America will experience a total eclipse this month. Even if you aren’t in the path of totality on August 21, you will experience a partial eclipse, where the Moon blocks some portion of the Sun. Millions of Americans will be tempted to look up at the eclipse, which violates one of the most basic rules of astronomy: Do NOT look directly at the Sun. This rule always applies, even during a partial eclipse when the Sun looks like a crescent. You can permanently damage your eyes, so don’t do it. Fortunately, there are special eclipse glasses you can get that allow you to watch the eclipse without harming your eyes. Unfortunately, some eclipse glasses aren’t safe to use, so you shouldn’t use any eclipse glasses that haven’t been verified as safe. 

The danger of looking at the Sun is partly due to its extreme brightness, but it’s mainly due to two things you can’t see. Infrared and ultraviolet radiation. Infrared light is the type we feel as heat, such as the warmth that radiates from a campfire. If you stare at the Sun too long, its infrared light can overheat your retinas and damage them. Ultraviolet light is what gives us sunburns. Just as our skin can become damaged due to UV exposure, so can our eyes. If you’ve ever experienced a sunburn, you’ve noticed that you aren’t aware of the burn until its too late. The same is true with damage to your eyes. You might not notice a problem until you have already damaged your eyes.

My opinion of those who make and sell fake eclipse glasses.

Eclipse glasses are designed to block the harmful infrared and ultraviolet light from the Sun. The latest manufacturing standard, ISO 12312-2, allows you to view the Sun safely for extended periods of time. You should still make sure you have sunscreen on your face, but proper eclipse glasses will make sure you won’t harm your eyes. Unfortunately, demand for eclipse glasses means some folks are selling eclipse glasses that aren’t safe. They don’t block enough UV and infrared to be safe. Some of these fake glasses even claim to meet the ISO 12312-2 standard. It takes a special kind of evil to risk blinding children for a quick buck. Unfortunately his means you can’t simply trust glasses with the ISO standard printed on them.

The only way to be sure your glasses are safe is to confirm the source of the eclipse glasses. The American Astronomical Society has compiled a list of manufacturers verified to be in compliance with the ISO standard, as well as a list of vendors that only sell from verified sources. If your glasses came from this list, then you should be good to go.

https://eclipse.aas.org/resources/solar-filters

Libraries and science museums are also a big source of eclipse glasses. In many cases they are giving them away for free, particularly to folks who can’t afford them. If you got a pair from a library or science museum, they are almost certainly fine. If you aren’t sure, just contact them to confirm the source. The biggest danger is if you purchased them online from a source not listed on the AAS resource page. They might be fine, but it’s hard to be sure. It’s better to be safe than sorry.

Use caution when viewing the eclipse. Credit: Rick Fienberg / TravelQuest International / Wilderness Travel

Once you have good eclipse glasses, proper safety is still important. Make sure that the glasses are not damaged or scratched, and don’t look towards the Sun unless your eclipse glasses are firmly in place. Make sure your children know the safety rules, and keep your eye on them while they view the eclipse. During the period of totality, you can look at the eclipse without glasses, but only when the Moon completely blocks the Sun.

If you don’t have eclipse glasses on August 21, don’t try using a substitute. Sunglasses are not enough. Welding visors are not enough. Don’t risk your eyes using them. Instead, build yourself a pinhole camera. They are simple to make, and you can watch the eclipse without ever risking your eyes.

The post How To Tell If Your Solar Eclipse Glasses Are Safe appeared first on One Universe at a Time.

It’s winter in the northern hemisphere. That fact, combined with the arctic blast that’s reddening many cheeks in North America, means that many of us will enjoy a white Christmas. Since it’s a time to be thankful, here’s five reasons you should thank astrophysics for this year’s Winter wonderland. 

