catdynamics | December 31, 2009On New Year's Eve, 2009, the Moon will be full, for the second time in december.
A Blue Moon?
Well, not really...
although colloquially, it is, now.
A full Moon looks full because it's directly opposite the Sun in the
sky, from our viewpoint on Earth, so its whole sunlit side faces us.
Photo by Gary Seronik / SKY & TELESCOPE magazine.
Sky & Telescope explains, with a mea culpa:
"..."In modern usage, the second full Moon in a month has come to be
called a 'Blue Moon.' But it's not!" says Kelly Beatty, Senior
Contributing Editor for SKY & TELESCOPE magazine. "This colorful term…
catdynamics | December 24, 2009King's College Choir
I miss the live version.
Good singing that.
King's College Choir - get the live CDs online.
catdynamics | December 24, 2009Not as intense as the original, but at least you can finally hear the lyrics...
bonus: original version (live)
catdynamics | December 22, 2009Set the focus on infinity!
A new one from the photomixers...
"I need a space telescope,
ain't got time to wait"
...
"My mind is busting,
and I got a PhD!"
catdynamics | December 21, 2009There are, of course, two types of thesis advisors: which should you want to have; and which are you, or will you become?
There is type I and type II.
There are "cat advisors" and "dog advisors".
Cats are independent, and only, grudgingly, need the occasional superior technical skills (eg can opener operation) and resources ($ for pouncie crunchies and tuna) provided by their so-called masters servants.
Dogs need big fenced yards, walks every day or more often, and to be members of a well defined hierarchical group.
Which is it?
Or, if you insist, there are also both, and neither.
Or, there…
catdynamics | December 17, 2009JoAnne and Risa are liveblogging the CDMS seminar at Stanford
bottom line, they see two events when they unblind, compared to expected 0.5
net confidence is a bit over 2σ (nailed it, yeah!).
interesting bounds on cross-section for WIMPs with mass under 70 GeV/c2
good stuff
catdynamics | December 14, 2009"The controversy over "Climategate" continues to heighten as some Pennsylvania legislators question the continuation of Penn State's current research grants -- and possibly even the appropriations the university has been waiting on since July."
There were two interesting articles late last week in the Penn State student paper, the Collegian.
The first article discusses the University's funding situation. The State appropriation for fiscal year 2009-10, which started July 1st 2009, has still not been approved, the hold-up is legislation on legalising table games, primarily poker.
The…
catdynamics | December 14, 2009WISE launched successfully this morning, spacecraft is in orbit and responsive.
The Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer launched successfully from Vandenburg this morning.
click to embiggen
Spacecraft is separated, oriented, and started cooling. Oh, and, obviously, communicating...
Dratt. Wish I'd been out at the coast still, that'd have been a launch worth getting up to watch, even from a distance.
WISE is a small explorer class mission, doing an all sky mid-infrared survey.
The spatial resolution is modest, as is the depth, but it is still better than anything before, and much needed as…
catdynamics | December 13, 2009Magnificent Seven Theme
pipe and drum version
To the Coffee Skate Club - nice routine.
Just one thing - real Scots cowboys don't wear boxers under the kilt!
Even not, nay, especially not on ice!
catdynamics | December 10, 2009The Case for Pluto is not settled yet, whatever the IAU may wish.
Now, just in time for the holidays, there is a very nice little book summarizing what happened in Prague that fateful summer.
I am decidedly "pro-Pluto".
Now Alan Boyle of the cosmic log blog, has taken up the baton, and written a very nice book to complement David Weintraub's Is Pluto a Planet.
"The Case for Pluto" is a very nice compact little book that is eminently readable.
Alan reviews the history of planet discovery and puts the Pluto controversy in context, with some interestingly frank interviews with many of the…
catdynamics | December 9, 2009Vote for John Grunsfeld in the National Geographic "Choice Adventurer of the Year" Competition
He is number 3 on the list.
Vote.
catdynamics | December 9, 2009There has been a lot of chatter about the e-mail cracked from the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia (not to be confused with the Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research at the UK Met Office in Exeter).
I would like to post abou it, but, I really can't comment.
Since PSU is involved in the issue and there is an ongoing inquiry into the issue, I can not comment: there is a slightest possibility anything I say could be considered in some sense official from PSU; or, prejudicial to the inquiry; or, biased, as I have some connection to some of the people involved…
catdynamics | December 9, 2009Quick!
Its the Santa Signal!
Get the Sled, and Rudolph, fast!
Or, a spontaneous study of how many people have cell phones with video capability and fast reflexes!
Nice pictures and videos!
From altaposten.no - click to embiggen
altaposten.no story - in Norwegian, natch
From NRK.no - with video - good video
Daily Mail in the UK has a good photo and video collection
This brought out the UFOfans and conspiracy theorists, what with Obama heading for Scandinavia for the Nobel festivities.
Youtube video summarizing story, with several views and videos.
Youtube summary of pictures and videos…
catdynamics | December 8, 2009there is an amusing rumour on the resonaances blog about cold dark matter
The CDMS experiment is a Cold Dark Matter Search experiment, looking for nuclear recoil in lab detectors, due to scattering of weakly interacting massive particles with normal matter.
[hmm, link is to UC site for CDMS - the Stanford CDMS website is password protected, don't know if that is usual - I have some recollection of linking to CDMS at Stanford in the
past with no problems.]
CDMSI ran for several years, and reported upper bounds on WIMP masses and cross-sections, and CDMSII has been running for a while now with…
catdynamics | December 6, 2009so here I am, catching up on stuff on the laptop, and being mildly distracted by the television
and I notice my duty cycle of glancing at the television is very low, and I ponder why
the bandwidth of the ears is only about 10 kbaud, and auditory input is rarely near maximum throughput
in contrast the eyes have several megapixels, with scan rate of about 10 Hz, and even allowing for compression and redundancies, the bandwidth has to be 1-10 megabaud,
and 2-3 orders of magnitude higher than the ears
so therefore a lot of TV programming, uses static, uniform colour slabs as part of their…
catdynamics | December 3, 2009A Hubble Advent Calendar?
Cool.
So Boston.com has a Hubble Advent Calendar.
Damn, I wish I had thought of that.
STSCI, as before, has Hubble Seasonal Greeting Cards, free, for you to print out old style, or to send electronically.
and, for the classically minded, there is the BBC's A Bach Christmas Advent Calendar
catdynamics | November 30, 2009history is but a recapitulation of ancient themes
after flipper
came skippy!
Much more better.
still no flying car though...
Done travelling for a bit.
Now to catch up.
catdynamics | November 23, 2009more assorted linky goodness
Astronomy Portraits (UK) - these are very good, take a look.
From e-Astronomer
XKCD - Pure Genius
Wait, Chad wrote a book? Who knew...
I now have this insane desire to explain lightcones in term of pet post-surgery collars...
I know how to push peoples' buttons
Carnival of Space: 128 at AARTScope, 129 at Tiny Manntras and 130 at Chandra Blog
OMG, like so harsh - don't know if it is true, but it ought to be.
we hates them, yes we do
Real Estate Crash - An Engineering Analysis
Ooops, almost forgot this classic from Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis