Starship Asterisk*

I predict you are wrong. Chris, i respect your knowledge and you are entitled to any opinion (including your above prediction). I'm no Aristotle or Einstein but they both seem to be in agreement with me. Their own quotes = Aristotle ("The more you know, more you know that you don't know")...

I checked the link for "passes right" (https://www.science.org/content/article/milky-way-may-escape-fated-collision-andromeda-galaxy), I'm glad many scientists openly said we don't know many things and so it's impossible to simulate and predict any deterministic ways. I absolutely agree. ...

I checked the link for "passes right" (https://www.science.org/content/article/milky-way-may-escape-fated-collision-andromeda-galaxy), I'm glad many scientists openly said we don't know many things and so it's impossible to simulate and predict any deterministic ways. I absolutely agree. I...

Very interesting today's APOD. Quick 2 questions - 1) What's the size of the sky captured ? Is it full (whatever is "visible" to space telescope) ? e.g 13 billion light years across 360deg ? 2) Since the data is of 12 years, I'd imagine some prominent gamma ray bursts might have got record...

I am more amazed by everything else other than the galaxy and the colored lighted meteorite streak. Look at the number of objects in visible light. I'm not seeing any refraction spikes etc, so assuming every single light blob is some galaxy. Yes ? How many ? 1000s.. Seems denser than deep/ultra deep...

I wonder, after Voyager did it (famous "pale blue dot"), what's the reason NASA didn't feel like instructing any other space shuttle in last 50+ years - sent to other planets and asteroids and comets - to look back and take another (better resolution, different angle/perspective/distance) ...

1) I LOVE globular star clusters (colored and shaped nebulae next best!). Have been able to see 1-2 during star parties from Mt Hamilton in San Jose, CA. 2) I wondered how someone could say there were 10 million stars in the cluster when we can't even differentiate one star from other in most of cen...

Apart from tons of size and color variations, 3 things i find interesting -
1) very few have rings
2) spinning axis seems so randomly distributed (any direction in 360 degrees)
3) bottom right elliptical/egg shaped planet (the ONLY one of such odd shape)

The Earth doesn't rise over the Moon unless the camera is moving. The video shows the camera as stationary. Bad video. The Moon is tidal lock to the Earth. That means the Earth's position is fixed at the same azimuth and zenith. To get the Earth to rise, the camera must be moving toward the Earth. ...

The Earth doesn't rise over the Moon unless the camera is moving. The video shows the camera as stationary. Bad video. The Moon is tidal lock to the Earth. That means the Earth's position is fixed at the same azimuth and zenith. To get the Earth to rise, the camera must be moving toward the Earth. ...

Sorry, tangential thought that is top of my mind looking at the photo.. Those "direction" arrows.. I've always wondered how and why someone would feel/decide - and obviously I'm assuming the whole scientist community agreed to - a specific direction as North/East/South/West.. When someone ...

I'm sorry to say, to me, this looks more like a sci-fi movie, super exaggerated dramatic, with all kinds of visual and audio effects (music) to make this even waaaaaaaaaaaay more explosive and dramatic than how in reality it'd be (as per many books and articles and scientists and presentations I've ...

I've always been amazed by science and capabilities of the instruments we have. In such photo, apart from obvious spikey stars in our own galaxy, when every single object scene is a galaxy, at the distance of 3.5 bly and beyond, the instruments we have (and skills of algorithms and software) and the...

I was following link for "Wolf-Rayet stars" and wondered - 1) Where do "Sharpless 2-308" and "R136a1" fit into largest known stars (e.g. compared to Antares to VY Canis Majoris range) ? and 2) I came across this paragraph - "Consequently, R136a1, and stars like it,...

Thank you Ann and Chris. As always, you help me understand things a bit better.

I wonder what makes the comet get too close to the Sun ? I'd imagine gravity pull .. but then, how long it must have taken that comet to reach that stage (i mean how many times it must have made rounds around Sun and how many years it must have been doing it before finally getting too close and gett...

Couldn't understand one basic aspect. Why the eclipse is seen starting from west coast in US to east coast in US.. Apparent motion of moon from east to waste should be faster than Sun's apparent motion from east to west.. So I was imagining it'd start from east coast and move towards west coast. And...

Beautiful and Amazing. I wish they had mentioned the range of distances to galaxies (e.g. from 170 million to 10 billion light years away etc). Just to get and give a perspective, not everything that's "seen (looks) together and close" isn't so in reality.

"NGC 1365's prominent bar plays a crucial role" .. Sorry, but where is the "bar" ? I zoomed and zoomed.. maybe I am challenged to see shapes OR people who think there's a bar are falling to brain's "looking for shapes and patterns" bias/tendency ?

Maybe the small rover should go and bump into Moon Sniper (a nudge, not a destructive bang/collision) so that it stands on it's feet (thrusters touching ground) normal ? Worth experimenting instead of letting it lay there in "vegetable state".. just wondering..

From bay area California, whenever I saw Pleiades, I saw "Y" shaped star cluster, with 6 stars I can see with naked eye on most nights even from urban location. In this image, I am not able to figure out where's that "Y" shape (that makes it difficult to relate to what I see) and...

Good angle, good view, good perspective. Not so usual. I also like that we are able to see some portion of moon that we never get to see from earth but I wish we could see it better (I'm thinking the cameras on Artemis I don't have good resolution), i've never seen so much large portion of the moon ...

Sorry, what's today's APOD got to do with "A" in "APOD" ? It happens from time to time, I wonder what the person in-charge of posting APOD was drinking last night..

Quick question on Barnard's loop - 1) Why it's called a "loop" when all we can see (at least prominently and obviously) is a C shaped arc ? I did quick Google search and couldn't see an answer in a few clicks :( 2) How do they measure distances to such objects and why it has large margin o...

Thank you Ann and Chris. I can understand the other reasons (not a question of pride anymore, not a military operation anymore.. etc) but with trillions of $$ of spending at federal and state levels in US and with many private companies $$ also coming in, I'm surprised "money (or lack thereof)&...