1. Axial Tilt
   Earth’s axis is tilted about 23 degrees relative to its orbital plane. As the Earth orbits the Sun, the northern hemisphere is tilted toward the Sun for about half the year, and tilted away from the Sun for half the year. When it’s tilted away from the Sun, the sunlight that reaches us is at a lower angle, meaning there’s less energy and heat reaching the Earth’s surface. That, combined with the fact that the Sun is visible for fewer hours in the day means the northern hemisphere enters a period of cold winter. Of course, for the southern hemisphere it’s reversed, meaning it’s a summer Christmas for those down under.
2. Elemental Abundance
   The most abundant element in the Universe is hydrogen, making up about 74% of cosmic matter by mass. Helium comes in second, making up about 24%. These two elements are so common because they were the elements formed soon after the big bang. Other elements of the periodic table are formed through astrophysical processes such as fusion in the heart of a star. This is true of the third most common element, oxygen, which makes up only 1% of the elemental mass in our galaxy. Helium is a noble gas, and doesn’t combine with other elements to form molecules, which leaves only hydrogen and oxygen. One of the most readily formed molecules from these two elements is H₂O, which is the primary ingredient of snow. Water is so common in the Universe because it’s formed from the two most common molecule-forming elements.
3. Heavy Bombardment
   Although water is common, it can evaporate away from a small, warm planet that forms close to its star. This is why Venus and Mars are so dry. We often think of Earth as a watery world, but it actually has less water than many moons of the outer solar system. We’re still not entirely sure how Earth came to have much more water than its planetary cousins, but one popular idea is that water was brought to Earth by asteroids and comets that bombarded our world during its youth.
4. Dalton Solar Minimum
   When you think of the winter season, you might think of Charles Dickens, whose stories such as A Christmas Carol have become a holiday staple. Dickens often wrote of a wintery Britain covered in snow, which may have helped drive the nostalgia we have for a snowy holiday. But interestingly, Britain doesn’t often have a snow-covered Christmas. In the 1900s, it was a white Christmas only seven times. But things were very different in the early 1800s, when Dickens was a child. Six of his first nine Christmas holidays were snowy. This period also corresponds to the Dalton solar minimum, which is a period between 1796 to 1820 when sunspot activity was unusually low. There’s some evidence to show that solar minima are correlated with colder temperatures on Earth. For example, the Maunder minimum spanning 1645 to 1715 is associated with the “little ice age” of Europe. It might just be a coincidence, but sunspot activity could be the source of Dickens’ holiday nostalgia.
5. Global Warming
   Although it is more properly called global climate change, the warming of Earth in recent decades could be the reason why it’s so cold in the northeast. It might seem paradoxical, but our cold temperatures are caused by the polar vortex dipping farther into North America than it usually does. The polar vortex is bounded by the jet stream, which typically moves in a smooth circle around the Earth. In recent years the jet stream has had a more wavy flow, and this may be driven by record warm temperatures at the north pole. As the arctic ice continues to melt and polar temperatures rise, the polar vortex can be pushed southward more often. It’s too soon to tell if this shift in the polar vortex is driven by climate change, but it is a possibility.

So there you have it. But whether your solstice holiday is wintery white or summery green, I wish you a joyful and peaceful season.

The post Winter Wonderland appeared first on One Universe at a Time.

It’s flu shot season, which means an annual popup of anti-vax memes in my social media feeds. Most of the memes this year are of the “OMG! The flu shot contains mercury!” variety. While it’s true that some versions of the flu vaccine do contain trace amounts of mercury, such a statement is largely meaningless. 

Thimerosal, the organic compound used as a preservative in some vaccines, breaks down in the body into ethyl mercury. Since our bodies can remove ethyl mercury from our bodies, it doesn’t bioaccumulate. This is very different from methyl mercury, found in trace amounts in certain fish like tuna. Methyl mercury is hard for our bodies to remove, and can bioaccumulate. It’s the buildup of mercury over time that can be dangerous, which is why the FDA recommends limiting consumption of certain varieties of fish. While both compounds contain mercury, the two molecules are structurally different and behave differently in our bodies. It’s similar to the difference between ethyl alcohol and methyl alcohol. The former is found in beer and wine and used as a social lubricant, while the latter is used in things like antifreeze and is highly toxic. Simply stating some vaccines contain mercury is like saying “OMG! Beer contains antifreeze!”

