Across the Universe: Patrolling the Final Frontier

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This entry is part 184 of 183 in the series Across the Universe

This column first ran in The Tablet in May 2018 Compared to the student riots and political assassinations of 1968, the United Nations Conference on the Exploration and Peaceful Uses of Outer Space that year caused relatively little stir. Back then, of course, only two nations were in any position to explore or use outer space. It was easy for the rest of the world to give lip service to the ideal that the space resources were the heritage of all humankind. Fifty years on, though, things are changing. In June, 2018, the UN’s Office of Outer Space Affairs held a fiftieth anniversary meeting: UNISPACE +50. To set the stage, the organizers decided to hold a small workshop where their diplomats could meet informally with scientists and engineers active in understanding how we’ll be using space resources, from satellite data to actual asteroid mining, in the near future. They asked the Vatican Permanent Mission to the UN for help organizing … Continue reading →

In the Sky This Week – May 8, 2019 – MARCON 54 Edition

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This entry is part 95 of 97 in the series In the Sky This Week

My wife and I are Science Co-Guests of Honor at MARCON 54, a science fiction convention this weekend in Worthington, Ohio! The excitement and anticipation is going to make me explode! We’ve been attending midwest SF conventions for decades – I met Br. Guy at one! I became a volunteer NASA/JPL Solar System Ambassador and started lecturing at SF cons in 2013; in 2014, I was asked to run the science programming track for DETCON1 – the North American Science Fiction Convention (NASFiC) in Detroit. where I helped arrange to have Br. Guy Skype-in from the Vatican Meteorite Lab for a very well attended panel. Br. Guy will be Skyping-in to MARCON for a lecture with me, and weather permitting I’ll be setting up my telescopes to see the Moon and Sun – I’m REALLY hoping for clear skies on Sunday when I’m scheduled to have my solar telescopes out, as there are a couple large sunspots right now! Saturday morning my wife and I … Continue reading →

Specola Guestbook: April 9 1907

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This entry is part 2 of 3 in the series Specola Guestbook

Since its founding in 1891, many people have passed through the doors of the Vatican Observatory.  A quick perusal of our guestbook reveals several Names, including Popes, nobel laureates, astronauts, actors, and saints.  This is the first post in a new series that will highlight some of these notable visitors. Today’s guestbook entry is from April 9, 1907.  On that day, H. A. Lorentz signed the book. Hendrik Antoon Lorentz (1853-1928) was a Dutch physicist at the University of Leiden. In his inscription, he wrote “Hoogleeraar aan de Universiteit te Leiden” (Professor at the University of Leiden). He is notable for two significant contributions. (Well, he has a list of significant contributions and various things that bear his name, but two are most significant.) First, he developed a theory to explain the Zeeman effect; i.e. the splitting of spectral lines in the presence of a strong magnetic field.  The splitting is due to the effect of the magnetic field on … Continue reading →

Scoping Out the Rosette Nebula from Kentucky

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Many different astronomers and their work have been featured on this blog.  We’ve seen some of the research being produced by Vatican Observatory astronomers.  Brenda Frye of Steward Observatory at the University of Arizona was a regular contributor to the blog for quite a while.  Fernando Comerón has contributed a guest post about his work at the European Southern Observatory, where he gets to observe with some of the world’s largest telescopes.  Larry Lebofsky has recently written about observing with the Vatican Advanced Technology Telescope (VATT) on Mt. Graham in Arizona.  But today I would like to give readers of The Catholic Astronomer a different perspective on doing astronomical research. Meet Chad Howard, a colleague of mine at Jefferson Community & Technical College (JCTC) here in Louisville, Kentucky.  He is doing work that I think will be of interest to readers of The Catholic Astronomer, and he is doing it for reasons that readers will also find cool.  Chad is … Continue reading →

Multiple Intelligences — An Introduction

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Those of us engaged in Education and Public Outreach (EPO) find out very quickly that not everyone processes or responds to information in the same way. Especially important to presenters is the realization that audience or workshop members do not necessarily share our “individual competences,” and because of this disparity, our well-prepared lessons and our expectations for student responses may not be compatible with all learners. In 1993, Professor Howard Gardner published Multiple Intelligences, The Theory in Practice. Gardner was a member, later Co-Director, of  Harvard University’s Project Zero and an Adjunct Professor of Neurology (Boston University School of Medicine). Gardner’s specialty was human cognition, and 25 years later his theory of Multiple Intelligences (MI) is said to have “revolutionized how we understand intelligence” (edutopia.com, George Lucas Educational Foundation). Gardner’s original theory posited seven types of MI, with an eighth added later. Each “intelligence” gives insight into how learners process information. Which MI best describes your style, your comfort zone, … Continue reading →

In the Sky This Week – April 30, 2019

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This entry is part 94 of 97 in the series In the Sky This Week

Mercury, Venus appear very low in the eastern sky just before sunrise – if seeing Mercury was a challenge last week, it will be even harder this week. The waning crescent Moon joins the two planets until May 3rd. Saturn, Jupiter and the star Antares appear southern sky early in the morning. In this image, I have the light pollution set to high – this is typically what I can see from a close suburb to Detroit. This is the same patch of sky seen from a dark sky site. Mars and the star Betelgeuse are low on the horizon after sunset; the winter constellations will soon be gone. M-109 – “Vacuum Cleaner Galaxy” Messier 109 (also known as NGC 3992) is a barred spiral galaxy exhibiting a weak inner ring structure around the central bar approximately 83.5 ± 24 million light-years[3]away in the constellation Ursa Major. M109 can be seen southeast of the star Phecda (γ UMa). – Wikipedia Where did the name “Vacuum Cleaner Galaxy” come from? It’s … Continue reading →

