"We are like dwarfs sitting on the shoulders of giants. We see more, and things that are more distant, than they did, not because our sight is superior or because we are taller than they, but because they raise us up, and by their great stature add to ours." This tumblr's for all the great men and women of science for whom we owe our current understanding of the natural world; their achievements, their failures, and even their quirks, we celebrate them all.
For Science. For Inquiry. For Humanity.
Neil deGrasse Tyson Answers the Big Enchilada Question, “Does the Universe Have a Purpose?”
To say that the universe has a purpose implies that there is a destination or a goal. If that purpose exists, it certainly doesn’t have anything to do with us, the Johnny-come-latelys of the human race. Does the universe have a purpose? There’s a heck of a case to be made that it doesn’t.
But don’t despair in that view. Purpose or not, we are here, and we can discover our place in the larger extent of the cosmos even if we can’t fully describe why it’s all here.
Narrated by the great Neil deGrasse Tyson for the Templeton Foundation, and animated by Henry from MinutePhysics, this is one of the greatest things you’ll watch all week.
(via Open Culture)
Maria Mitchell (1818-1889), astronomer and first woman elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Rare Star Explosion Reveals Hidden Black Hole in Our Galaxy
Astronomers have spotted a rare X-ray star explosion near the center of our Milky Way galaxy, revealing a previously unknown black hole munching on gas from a neighboring sun-like star.
Image: Gas builds up in a storage disk around a black hole, eventually leading to a bright X-ray nova. Credit:NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center
NASA’s Swift satellite made the cosmic find last month when it detected a new and rapidly brightening X-ray source a few degrees from the galactic center of the Milky Way. Astronomers identified the outburst as a short-lived bright X-ray nova, which is produced when a stream of gas rushes toward either a neutron star or a black hole. Unlike a supernova, which is the explosive death of a star, novas are smaller explosions that do not completely destroy a star.
The black hole is thought to be 20,000 to 30,000 light-years away in the galaxy’s inner region. Astronomers, who named the bright X-ray nova Swift J1745-26 after its coordinates in space, said witnessing such an event is rare.
“ Recognize that the very molecules that make up your body, the atoms that construct the molecules, are traceable to the crucibles that were once the centers of high mass stars that exploded their chemically rich guts into the galaxy, enriching pristine gas clouds with the chemistry of life. So that we are all connected to each other biologically, to the earth chemically, and to the rest of the universe atomically. That’s kinda cool! That makes me smile and I actually feel quite large at the end of that. It’s not that we are better than the universe, we are part of the universe. We are in the universe and the universe is in us. ”
~ Neil deGrasse Tyson; (Born 54 years ago today, October 5, 1958)
(via project-argus)
“If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe.”
(Source: bouncingdodecahedrons, via astrotastic)
Maria Mitchell (1818-1889), astronomer and first woman elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