The glossing over of these kinds of details is depressingly common in popular science writing. For example, a while back there were posts about how there is evidence of life found in some meteorites, supporting the idea that life came from outer space. What was actually found was that some meteorites, such as the Murchison meteorite, contain more than 70 types of amino acids, which are sometimes referred to as the building blocks of life. Since the fall of the Murchison meteorite was observed, and the meteorite was recovered soon after it reached Earth, we can be confident that those amino acids are not due to terrestrial contamination. It’s in the details, however, where things get interesting.

Chiral molecules come in left-handed and right-handed versions. Credit: Wikipedia

Amino acids are chiral molecules. This means they come in two different forms that are mirror images of each other. Each type of amino acid has a left handed and right handed version. Terrestrial organisms mainly use left-handed proteins (of which amino acids are the building blocks) and right-handed sugars. The amino acids on the Murchison meteorite were found to be roughly equal parts left and right handed. This means they were likely produced by a nonbiological process. We know from other studies that complex molecules can form in deep space. So the Murchison meteorite actually contradicts the idea that terrestrial life began in space. Cosmic amino acids may have played a role, but likely some mechanism on Earth gave rise to the handedness of biology we see today.

Often in science it’s the smallest of details that make all the difference. Some evidence can’t be reduced to a catchy headline, and doing so can often lead to headlines that are downright misleading.

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Physical theories are often presented as a description of what’s really going on. Forces act on a baseball, causing it to fall. Atoms collide and fuse in the heart of a star, releasing heat and energy. Science is true, as is often said, and our scientific theories encapsulate this truth. But this isn’t entirely true. 

The probability distributions for hydrogen in different energy states.

For example, quantum mechanics is a strange, sometimes confusing theory. Objects can be particles and waves. They do strange things like tunnel through barriers, and can even appear and disappear.  Given all this strangeness, what’s really going on? What’s the true nature of quantum reality? It depends on which approach you want to take. In one view quantum objects are described by a wave-like probability function. When you interact with or “observe” the object this “wavefunction” collapses into a definite state. That’s view commonly presented, but a quantum system can also be described by its transitions between energy states. Since this uses a mathematical method involving matrices, it’s known as matrix mechanics. Both wavefunctions and matrix mechanics give the same results, but their view of what really goes on is very different. Then there’s the path integral method. Rather than a wavefunction or matrix transitions, path integrals imagine quantum objects can take almost any path between two states. By summing all the possible paths you can derive the odds that it will occur.

The matrix transition version of quantum theory doesn’t care about the wavefunction.

So which one is true? Are quantum objects distributed waves of probability? Are they simply transitions between energy states? Do they take an infinite number of paths between states? Each of these models make the same predictions, so one version is no more “true” than the others. What happens in practice is that we’ll use whatever method is useful at the time. They are equivalent models, so the best model for the job is the one we’ll use. The only reason the wavefunction view is so common is that it’s the version usually taught to introductory students.

You might think this uncertainty of truth is due to the behavior of quantum physics itself. It’s so strange and counterintuitive that we can’t wrap our puny brains around what’s really going on. But the same thing occurs in lots of other fields. Even something as straight forward as basic Newtonian physics.

In the path integral view many potential paths are summed.

Toss a baseball in the air and Earth’s gravitational force pulls it down. The force of gravity is a simple truth, right? While we often describe classical motion in terms of forces and acceleration, we can also describe it in terms of energy and momentum. In the Lagrangian and Hamiltonian approach, the path of a baseball is the optimized path among possibilities. In this view a baseball’s path is the extrema of an energy equation, and force can be derived as a necessary consequence of this. In the relativistic view the baseball follows a geodesic, which is the minimal path through space and time. So is a baseball’s motion due to a gravitational force, an energy extrema, or a spacetime geodesic? As with quantum theory, different approaches yield the same result. They are mathematically equivalent, so we can use whatever method is most useful at the time.

At its core, science is less about truth and more about models. The metaphysics underlying a model is useful only as far as it allows us to make better predictions, generate new ideas, or bring models together as a cohesive whole. This is why we have no problem using classical gravity to calculate the path of a spacecraft through the solar system, while using special relativity to account for the Doppler shift of the spacecraft’s radio signals. It’s why we can use quantum physics to study atoms in the morning, and general relativity to study black holes in the afternoon. In regimes where models conflict with each other it isn’t a failure of truth, but instead shows an opportunity to develop a better model.