Religious Scientists: abbot Gregor J. Mendel O.S.A. (1822-1884), Father of Genetics

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This entry is part of 3 in the series Religious Scientists of the Catholic Church

Back when I taught an introductory-level astronomy class at university, I would start the course with a short unit on what science is and on the relationship between faith and science. I would mention Gregor Mendel as an example of a religious scientist because anyone who has taken high school biology knows the name.  So then I would ask the class what they know about him. “Father of genetics,” one person would say. Another student would pipe in, “He was a monk!” A third would offer something about “<mumble, mumble> pea plants.” At this point, I would then ask, “Okay, so given what you know about him, what do you think his job (his daily work) at the monastery was?” Every time I taught this unit, and almost every time I have brought up this example with peers (there’s always someone who spoils the trend eventually), I got the response, “He was the gardener.” It makes a certain sort of sense.  … Continue reading →

Washington Irving’s Columbus and the Flat Earth

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  This is a re-posting of a blog written by Dr. Darin Hayton, a historian of science at Haverford College in December 2014.  Darin obtained his Ph.D. from the History and Philosophy of Science program at the University of Notre Dame, and it is through Notre Dame that I got to know him: The University of Notre Dame Press asked him to review my translation of Johann Georg Locher’s Mathematical Disquisitions, which Notre Dame published in 2017. This past semester all my students were certain that Christopher Columbus proved that the world is round, and that prior to Columbus everyone thought that the world was flat.  When I asked Darin if I could use this post, since my students had put this subject on my mind, he noted in response that for over a decade of teaching he has found that nearly all of the students in his introductory-level courses have been taught the flat-earth story.  He added, “Last term one … Continue reading →

Experimental sketch goodbye – Active Region 2738

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April 16th On April 16th Active Region 2738 was heading towards the limb, looking very dramatic. I decided to try an experimental sketch using just pencil to capture the action around the giant sunspot. I used a very black pencil called a Conte de Paris Carbone B, which was deeply black. For the sketch I also used some silicone tipped brushes, these were perfect for drawing with and allowed some good flexible movement to be developed.  There is always massive movement  in the area around sunspots. A kind of disturbance caused by the huge magnetic activity in the sunspot itself. The light bridge and the change in it since April 10th was clearly visible in my h-alpha view  however the seeing was soft not as sharp as I would have liked. A well shape filament would have been nice to observe but none developed as I viewed April 18th On April 18th another opportunity to view this active region came … Continue reading →

Across the Universe: Dramatic Science

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This entry is part 64 of 183 in the series Across the Universe

This column first ran in The Tablet in April 2008. We ran it here in 2016. From a glass-enclosed visitor’s gallery at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, I watched three technicians, encased in white suits, slowly affix bits of equipment to a large aluminum frame, the platform of an SUV-sized rover to Mars. Two sets of steering rockets were already attached; two large metal spheres painted black and gold were seated nearby. “Those are the fuel tanks, right?” I asked my friend Steve, an engineer on the project who guided my tour. “Like the ones that blew up the Mars Orbiter in the 1980s?” Every piece has a necessary function, and every piece has a history of what can happen if it goes wrong. Even with a recent string of triumphs, Mars probe failures still outnumber the successes. Each piece is added in a carefully scripted order, with a quality-control specialist looking on: the torque wrench must not overtighten … Continue reading →

In the Sky This Week – April 23, 2019

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This entry is part 93 of 97 in the series In the Sky This Week

Did you get a chance to see the conjunction of Jupiter and the Moon the the predawn sky this morning? I did as I drove my wife to work. Mercury and Venus appear very low in the eastern sky just before sunrise all week – seeing Mercury may be a challenge. There will be a conjunction of the Moon and Saturn in the eastern predawn sky on April 25th; Jupiter and the star Antares continue to appear in the southwest. Mars continues to move away from the Pleiades – which is very close to setting with the dusk; the constellations Orion and Taurus set shortly after sunset. Over the last several months, Earth’s orbit has taken it away from Mars (see solar system images below). M5 – The Rose Cluster Messier 5 or M5 (also designated NGC 5904) is a globular cluster in the constellation Serpens. Under extremely good conditions, M5 is just visible to the naked eye as a faint “star” near the star 5 Serpentis. Binoculars or small telescopes will identify the … Continue reading →

Welcome to Sacred Space Astronomy!

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You may have noticed a change here… what we used to call The Catholic Astronomer is now Sacred Space Astronomy. And along with a change in layout and title, we’re expanding the way you can support our work. Why the name change? OK, so I admit, I am the guy who came up with the original name. I meant it as a pun, in the sense that “catholic” means “universal” and of course astronomers look at the universe, while our interests on this site cover pretty much the gamut from naked-eye stargazing to theoretical cosmology. All, of course, under the aegis of the Vatican Observatory Foundation. Well, like most puns, nearly everyone missed it entirely. And since a number of our contributors are not actual Catholics (again, there is a gamut, from practicing Jews to Catholic priests to non-churchgoers) the face value of the title wasn’t always appropriate. Meanwhile, for those of you who contribute financially to keep the site (and … Continue reading →