Comments on: Cassini's pentaverate

By: Matt B.

Matt B. — Wed, 08 Jun 2011 20:46:18 +0000

It should be “pentavirate”, with an i, like “triumvirate” (“vir” being Latin for “man”). Of course, the word really should have been “quinquevirate”, using a Latin prefix on a Latin suffix.

By: Linda

Linda — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 20:29:44 +0000

Absolutely stunning!

Thanks for sharing this with us.

By: Messier Tidy Upper

Messier Tidy Upper — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 14:15:51 +0000

Would a pentaverate be a plural of Titans?

Oh wait, that’s not among that particular quintuple of Saturnian moons. Drat. Neta new word though.

My personal top five “pentaverate” of Saturn’s moons would have to be :

Titan, Enceladus, Iapetus, Mimas & Hyperion. (Or maybe Phoebe?)

@1. Ken B : “That’s a bit ironic, as I always thought it was Prometheus Unbound.”

Well, if it helps it is Prometheus that is *doing* the binding in this case!

By: TJ Czeck

TJ Czeck — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 19:52:29 +0000

Nigel (13) said:

The absence of an atmosphere (combined with the absence of any familiar
objects) on the moon made it very hard for the Apollo astronauts to judge
distances.

That reminds me of some Apollo footage that I’ve seen (can’t remember where now) where one of the astronauts is bouncing over to a boulder. From the initial shot, it looks to be about the size of a car or so, but when he gets to it, it is the size of a house. Very confusing at first.

By: Nigel Depledge

Nigel Depledge — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 12:11:59 +0000

Sam H (6) said:

If we were actually there, floating amongst their orbits in a windowed spacecraft with a wider view angle, would the human eye be able to deduce at least some kind of distance perception?

In short, no.

Human binocular vision is only effective out to about 100 m or so. Beyond that, we must rely on other clues for relative distances of objects (such as knowledge we already have of them, haziness due to atmospheric dust and so on).

The absence of an atmosphere (combined with the absence of any familiar objects) on the moon made it very hard for the Apollo astronauts to judge distances. However, when they were heading towards the LM (i.e. an object with whose size they were familiar), they found it easier.

By: Nigel Depledge

Nigel Depledge — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 12:07:48 +0000

Wonderful shot!

By: MarkW

MarkW — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 11:23:50 +0000

Enchronosate? Shouldn’t it be enchronosenate?

By: Contraposición: el fin de Spirit contra la energía de Cassini : vooLive.net

Contraposición: el fin de Spirit contra la energía de Cassini : vooLive.net — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 06:46:31 +0000

[...] imágenes han sido recogidas de Bad Astronomy y de Gizmodo ES Tweet [...]

By: Thea

Thea — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 22:20:09 +0000

The rings are so insubstantial. In other photos taken of Saturn, the rings look so huge, but they only contain enough material to make a sphere 100 kilometres in diameter. The Universe is an amazing place.

‘Penta-’ means five. What does ‘verate’ refer to? Moons? Spheres?

By: ohai

ohai — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 19:58:05 +0000

This is officially the second time in my life that I have heard the word "pentaverate". Just fyi.