It could be that with each better model we move closer to the truth about reality. The truth is out there, and science strives to move towards that truth. It’s a common view, and certainly the search for truth has driven many scientists to develop better and better models. But the real power of science is the recognition that what we have are models. Our models can be powerful, but they are always a bit tentative. There’s always a chance that they might just be an illusion of truth.

The post The Illusion Of Truth appeared first on One Universe at a Time.

Elon Musk thinks we probably live in a virtual universe. Meanwhile scientist have shown that wormholes can be traversed by spacecraft. Perhaps they’re used by nearly a trillion alien civilizations that live in our cosmos. 

At its core, science focuses on evidence. Models are tested against the evidence we have, so that over time a confluence of evidence allows us to refine scientific theories into something that’s reliable and predictive. There’s always a chance that a newer, better theory will replace an older one, but our focus on evidence keeps us from straying into wild speculation.

That doesn’t mean we can’t sometimes speculate about what might or might not be. Exploring “what if” models can be a great way to push back against the assumptions of a model. Debates about metaphysics and the philosophy of science can help keep us honest about the limits of a theory’s power. While these speculations aren’t necessarily science, they play a role in the scientific process. Unfortunately there is often confusion in popular media about the difference between what might be and what is.

Take, for example, the idea that we live in a virtual universe. The basic argument is that if it’s likely that civilizations far more advanced than ours can arise in the universe, and they have a good chance of simulating aspects of their past, then odds are we are living in a simulated world. Statistically its more likely that we are a simulation of pre-singularity humans than actually living in that rare time period. The argument is a philosophical exploration about the limits of what we can know, and has a long history tracing back to descartes’ demon and Plato’s cave. The often-referenced work by Nick Bostrom doesn’t claim we are living in a virtual world, but rather argues we can’t simply discard the idea out of hand.

Then there’s the idea that wormholes might be traversable. Wormholes are a hypothetical idea that has been studied for decades, including how they might be traversed. The latest work on the idea focuses not on spaceship travel, but on how microscopic wormholes might allow elementary particles through. It’s a mathematical study of the limits of general relativity. It’s less about proving wormholes real and more about pushing an established model until it breaks to see how it works.

But what about alien civilizations? Have we finally proved they’re out there? No, the latest paper on alien civilizations is a study of the observational constraints on alien civilizations. We now have a good handle of just how many potentially habitable planets there are in the Universe, at least on a broad order of magnitude. They’re extraordinarily common, and that means there could be trillions of alien civilizations out there. There could also be no civilizations other than ours. It really comes down to how rare the formation of life on a world actually is. Even if civilizations are common, it’s quite likely that we simply won’t meet up with them.

While each of these ideas might be true, there currently isn’t evidence to support them. They may lead us to new ways of seeing the Universe, or they may just end up a false, but cool, story.

Paper: Nick Bostrom. Are You Living In A Computer Simulation? Philosophical Quarterly, Vol. 53, No. 211, pp. 243-255 (2003) DOI: 10.1111/1467-9213.00309

Paper: Gonzalo J Olmo, et al. Impact of curvature divergences on physical observers in a wormhole space–time with horizons. Classical and Quantum Gravity, Vol 33, No 11 (2016) DOI:10.1088/0264-9381/33/11/115007

Paper: A. Frank and W.T. Sullivan III. A New Empirical Constraint on the Prevalence of Technological Species in the Universe. Astrobiology, Vol 16, No 5 (2016) DOI: 10.1089/ast.2015.1418

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This morning I woke to find a request in my email. A journalist was writing a story on new research and wanted me to comment on what pitfalls there might be in the model. It seemed like a pretty standard request, but I was wrong. 

To begin with, the journalist didn’t give me a link to the research paper, they gave me a link to a popular article from a competing website asking whether black holes were actually holograms. The article tried to explain mind-blowing ideas about higher dimensions, and even featured a video clip where Matthew Mcconaughey explains M-theory in True Detective.

It’s too early for this. I haven’t even had a morning cuppa.

