APOD: The Fainting of Betelgeuse (2020 Jan 02)

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Ann
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Re: APOD: The Fainting of Betelgeuse (2020 Jan 02)

Post by Ann » Sun Jan 05, 2020 9:07 pm

I just struck me... the name Betelgeuse. The name itself tells us that Betelgeuse must be the Beta star of Orion, doesn't' it?

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Chris Peterson
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Re: APOD: The Fainting of Betelgeuse (2020 Jan 02)

Post by Chris Peterson » Sun Jan 05, 2020 9:11 pm

Ann wrote: Sun Jan 05, 2020 9:07 pm I just struck me... the name Betelgeuse. The name itself tells us that Betelgeuse must be the Beta star of Orion, doesn't' it?
Well, it doesn't mean that. But it's a nice mnemonic.
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Re: APOD: The Fainting of Betelgeuse (2020 Jan 02)

Post by neufer » Mon Jan 06, 2020 12:01 am

Chris Peterson wrote: Sun Jan 05, 2020 9:11 pm
Ann wrote: Sun Jan 05, 2020 9:07 pm
I just struck me... the name Betelgeuse. The name itself tells us that Betelgeuse must be the Beta star of Orion, doesn't' it?
Well, it doesn't mean that. But it's a nice mnemonic.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betelgeuse#Nomenclature wrote:
<<α Orionis (Latinised to Alpha Orionis) is the star's designation given by Johann Bayer in 1603. The traditional name Betelgeuse is derived from the Arabic إبط الجوزاء Ibṭ al-Jauzā’, meaning "the armpit of Orion.". The WGSN's first bulletin of July 2016 included a table of the first two batches of names approved by the WGSN, which included Betelgeuse for this star. It is now so entered in the IAU Catalog of Star Names.

In the popular science fiction series The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams, Ford Prefect was from "a small planet somewhere in the vicinity of Betelgeuse." Humbert Wolfe wrote a poem about Betelgeuse, which was set to music by Gustav Holst.

Click to play embedded YouTube video.
  • On Betelgeuse
    the gold leaves hang in golden aisles
    for twice a hundred million miles,
    and twice a hundred million years
    they golden hang and nothing stirs,
    on Betelgeuse.

    Space is a wind that does
    not blow on Betelgeuse,
    and time - oh time - is a bird,
    whose wings have never stirred
    the golden avenues of leaves
    on Betelgeuse.

    On Betelgeuse
    there is nothing that joys or grieves
    the unstirred multitude of leaves,
    nor ghost of evil or good haunts
    the gold multitude
    on Betelgeuse.

    And birth they do not use
    nor death on Betelgeuse,
    and the God, of whom we are
    infinite dust, is there
    a single leaf of those
    gold leaves on Betelgeuse.
    >>>>
Art Neuendorffer