Just when you think our tiny Solar System is at peace, news of rogue comets or ginormous asteroids hitting a nearby planet wipe all those thoughts away. Amateur astronomer Dan Peterson reported that he had captured a collision on Jupiter while doing routine observations the morning of September 10th. Dan Hall, another amateur astronomer who happen to be imaging the planet, posted this video on Flickr (seen above) showing the fiery impact.
I'm not a scientist nor a mathematician, but just mixing together a few Google image searches with a screen capture of the video leads me to believe that if we had a collision like this on Earth we would be adding ourselves to the fossil collections with the dinosaurs.
Someone tell me, is the below image pretty accurate? If it is we all owe Jupiter a huge thank you...
NASA's Mars Science Laboratory costs $2.5 billion dollars (and some change) and just happens to be roving around the red surface of Mars - so your chances of ever owning it are slim to none. That is unless you happen to get your hands on one of these awesome replicas.
If you are a LEGO enthusiast, you can get your hands on this kit or instructions on how to build this replica with your owns pieces. This was actually designed by a mechanical engineer that worked on Curiosity at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory! This LEGO set doesn't stop with just a rover, you can even make the Sky Crane!
Of course when it comes to making models of out-of-this-world vehicles, your collection wouldn't be complete without a Hot Wheels car!
LEGO building is all fine and dandy, but where there real fun comes in are LEGO Mindstorms! I like to call these big boy LEGOS or LEGOS on steroids. Only thing this bad boy is lacking is a rock crushing laser!
In 1954. a year before his death, Albert Einstein wrote a very open letter to author Eric B. Gutkind. The letter was a response to Gutkind's book titled, Choose Life The Biblical Call To Revolt. The letter is a no-holds-barred look at Einstein's own personal beliefs on religion and God. Those opinions were always a very hot topic and very much guarded by Einstein, which is why this document will probably sell for well more than the starting bid of $3 million dollars.
The word God is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honorable, but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish. No interpretation no matter how subtle can (for me) change this. These subtilised interpretations are highly manifold according to their nature and have almost nothing to do with the original text. For me the Jewish religion like all other religions is an incarnation of the most childish superstitions. And the Jewish people to whom I gladly belong and with whose mentality I have a deep affinity have no different quality for me than all other people. As far as my experience goes, they are also no better than other human groups, although they are protected from the worst cancers by a lack of power. Otherwise I cannot see anything 'chosen' about them.
Got deep pockets and want a piece of history? Then go get prequalified to bid!
I saw this picture today, and while it was so ridiculous that it was actually funny, the replies kind of pound home a pretty good point:
I'm not here to make fun of or shit on anyone's religion, but the root of the problem is clearly in our methods of taxation:
Staggering numbers, but are they legit? In the above graphic there are two sourcing links, did you try to click them (ha)? I took the liberty of following the first one for you, the second one appears to be dead. That first link takes you to a USA Today article that tackles this very subject; how much money does the U.S. government forgo by not taxing religious institutions?
In the article, Professor of Sociology Ryan Cragon and two students conducted research that says that the government could be losing out on as much as 71 billion a year. 71 billion...that is 71,000,000,000 dollars. That's a lot of rovers.
How can you justify that? Well, when asked, Mark Rienzi, senior counsel at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, said that "Americans have made a democratic decision that religious institutions are good for our communities — believers and atheists alike."
Good for our communities? I can see 71,000,000,000 feeding a lot of people, paying for more police and fire men and women, paying our teachers more, improving road conditions, allowing for tax breaks for hard working middle class families. Yes, 71 billion dollars would benefit our communities far more than giving tax exemptions to religious organizations.
So, why does the fundamentalist right want to attack science every time a major achievement happens? Is it because of them that the funding for NASA has been sliding down hill since the 1960's? Here is another alarming graphic:
In the 1960's NASA's budget peaked somewhere close to 4.3% of the Federal Budget. Now? 0.5%. That's sad. What's more sad? In 2012 NASA got just below 20 billion dollars, that is more than 3 times less than religion saved on tax breaks. Keep that in mind next time you want to cry about X amount of money going towards the next X scientific endeavor.
Yes this is a fantastic color image of the landscape of mars, but, just like the first images from Curiosity; it is distorted by it's clear dust cover. The cover will stay in place for about another week to let the proverbial dust settle. In the distance you can still see the north wall of the Gale Crater.
The picture was taken by the Mars Hand Lens Imager, (MAHLI). The MAHLI is capable of taking images from as close as 0.8 inch to infinity (how ever far that is).
When I started CPOD I wanted to stick to images from amateur astronomers and astrophotographers, but in light of the recent Mars Curiosity news and all the excitement that comes with it; I found it only fitting to use this crystal clear image of the Red Plantet taken by the Hubble Space Telescope.
This image was obtained by the Hubble Space Telescope in 1995 as part of an observing program to monitor seasonal changes in the atmosphere and surface of Mars. The prominent dark feature in the center of the image is called Syrtis Major. The differences in color, which are exaggerated in this computer-enhanced image, are thought to be caused by differences in the deposits of dust and sand covering different regions. Features as small as 50 kilometers are seen in this image. The white region at the top of the image is the north polar cap. On the right, white clouds cover the Elysium volcanos.
Curiosity has been on Mars for almost one Earth day now and the news and footage just keeps getting more awesome.
Here is stop motion footage of the rover's last 2 minutes of descent. The footage was taken at a measly 4fps from the camera on the heat shield separator called The Mars Descent Imager (MARDI). Amazing.
After the dust settled on this mornings Mars Curiosity landing (literally), I got to thinking how cool it would have been to see the amazing landing live. Although that would have been impossible (for this landing at least), we will at least get this amazing satellite picture of the MSL as the parachute slows it down so that the sky crane can take over.
And just when you think this landing can't get anymore amazing!
This morning, at 00:31 CST, Mars Curiosity Rover successfully landed on Mars after 8 and a half months of anticipation which climaxed with 7 minutes of terror.
Imediately following the landing, the rover started sending images our way. These images were taken at one-quarter of full resolution and with a clear dust cover still intact. Higher resolution, color images will be seen later this week once the rover's mast cameras are deployed.
Shortly after the landing, President Obama made this statement:
Statement by the President on Curiosity Landing on Mars
Tonight, on the planet Mars, the United States of America made history.
The successful landing of Curiosity – the most sophisticated roving laboratory ever to land on another planet – marks an unprecedented feat of technology that will stand as a point of national pride far into the future. It proves that even the longest of odds are no match for our unique blend of ingenuity and determination.
Tonight’s success, delivered by NASA, parallels our major steps forward towards a vision for a new partnership with American companies to send American astronauts into space on American spacecraft. That partnership will save taxpayer dollars while allowing NASA to do what it has always done best – push the very boundaries of human knowledge. And tonight’s success reminds us that our preeminence – not just in space, but here on Earth – depends on continuing to invest wisely in the innovation, technology, and basic research that has always made our economy the envy of the world.
I congratulate and thank all the men and women of NASA who made this remarkable accomplishment a reality – and I eagerly await what Curiosity has yet to discover.
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. The letter is a no-holds-barred look at Einstein's own personal beliefs on religion and God. Those opinions were always a very hot topic and very much guarded by Einstein, which is why this document will probably sell for well more than the starting bid of $3 million dollars.