Okay, so I pour myself a cup and settle in to the task of tracking down the actual paper. A couple of Google searches later I have the actual paper (behind a paywall, natch) and start reading. Of course it uses the holographic principle, which is a mathematical technique that involves making journalists confuse it with “is a hologram.”

It turns out the article is interesting, but has very little to do with the holographic principle. It’s actually a study of how quantum and classical descriptions of thermodynamics can give the same entropy results for black holes. Not a radical idea, nor some hologram heresy, but solid work towards bring together quantum theory with gravity. At this point I’ve already spent two hours on it, which I could do today because I have the time, and the article was interesting enough that I might get a post out of it.

Time to reply to the journalist. While they were looking for a “this is interesting, but..” reply, what they got was a tearing apart of the popular article and a basic summary of what entropy and thermodynamics are, how they relate to black holes, what the holographic principle actually is, and what the research paper is actually about.

But here’s the thing: articles on “black holes are holograms” are already gathering page-view money, and the journalist who emailed me is under pressure to get an article out quickly. They might go through what I sent them and write a thoughtful rebuttal to the hologram hype, but that wouldn’t get nearly the pageviews that Matthew Mcconaughey will. It would be easier and more profitable to simply gather a quote from someone else. I may have just wasted a couple hours this morning, but I hope not.

The thing is, the journalist actually tried to do the right thing. Seeing some sensational article they tracked down someone who might understand it as a reality check, and that’s why I took the time to reply. But if they write a more accurate article as a result it will cost them money. That’s where we are at this point. In the pay per view economy science writers lose money by taking the time to get it right.

I’m not sure how to fix this problem, but maybe one way is to draw attention to good science writing. If you see a popular science article that took the time to get it right, think about writing their editor. Tell them you liked the article because of its clarity and accuracy, and that you’d like to see more science writing like this.

Maybe then news sites will understand that science journalism can be more than pay per view.

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Recently I wrote a post rather critical of the EmDrive, which supposedly defies the laws of physics. As a result I’ve gotten a flurry of emails criticizing me for being closed minded, or claiming that defending the status quo for financial gain. After all, Einstein overturned Newton, so perhaps I should show some humility and be open to new ideas. It’s a common accusation when I’m critical of the electric universe model and other fringe science. There is this view that scientists are like dogmatic clergyman who refuse to look into Galileo’s telescope. In reality, the reason we’re so critical of radical scientific ideas is that we’re actually looking for Narnia.

In C.S. Lewis’s The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Narnia is a magical land where animals talk. It is discovered when Lucy, the youngest of four children, discovers a gateway to Narnia in a magical wardrobe. Most of us would love to find a hidden magical world, but we have a pretty good understanding of how the world works, and it doesn’t involve wardrobes to other worlds. So when Lucy returns from Narnia to tell her siblings of her discovery, they naturally are skeptical. It’s far more likely that Lucy is playing a practical joke, or that her imagination has gotten the best of her. Of course eventually the other children enter Narnia as well, and Lucy is vindicated.

Deep down most scientists want to be like Lucy. We want a great discovery that overturns some established theory. The joy of discovery is what drives us, and sometimes we explore scientific wardrobes. We really do want to find Narnia. But it’s because we want it that we’re so critical of wild claims. We don’t want to fall prey to a childish prank. So when something like the EmDrive comes along we rip it to shreds. We point out all the ways it could be an error, and all the ways the engineers could be wrong. But we’re also hoping the EmDrive can overcome all those challenges. As long as the work listens to the evidence and responds to criticism, we’ll always be rooting for it.

We’re skeptical. We demand proof. But there’s a part of us that hopes Lucy will take us to Narnia after all.

The post Looking For Narnia appeared first on One Universe at a Time.

The rotational axis of the Earth is tilted about 23 degrees away from its orbital axis. Or, according to one introductory science textbook, 23.5 degrees. It’s very important, the book goes on to stress, that you remember 23.5. It’s one of the facts you should memorize apparently. Which irks me on two levels. The first being that Earth’s axial tilt is closer to 23.44 degrees, but the second being that I don’t care. And neither should you. 

