If you have 4 minutes and 8 seconds, why not spend them a billion kilometers away, and let my friend astronomer Carolyn Porco give you a tour of Saturn as seen through the eyes of the Cassini mission.
I promise, you’ll be glad you did.
Tip o’ the dew shield to MandyDax.
If you went to BadAstronomy.com and found yourself here, never fear: the BA Blog has moved to its new home at Discover Blogs. The original BA site (with the Moon Hoax debunking and all that) is still online, too.
Phil Plait, the creator of Bad Astronomy, is an astronomer, lecturer, and author. After ten years working on Hubble Space Telescope and six more working on astronomy education, he struck out on his own as a writer. He has written two books, dozens of magazine articles, and 12 bazillion blog articles. He is a skeptic, and fights misuses of science as well as praising the wonder of real science.
Contact me: The Bad Astronomer "at" gmail "dot" com
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"Reading this book is like getting punched in the face by Carl Sagan. Frightening, but oddly exhilarating."
-- Daniel H. Wilson, author of How to Survive a Robot Uprising
DISCOVERmagazine.com: Latest Articles on Space DISCOVER Blogs: The Loom
November 10th, 2008 at 5:17 pm
That reference to the saucer, Huygens, that was sent down to Titan’s surface makes me suddenly realize:
We ARE the Saucer People.
November 10th, 2008 at 5:26 pm
Hey, Phil, have you heard about Phoenix?
November 10th, 2008 at 5:28 pm
Nicely edited and scored. It’s the kind of piece that would be great to tune into on NASA TV which is usually about as interesting as watching paint dry in a space station.
November 10th, 2008 at 5:49 pm
This is why i visit BA. Thank you Dr. Plait.
November 10th, 2008 at 6:08 pm
I believe that this video is a part of this talk @ TED.
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/carolyn_porco_flies_us_to_saturn.html
Another Phil.
November 10th, 2008 at 6:13 pm
Doh – requires Quicktime. Don’t suppose there’s a non-Quicktime version anywhere? (QT nearly gave me a nervous breakdown with its unending, usually failing, incessantly needy download behaviour. Had to uninstall it before I broke something.)
November 10th, 2008 at 6:27 pm
Umm… no mention that Chandrayaan-1 is now in lunar orbit?
November 10th, 2008 at 7:07 pm
This kind of production should be on Nasa TV.
November 10th, 2008 at 7:26 pm
Those images of Titan gave me the chills! Awesomtastic post!
November 10th, 2008 at 8:02 pm
Wonderful…the cool thing to me is that I recognized those images, and they were all available in near real time when they were photographed if you were willing to sift through the raw photo data they have at the Cassini site. To think we can sit in our living rooms and look at pictures taken millions and millions (I didn’t say “Billions”
) just the day before…that’s the science fiction come true.
Thanks BA
November 10th, 2008 at 9:19 pm
Wicked cool (as colleagues of mine say up in Maine)! And the comments on that web page get even more off topic than they do here!
November 10th, 2008 at 9:29 pm
I think I already mentioned here sometime ago the amazing talk by Carolyn Porco at TedTalks . Check it out. It’s one of the most inspiring talks EVAH!
November 11th, 2008 at 12:53 am
Fantastic. That was Carl Sagan-level of awe and inspiration.
November 11th, 2008 at 5:11 am
Hey, I get it. Gian Domenico Cassini and Christiaan Huygens.
Or was that the other way around… ?
November 11th, 2008 at 6:40 am
@IVAN3MAN
Of course not. Chandrayaan-1 is just another hoax like the Chinese space walk and the moon landing.
November 11th, 2008 at 6:57 am
So Saturn is his first name? What’s his last?
The video is wonderful, thanks for posting this.
November 11th, 2008 at 7:09 am
@Pieter Kok
Saturn Poseidon Smith
November 11th, 2008 at 8:14 am
An emotional thank you
November 11th, 2008 at 10:58 am
Todd: Poseidon = Neptune.
November 11th, 2008 at 11:06 am
D’oh! I knew something seemed off. His last name is Smith, though. I have it on good authority.
November 11th, 2008 at 12:29 pm
And it’s Jupiter Jones.
November 11th, 2008 at 2:19 pm
Another Phil Says: “I believe that this video is a part of this talk @ TED.”
Wow! Carolyn Porco for president!
- Jack
November 11th, 2008 at 6:32 pm
Another Phil, yes, that is a great talk with a lot of great images.
malwae. there are a couple of flash versions listed in the RD.net article.
November 11th, 2008 at 6:33 pm
Also, yay, my first “tip o’ the”!
November 15th, 2008 at 1:54 am
[...] If you went to BadAstronomy.com and found yourself here, never fear: the BA Blog has moved to its new home at Discover Blogs. The original BA site (with the …Read More：http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/11/10/carolyn-gian-domenico-… [...]