Observing Jupiter

Jupiter…is always a joy to look at. Even through nothing more powerful than a good pair of binoculars. Jupiter’s four Galilean moons should be visible, their positions changing noticeably from one night to the next. The smallest telescope reveals features on Jupiter’s cloud tops, including two dark bands straddling the equator. Through larger telescopes, other dark belts and bright zones appear, as well as exciting detail within the belts.

The best way to learn about Jupiter through observation is to draw it. Observers use a soft, 2B pencil and a dim white flashlight so that they can see what they are committing to paper. Before beginning to draw, they watch the planet for a few minutes to get familiar with the shapes and details of its belts and zones. Since Jupiter rotates very quickly - the whole planet goes once around in less than 10 hours - observers complete the basic outline of their drawings in about a quarter hour, filling in the details later.

The experience of drawing this planet brings to mind the fact that Jupiter is big. It is a planet much larger than Earth and some 400 to 600 million miles from us.

While you look at Jupiter’s moons, consider how they helped persuade Galileo that the Earth was not the center of the universe, and remember that the idea was so threatening to that era’s powerful religious politics that he was forced to recant on pain of torture. By taking us back to an earlier, darker time in our history, Galileo’s moons remind us not to be too attached to the accepted wisdom of our own age.

David H. Levy; author, Impact Jupiter: The Crash Of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9; comet co-discoverer (image sources: 1, 2, 3, 4)

Amateur Astronomers: When using a “dim flashlight”, make sure to use filtered red light, via LED or DIY.

Everyone: This “darker time in our history” persists to this day. We may not have astronomers being physically tortured; no, the torture comes from our (predominantly misinformed) society’s continual persistence in ‘tolerating’ the ‘rights’ of religious influence in politics and education.

This world (and our species) deserves minds capable of critical thinking fueled by an insatiable curiosity without religious influence governed at the helm by scientifically illiterate people who claim to have a neurological two-way radio with the creator of the universe/s.

Galileo would be proud of our achievements, but more steadfast than we in his commitment to the true nature of the physical world via the scientific method and meticulous observation, to which religious “knowledge” have produced no such observations, progressions or achievements toward our understanding of the universe, led by the literal interpretation of outdated Biblical text, in order to give credit to a creator or reason yet to be named by science itself, upon which the ‘rights’ of religious organizations are allowed to exploit their superimposition of the divine plan unto our current understandings of the cosmos, without aiding in any of the countless hours of scrupulous investigation themselves.

As a father and a student of life, my parenting efforts have been led by a simple motive: teach my child (and others) how to think, not what to think. All of us the world over will benefit by a society and human civilization led by this principle as well.

Ad astra.

(sagansense)

“Nature, deaf to our entreaties, will not alter or change the course of her effects; and those things that we are here trying to investigate have not just occurred once and then vanished, but have always proceeded and will always proceed in the same style. This should be a great restraint upon us, and ought to render us very circumspect about pronouncing on such things. We cannot take care that no passion - either toward others or ourselves - bends us away from our aim of pure truth.”

Galileo Galilei (1611)

In my opinion we need not entirely give up contemplating things just because they are very remote from us, unless we have indeed determined that it is best to defer every act of reflection in favor of other occupations. For in our speculating we either seek to penetrate the true and internal essence of natural substances, or content ourselves with a knowledge of some of their properties.

I do not see that in comprehending substances near at hand we have had any advantage except copious detail; all the things among which men wander remain equally unknown, and we pass by things both near and far with very little or no real acquisition of knowledge. When I ask what the substance of clouds may be and am told that it is a moist vapor, I shall wish to know in turn what vapor is. Peradventure I shall be told that ti is water, which when attenuated by heat is resolved into vapor. Equally curious about what water is, I shall then seek to find that out, ultimately learning that it is in this fluid body which runs in our rivers and which we constantly handle. But this final information about water is no more intimate than what I knew about clouds in the first place; it is merely closer at hand and dependent upon more senses. In the same way I know no more about the true essences of the earth or fire than about those of the moon or sun, for that knowledge is withheld from us, and is not to be understood until we reach the state of blessedness.

Galileo Galilei, 1612 | Stillman Drake: Discoveries and Opinions of Galileo

Galileo Galilei was deemed by Albert Einstein as the “Father of Modern Science” and by others as the “father of modern observational astronomy”, the “father of modern physics”, the “father of science” and the “father of the scientific method.” It’s clearly evident in these poetic words as to why such titles were stapled to such a man, words and opinions which resonate with me throughout every neuron and fiber of my curious being.

I’ve been painfully holding back all of t(his) knowledge

Science Branding

Galileo (via subatomiconsciousness)

Galileo, in a letter to Federico Cesi in 1624, after gazing into a microscope for the first time. (via jtotheizzoe)

ikenbot:

This Day in Astronomy History: Feb. 13, 1633: Church vs. Galileo

Galileo Galilei, who has run afoul of the church for his theories concerning heliocentrism and for insulting his old friend Pope Urban VIII, arrives in Rome to face an ecclesiastical court on charges of committing heresy.

Galileo’s long-running feud with the Roman Catholic Church over whether the Earth revolved around the sun (the Copernican view advocated by Galileo) or the sun around the Earth (the Aristotelian view echoed in the scriptures) seemed amicably resolved by 1632. But that was before the publication of Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, a book that the pope had allowed to be published as long as his own views on the subject were included.

Galileo included them, but inexplicably (for no malicious intent on the part of Galileo has ever been proven) put Urban’s words into the mouth of his character Simplicius, a defender of Aristotelian geocentrism who was often proved wrong and considered something of a fool. This didn’t go down too well in Rome and Galileo was summoned to face the Inquisition.