Sure, you could argue that one should have a general idea of how much the Earth is tilted, but it’s vastly more important that you know the consequences of the axial tilt. That axial tilt (and not the distance from the Sun) is what drives our seasons, which explains why January is cold in New York, but warm in Sydney. Someone who understands this, but only knows the tilt is “about 20 degrees” clearly has a better understanding of the universe than someone who simply knows “the tilt of the Earth is 22.44 degrees.”

I’ve been reading through several introductory science texts as background for a children’s outreach project, and the emphasis on random facts is disappointing. It also makes for a poor representation of what science is all about. Sure, we need precise measurements and experimental results, but unless you’re working on a specific measurement, the actual value is less important than its connection to other results. So what if the speed of light in a vacuum is 299,792,458 m/s? It’s better to know that it’s a universal constant, and through relativity we know that measurements of time and space depend upon the reference frame of the observer.

While most scientists have memorized many of the values they regularly use, we still look up values all the time. I can recite things like the speed of light, the gravitational constant and the charge of an electron to a few decimal places, but ask me to recite something like the Rydberg constant, and I’m at a loss. I know it relates to the spectral lines of an ideal hydrogen atom, but I’d still have to look up its value. I simply don’t use it enough to have it memorized.

So don’t sweat it if you’ve ever struggled and failed to memorize facts and figures. They aren’t as important as they seem.

The post Facts and Figures appeared first on One Universe at a Time.

There are mountains on Pluto. Rugged mountains beneath a hazy sky that is both familiar and strange. Before humans walked upon the Earth, Pluto’s mountains watched over a frozen plain. Waiting to be seen.

There are lakes on Titan. There are waves of hydrocarbons that wash upon a shore of ice beneath methane clouds. When humans first noticed Saturn wandering against a background of stars they couldn’t imagine such alien lakes, but they were there, waiting to be seen.

The first Martian rocks that will be gathered by humans rest upon the surface of Mars as you read this. The first asteroid to be captured currently orbits the Sun. There could be life in the subsurface oceans of Europa. Some wondrous organism waiting to be discovered.

Left: first image of Pluto with moon Charon. Right: more modern Hubble image.

For most of my life Pluto was little more than a fuzzy blob. Through human ingenuity we’ve come to know the amazing and unexpected geography of the once planet. It has long existed in the universe, but only now is part of human understanding. To study the universe is to be explorers, following our paths of curiosity to find what lies beyond our view. Working together as humans we’ve discovered mountains on Pluto. If we continue to work together we can find more awe-inspiring things.

There’s a lot out there, waiting to be seen.

The post Waiting To Be Seen appeared first on One Universe at a Time.

Yesterday I got an email asking for a favor. I’ve never met this particular person before, but they had this revolutionary new approach to relativity that could explain away dark matter and dark energy. Could I please just read through the 40-page tome and give them feedback. It’s so simple it must be right. They just need a little help with the details. I get similar emails about once a week. Please look at this theory, if you could just fill in the math, if you just read it you’ll see I’m right. Usually they call upon the importance of their work to urge me to do it. Sometimes they kindly offer to make me a coauthor of their paper. Not once have any of them offered to pay me.

I usually just ignore these emails, but I think I’ll start responding. I’d be happy to, for $250 an hour. Paid in advance.

If you are emailing me, it’s presumably because you know that I’m trained in astrophysics. Maybe you’ve come across my blog, or you saw me listed on my university’s website. I have a skill you’d like access to, and you’re asking for personal feedback on work that will take time to understand an analyze. Paying $250 an hour for such work is actually quite reasonable. Whether or not you agree, that’s my going rate.

Like most scientists, I got into my field not for the money, but because it’s what I’m passionate about. I’m fortunate to be employed as a scientist so that I can make a living doing what I love. And there’s a great deal I’ll do for free because of that love. You want me to give a talk about astronomy or physics? I’d be happy to. Have a question about my field, I’ll try to answer it. Want me to talk science on your podcast or TV show, I’ll try to fit it into my schedule. The universe is an amazing place, and I’ll do what I can to tell the world just how amazing it is.

But our time on this rock is limited, and in my case I can either spend my spare time communicating science to the general public, or I can spend it working on your pet theory.

So, you want me to vet your personal theory? As they say, show me the money.

