Centaurus A
Jan. 29th, 2009 01:02 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
theweaselking
... that's a galaxy.
A pretty damn big one. Or, rather, it's TWO galaxies, colliding.
See those things coming out the top and the bottom? The things that are as big as the rest of the galaxy? Those are jets of matter from the accretion disk of the black hole in the center. In the part where they're blue, near the source, they're moving at about half the speed of light because that's just how much energy the black hole is throwing off.
Holy CRAP.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-29 06:11 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-29 06:31 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-29 06:40 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-29 10:01 pm (UTC)Every time I see "photos" like this, it brings to mind the moon. If they can get a picture of this, why can't they take one of the moon, with the landing craft, and shut all the disbelivers up. I can't fathom there isn't a lens, or telescope now that couldn't.
Also I don't know why they get all giggly over these. According to their own science, what they took a picture of, doesn't even exist anymore because of the time it took for the light, radio waves or whatever got back to earth for us to say, hey look at that. If a star is 10,000 light years away, we are seeing it today as it was 10,000 years ago, so this thing happened 13 Million years ago.
I was going somewhere, but this always just makes my brain hurt thinking about space. It's just all too weird. We might have been better off thinking the sun revolved around the earth, and we might even be part of a marble like in Men In Black. How would we know? How do we not know that in out own molecule stuff there isn't 1000's of little earths. See it's just to weird. No wonder a lot of those guys are a bit off when you talk with them. They're smart as hell, but you kind of do that head tilt thing like a dog when talking to them.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-29 10:28 pm (UTC)The short version is "optics". Basic optics. Optics that haven't changed since Newton. High-school math.
The objects they're resolving in that pic? Are LIGHT-YEARS ACROSS.
Whereas the lunar lander is meters wide.
Hubble, for comparison, has a minimum focus of about 200m/pixel. As in, each pixel of a Hubble image is two hundred meters square.
Assume generously that the Lander casts a 5m shadow, and that the moon is at it's closest to the earth, you're looking for an object that is about three one thousandths of an arcsecond across. A 10m reflector has a resolution of about two HUNDREDTHS of an arcsecond - a full order of magnitude too big to pick out something as small as a lander on the moon. As the person whose math I'm stealing says, this is like standing in Melbourne, looking through a telescope at Sydney, and expecting to be able to see a dime.
So no, there is no telescope that can do it. And even if there was, it wouldn't shut up the disbelievers, because their disbelief is not in any way grounded in fact to begin with, and any pictures *now* would simply be met with "oh, of course, you needed 40 years to make good fakes, and those fakes are still coming from someone who agrees with NASA that it really happened so they MUST BE IN ON IT!"
How would we know? How do we not know that in out own molecule stuff there isn't 1000's of little earths
Well, the fact that there's no evidence for it is a start, and also the fact that if it was true, it wouldn't be at all relevant because we can't detect it and it doesn't cause any effects that we can see or measure.
No wonder a lot of those guys are a bit off when you talk with them. They're smart as hell, but you kind of do that head tilt thing like a dog when talking to them.
I'm afraid I'm one of "these guys", and I'm doing the dog head-tilt thing right now because I don't get how you don't get why this is so cool. So there!
(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-29 11:15 pm (UTC)My point was take this camera, and take a photo of the moon. If it can see this, the moon should be real clear. (I know, I know)
Well, the fact that there's no evidence for it is a start, (little earths) and also the fact that if it was true, it wouldn't be at all relevant because we can't detect it and it doesn't cause any effects that we can see or measure.
That just proves my point on all this stuff. It's not relevant if we can't see or measure it? Oh man...
It's all pretty to look at but doesn't mean thing.
Not trying to flame, just trying to rap my head around the warped logic that we see all the time now, that didn't exist 30 years ago.
I have a pencil. Now I want more pencils, so I multiply it by 2, now I have 2 pencils. I have a pencil. Now muliply it by zero. I still have my pencil.
Nope 1X0=0
Who took my pencil.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-29 11:51 pm (UTC)We can't take pictures of the lunar landers because we lack the ability to do so from this distance. It is physically impossible to do with current technology. We HAVE pictures of the lunar landers from LUNAR ORBIT, but nobody who disbelieves that people went to the moon believes that those pictures were taken from lunar orbit, either.
My point was take this camera, and take a photo of the moon. If it can see this, the moon should be real clear. (I know, I know)
But the resolution of your camera has limits, right? If you zoom in past them, you can make part of the moon as big as you want in that picture but it will still just be a silver blur, right?
It's the same problem. There is *no such thing* as a telescope with a zoom fine enough to pick out details as small as the lander. We simply can't make them that big.
It's not relevant if we can't see or measure it? Oh man...
That's exactly right. Untestable propositions are worthless and should be discarded.
It's all pretty to look at but doesn't mean thing.
Spoken like someone who hasn't a clue on the usefulness of science in general.
As far as your pencil goes: How are you "multiplying" pencils, again? What does that have to do with anything?
(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-30 01:15 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-30 10:29 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-03-25 11:40 pm (UTC)http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2009/03/25/shuttle-and-station-imaged-from-the-ground/