He was found guilty and the sentence was severe: He was forced to renounce heliocentrism, Dialogue was banned and Galileo spent the remainder of his life under house arrest. In this last he was lucky: The original sentence called for imprisonment.

Adam Gopnik on Galileo (via explore-blog)

(Source: , via explore-blog)

kidsneedscience:

On the nights of January 7/8, 1610, Galileo Galilei noted in his notebooks the discovery of the first 4 Jovian moons, which he named after the powerful Medici family, naming them Medicean I, II and III.  The name Europa (above left) comes from Greek mythology-Europa was abducted by Zeus (the Greek name for Jupiter) in the form of a bull and bore him many children.  Io is also named for a child of Zeus (Jupiter) the daughter of Inachus, who was raped by Jupiter. Jupiter, in an effort to hide his crime from his wife, Juno, transformed Io into a heifer.  Calllisto (on the right) was named for another seduction of Jupiter.  Callisto was the daughter of Lycaon, who was a follower of Artemis, famous as goddess of the hunt and for her chastity.  To punish Callisto for lying with Jupiter, Artemis banished her.  Without protection, Jupiter was forced to change Callisto and her son into bears to hide them from his wife Hera’s fury.  Eventually, Jupiter placed them both in the sky as the Ursa Major and Minor, the Big and Little Bears (known today as the Big and Little Dippers).  Ganymede was the fourth moon discovered by Galileo, named for the shepherd boy known for his incredible beauty and kidnapped by Jupiter.  These names would not become common for several hundred years.  Today, Jupiter has fifty named moons:

1. Io  2. Europa 

3. Ganymede 
4. Callisto 
5. Amalthea 
6. Himalia 
7. Elara 
8. Pasiphae 
9. Sinope 
10. Lysithea 
11. Carme 
12. Ananke 
13. Leda 
14. Thebe 
15. Adrastea 
16. Metis 
17. Callirrhoe 
18. Themisto 
19. Megaclite 
20. Taygete 
21. Chaldene 
22. Harpalyke 
23. Kalyke 
24. Iocaste 
25. Erinome 
26. Isonoe 
27. Praxidike 
28. Autonoe 
29. Thyone 
30. Hermippe 
31. Aitne 
32. Eurydome 
33. Euanthe 
34. Euporie 
35. Orthosie 
36. Sponde 
37. Kale 
38. Pasithee 
39. Hegemone 
40. Mneme 
41. Aoede 
42. Thelxinoe 
43. Arche 
44. Kallichore 
45. Helike 
46. Carpo 
47. Eukelade 
48. Cyllene 
49. Kore 
50. Herse 

and an additional 16 provisional moons:

1. S/2003 J2 
2. S/2003 J3 
3. S/2003 J4 
4. S/2003 J5 
5. S/2003 J9 
6. S/2003 J10 
7. S/2003 J12 
8. S/2003 J15 
9. S/2003 J16 
10. S/2003 J18 
11. S/2003 J19 
12. S/2003 J23 
13. S/2010 J 1 
14. S/2010 J 2 
15. S/2011 J1 
16. S/2011 J2 

All images courtesy NASA.  Thanks also to NASA for additional historical background

Galileo Galilei (via holymoleculesbatman)

we-are-star-stuff:

The rings of Saturn have puzzled astronomers since Galileo Galilei discovered them with his telescope in 1610. Detailed study by the Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 spacecraft in the 1980s only increased the mystery.

There are billions of ring particles in the entire ring system. The ring particle sizes range from tiny, dust-sized icy grains to a few particles as large as mountains. Two tiny moons orbit in gaps (Encke and Keeler gaps) in the rings and keep the gaps open. Other particles (10s to 100s of meters) are too tiny to see, but create propeller-shaped objects in the rings that let us know they are there. The rings are believed to be pieces of comets, asteroids or shattered moons that broke up before they reached the planet. Each ring orbits at a different speed around the planet. Information from NASA’s Cassini mission will help reveal how they formed, how they maintain their orbit and, above all, why they are there in the first place.

While the other three gas planets in the solar system — Jupiter, Uranus and Neptune— have rings orbiting around them, Saturn’s are by far the largest and most spectacular. With a thickness of about one kilometer (3,200 feet) or less, they span up to 282,000 km (175,000 miles), about three quarters of the distance between the Earth and its Moon.

Named alphabetically in the order they were discovered, the rings are relatively close to each other, with the exception of the Cassini Division, a gap measuring 4,700 km (2,920 miles). The main rings are, working outward from the planet, known as C, B and A. The Cassini Division is the largest gap in the rings and separates Rings B and A. In addition a number of fainter rings have been discovered more recently. The D Ring is exceedingly faint and closest to the planet. The F Ring is a narrow feature just outside the A Ring. Beyond that are two far fainter rings named G and E. The rings show a tremendous amount of structure on all scales; some of this structure is related to gravitational perturbations by Saturn’s many moons, but much of it remains unexplained.

To enter Saturn’s orbit, Cassini flew through the gap between the F and G rings, which is farther from the planet than the Cassini Division. As a safety measure, during the crossing of the ring plane, instruments and cameras onboard the spacecraft were shut off temporarily. However, the spectacular crossing into Saturn’s orbit brought incredible information, images and footage. The instruments onboard Cassini are still collecting unique data that may answer many questions about the rings’ composition.

holymoleculesbatman:

Galileo Galilei (1564-1642), painted by Justus Sustermans

hydrogeneportfolio:

Minimal Posters - Five Groundbreaking Moments In Astronomy.