So in my previous post, I skipped a few years, and I’m going to go back and fill some details in for you.
When I was younger, like most young kids at the time, I was fascinated with space, astronomy (not astrology), space exploration, space pictures, and basically anything to do with space and/or science. My favorite subjects in school were math and science, later to become a degree in physics, and when I was in elementary, I desperately wanted to be an astronaut. But as I found out later, this was not uncommon. I was in the Young Astronauts club in elementary, tried a couple of times to compete in science fairs, was a member of the science club in jr. high, and was basically a science geek all through my school years.
I would have tried harder to be an astronaut, but there were a few things in my way. Contrary to what you might think, the Challenger accident wasn’t one of them. I didn’t get superb grades in school, I was prone to motion sickness, and as I got older, and taller, the height restrictions seemed to creep closer and closer, until I passed them by a good half foot or so. And then there was the fact that most astronauts were also pilots in the Air Force, and I have a certain disposition towards authority figures that would have made me being in any armed forces a difficult hurdle at best. But I digress…
When I was younger, my parents bought me a telescope for Christmas and I loved it. It was the most amazing thing to me at the time. The only trouble with it was that I had no idea how to use it properly, and lived too close to a city to be able to see anything of note besides the moon. I did try as often as I could to look at anything and everything, but mostly all I saw were stars, stars, and more stars. I didn’t have the fancy computer programs to point me in the right direction, nor did I have a fancy telescope that could auto align itself to a point in space that’s really worth looking at. So I resorted to looking at distant mountain tops through my living room window with it, which, due to the optics, appeared upside down in the viewfinder.
I became fascinated by space phenomenon such as black holes, nebulae, etc., and have to say that my favorite of the bunch was, and still is, the Orion nebula, placed smack dab in the middle of Orion’s sword, and conveniently visible to the naked eye (although you don’t get much detail). And I’m still awed by the thought of the Universe and all it’s implications.
Just the other night, we were watching a television show on the death of the Universe, and I began to think about the life of the Universe as a whole, and seriously hurt my brain. It’s completely and utterly boggling to try and imagine anything outside of the Universe.
As for the techno in my previous post…
You’ll have to wait for the next installment to see where that leads us…
But I’ll leave you with an amazing image taken by one of the most successful (so far, IMO) science experiments/telescopes to leave this planet yet (and no, it’s not the Hubble, although that one is amazing).
This picture was taken by the Cassini spacecraft in orbit around Saturn right now. It was taken while Saturn was casting a shadow on the spacecraft. If you look closely (you may have to view the full size image), in the upper left limb of the outer rings, you’ll see a pale blue dot… that pale blue dot is our home world, the Earth.