavour’s launch for weeks. Second, the solid rocket boosters as they exist now are not the best tech; they are expensive and cost a lot to refurbish.

Now, it’s easy for me to poopoo this; it’s always easier to cast stones after the fact. Maybe this is a better idea than Constellation, and maybe not. I’ve never liked the Shuttle Orbiters; they are hugely overbuilt and extremely expensive. They are exquisite and amazing and all that, but from a cost/benefit point of view they’re a colossal waste of money. We need cheaper access to space! So not having an Orbiter on this Plan B Moonship is a good start.

I’ll be honest: I have not been able to follow all the intrigue going on with Constellation right now because it’s complex and there are machinations afoot that are complicated. But I find it extremely odd that — with only a handful of Shuttle launches left before an at least four year gap in being able to get people into space — NASA is still presenting plans for a Shuttle substitute. Seriously, NASA: this should’ve been in the bag five years ago. Ten. Then we wouldn’t be facing a lengthy gap where we have to rely on foreign partners to get to space, and domestic companies that, while their futures are very bright, do not have the capacity to launch people into space and won’t for several years.

Still, I’d rather have alternatives discussed now rather than build an expensive and untested rocket that might prove to be another ISS or Shuttle program: bloated and unable to do most of what was initially promised.

And let me say that this very fact ticks me off. I want access to space, and I don’t want a lot of corporate maneuvering and political sideshowing. But with hundreds of billions of dollars at stake and a government agency in charge, it’s what we get.

I still support a return to the Moon… if done correctly. But it’s things like this that make me wonder if this whole thing is a good idea on paper, but an impossibility in reality.

What must aliens think of us when they pick up our TV signals?

Abstruse Goose decided to figure it out:

I wonder what Lrrr from Omicron Persei 8 would say?

Tip o’ the brain slug to David Woods.

A lot of books are coming out right now to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Apollo 11. One of the best, called Voices from the Moon, is by my friends Andy Chaikin and Victoria Kohl.

Andy is familiar to Apollonuts: he wrote A Man on the Moon, considered by many (including me) to be the bible of Apollo, and he knows all the Apollo astronauts and their stories. I have a copy of Voices, and it’s a GORGEOUS book, loaded with extremely high-quality images of the missions, punctuated with wonderful stories from the astronauts themselves (hence the title).

The Hive Overmind has put up a gallery of beautiful images from the book, just to give you a taste of what’s there. If you’re looking for a gift for yourself or the space enthusiast in your life, this is the one to get.

Tonight on Showtime, Penn & Teller take on astrology! You can take a peek at the show online here (with the bad words edited out), or you can watch the show at 10:00 p.m. Eastern time.

I happen to know that a certain Beloved Internet Personality who blogs about astronomy and Doctor Who is on the show briefly as well. Well, it’s probably a good episode anyway, so you should order Showtime and watch it, and buy the DVDs as well.

Bonus ironic pun: the episode is directed by Star Price. Siriusly.

So, if you are totally convinced that astrology actually works, despite an entire Universe of evidence stomping on your face telling you you’re wrong, then you can give P&T a piece of your mind personally, since they’ll be at TAM 7. You can yell at them then… but be prepared to have Penn enthusiastically join that Universe of evidence.

And don’t forget:

[Update: Ken Bowley on Facebook clued me in that the LRO camera has a page where you can see the raw images, and zoom in — WAY in — on the image strips. They have 73 cm resolution, folks. Yikes.]

The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter has returned its first images from the Moon! Woohoo!

Check. It. Out!

Whoaaaa.

This image, taken in the Mare Nubium region of the Moon, shows a heavily cratered area. The scale here is amazing: the whole image is 1400 meters across, or just under a mile. That’s like looking out your airplane window… if you were over the frakking Moon! Even in this compressed image (click to embiggen) features just a few meters across are distinguishable. See that perfectly circular crater just to the right and a tad below the middle of the picture? It’s about 60 meters across, just a bit bigger than two tennis courts end-to-end. It would easily fit in a football stadium.

Holy Haleakala.

It’s a little difficult to interpret the image; for example, near the bottom in the middle I thought for a moment I saw a crater chain. I don’t think that’s real; our eyes tend to pick out linear features even when they aren’t there. Too bad, because that would be cool; crater chains form when an asteroid or comet breaks up before it hits, and we do see them on pretty much every cratered object in the solar system. You can also get them near a larger impact, when junk ejected from the crater splashes out and lands nearby.

I guarantee we’ll see lots of such chains as LRO snaps more pictures. Awesome.

Check this one too:

This image has the same scale as the other, and shows a region of low hummocks undulating across the Moon. I don’t have much to say scientifically about this particular picture, but I will say that it is eerily beautiful, and completely enthralling. I wouldn’t mind having that framed over my desk!

So there you go, folks. If you want to explore the Moon, all you have to do is sit back and wait for the images to roll in. And remember: when it settles into its final orbit, the pictures LRO takes will have a resolution of 0.5 meters, or 18 inches!

Wow. I cannot wait to see more.

P.S. If you liked this article, you might like this one as well where I dissect an image of the Moon taken from the space station.