This paragraph from near the end of that article gives the incident a different feeling:
Some years after the incident, my hidden fears of high speed flight came to the surface and I had to spend two periods in hospital. I had not come to terms with the emotional side of the event
There is something fundamentally different about actually looking at Jupiter... The image might be faint, imperfect ... But it is live.
The astrophotography/live viewing split in astronomy is interesting. For me, the whole reason I do backyard astronomy is to find the objects myself and observe directly, to the point where even using an app like Stellarium feels a bit like cheating.
You'll get a better result if you put in your actual location, but whatever. Looks like Saturn is visible this time of year, and will be in the east around midnight. You can check this right now and it'll be about right for the next few weeks. You can step the time forward and see what how the planets move over time.
If you don't do the above steps, you could probably make a guess, as the planets are the brightest objects in the sky, easily seen by eye.
Then you point your telescope at it. I found mine in the trash and it didn't come with the spotting scope, so I kind of just have to guess where to point it. Use your widest angle lens, and move the scope around until you see something bright go by. You're close! Then you center the bright thing in the center of the view, and after the scope stops shaking because it's on a cheap tripod, you can see a very tiny Saturn, including the rings. Then you swap the lens for a more zoomed in one to see it better. The rotation of the earth means it will quickly drift out of view, so you have to constantly adjust your scope every minute or so to keep it in frame, until I fix the motor that came with my equatorial mount which is supposed to do this part for you.
> How does one locate Saturn in the night sky without an electronic aid?
Seriously?
You mean that _really_ bright star that is out of place on your constellation map / planisphere?
It's a planet.
Look at it and see which one it is. (BTW: Look at it a few nights later as it moves to work out its trajectory. Congratulations, you can now identify which planet it is anytime, no telescope needed.)
I'm sorry if I'm not familiar with your area of expertise, that's why I'm asking the question, because I want to understand. There are lots of stars that are brighter than Saturn, even at its brightest. I don't know if I'd know if a bright point of light is Sirius or Vega or Saturn or what (I could probably at least tell if it's Polaris). I was just trying to find out how you go from a night sky to pointing at Saturn, or Mars, or Jupiter, unless you have a map showing you where it would be on a given night.
Also, don't planets sometimes seem to move in non-intuitive paths, like Mars performing retrograde motion when viewed from Earth? If you were viewing the plants constantly, then sure, you could pick it out, but if you left a gap between observations, wouldn't it be a lot harder?
SERIOUSLY?! You'd be surprised how few people know you can easily spot planets with the naked eye, in addition to many other little interesting things in life. You react as if he didn't know how to his shoes.
> How do you locate celestial bodies like that? Is it just a case of paper maps and a compass?
I mean (based on peer replies) it does come off as a funny question, but I guess if you're young enough it is a totally legitimate question! Never thought of it that way.
But yes, you have a star chart, or atlas. The North Star locates your north and everything else you can then reference from your chart.
(I'm not familiar with southern hemisphere viewing)
And after a little while you recognize the major constellations by sight, so you can orient yourself vs. the chart even if you don't see the North Star for example.
Planets are different since their relative position changes all the time, so a static chart can't tell you where they are. But there are really only four planets you can see with eyes (Mars, Venus, Jupiter, Saturn) so you learn to recognize them pretty quickly.
I understand maps and charts. But generally, stars stay in the same place, so its easy to put them on a map. I was trying to understand how you put a planet on a map when it keeps moving around
Yes. Would currently be "free" (<1c/kWh) around 1400-1530 tomorrow, and go up to ~15c/kWh at night. Fixed costs might distort everything significantly though.
I totally agree about school-level homework: it was many years before my pre-frontal cortex developed enough that I could have forced myself to do the work.
That said, though, one thing I don't understand about the heavy users of AI in academia and software development is that the thinking and coding is the fun part. And that's the part so many people seem to be so keen to automate away.
I'm right there with you. The thinking and the coding is the fun part. I'm pretty relieved that all of this is happening near the end of my career. To me, AI is just not fun. And constantly signaling how productive I am and having to show "my value" is exhausting. This is only my subjective experience, of course, but in many ways the world seems like the fun is getting sucked out everywhere, not just from AI. Like the type of people that become managers are taking over everything.
Depends on the person. I find that it's extremely satisfying to figure out a tricky problem on the way to that end result - to struggle with something for a bit, then finally fix it or fully wrap my head around it. So to me, it's a mixture of both. What I want is the end result, but in the past sometimes that came with thinking in the shower about an approach... Or a wild thought while going to bed that makes me jump up and grab my computer.
That doesn't happen for me anymore to the same degree.
I've read enough comments* on HN to know that there are different camps. Some people don't really enjoy the process of development and just want results. Meanwhile, telling me to automate away the problem solving aspect of software dev is like saying "you know you can just copy the answers to the crossword from the back of the book?"
different strokes for different folks. I'm def. in that end result camp, i get the biggest thrill out of seeing something work. For me, coding agents are awesome because i can bring a lot more to life in much shorter of a time frame. I do enjoy the process and problem solving of coding, it relaxes me. On the other hand, i really really enjoy when an idea i have is on the screen and working.
Seeing and hearing the last remaining Avro Vulcan pull up over the chalk cliffs at Eastbourne a few years back is something I won't forget for a long time.
If they could find a way to fund Radio 4 without it I'd be in favour of scrapping the fee.
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