The post I’d Be Happy To … For $250 an Hour appeared first on One Universe at a Time.

On the face of it, this might seem like a silly question. Of course we can see stars in space. We see stars more clearly from space than we do from Earth, which is why space telescopes are so useful. And yet, this question comes up again and again. Not just from moon landing skeptics and fringe science promoters, but from everyday folks who are sure they learned somewhere that stars can’t be seen in space.

When overexposed, the Moon seems to glow brilliantly. Credit: Bob King/Sky and Telescope

The origin of this misconception is usually traced back to an interview with the crew of Apollo 11, where (it is claimed) Neil Armstrong said he couldn’t see stars in space. What the crew were actually discussing at the time was the inability to see stars on the daylight side of the Moon, which is not surprising given how bright the lunar surface can be relative to the airless black of space. Even in space the stars aren’t overly bright, and our eyes can lose dark adaption pretty quickly.

An image from the ISS of stars and glowing layers of Earth’s atmosphere.

But what about all those photos of objects in space, such as the one of the international space station seen above? There’s no stars to be seen in the image. It’s actually quite common to see images of planets and other objects against a starless black background. Doesn’t that support the idea of a starless sky in space? No, since it’s no surprise that an image focused on a bright object like a planet or moon won’t have a long enough exposure to see stars clearly. There are plenty of images from space that do show stars, as well as other faint phenomena such as the green airglow of our atmosphere.

What this misconception really shows is how easily a misconception can get locked into our heads. We can all fall prey to the trap of holding misconceptions without really thinking about them. That’s part of the reason why we focus on published and verifiable evidence in science.

Which is why this isn’t such a silly question after all.

The post Can Astronauts See Stars In Space? appeared first on One Universe at a Time.

“So what do you do for a living?” I always cringe a bit when that question comes up among strangers, because when I reveal that I’m an astrophysics professor the response is almost always the same. “Um…wow…. You must be really smart!”

No, Tyson didn’t say this.

While it’s often intended as a compliment, it really isn’t. Smart didn’t allow me to become an astrophysicist. Hard work, dedication and the support of family and friends did. It’s also one of the most deeply divisive misconceptions about scientists that one can have: scientists are smarter than you. Part of this stems from the idolization of brilliant scientists. Albert Einstein was so smart that fictitious quotes are attributed to him. Media buzzes whenever Stephen Hawking says something about black holes. Any quote by Neil Tyson is a sure way to get likes on Facebook. We celebrate their genius and it makes us feel smart by association. But this stereotype of the “genius scientist” has a dark side.

For one there’s expectation that to do science you must be super smart. If you struggle with math, or have to study hard to pass chemistry, you must not have what it takes. The expectation to be smart when you don’t feel smart starts to foster a lack of self confidence in your abilities. This is particularly true if you’re a girl or minority where cultural biases presume that “your kind” aren’t smart, or shouldn’t be. Lots of talented children walk away from science because they don’t feel smart.

Dr. Ben Carson: not stupid.

Then there’s the us vs. them mentality that arises from the misconception. Scientists (and fans of science) are smart. Smarter than you. You are stupid. But of course, you’re not stupid. You know you’re not stupid. The problem isn’t you, it’s the scientists. Scientists are arrogant. For example, when I criticized a particular science website for intentionally misleading readers, the most popular rebuttal was that I (as a scientist) was being elitist.

Where this attitude really raises its head is among supporters of fringe scientific ideas. Some of the strongest supporters of alternative scientific ideas are clearly quite intelligent. Presidential hopeful and evolution denier Ben Carson is a neurosurgeon. Pierre Robitaille made great advances in magnetic resonance imaging, but adamantly believes that the cosmic microwave background comes from Earth’s oceans. Physicist and Nobel laureate Ivar Giaever thinks global warming is a pseudoscience on the verge of becoming a “new religion.” None of these folks are stupid.

Actually, that’s pretty clever.

If there’s one thing most people know about themselves it’s that they’re not stupid. And they’re right. We live in a complex world and face challenges every day. If you’re stupid, you can quickly land in a heap of unpleasantness. Of course that also means that many people equate being wrong with being stupid. Stupid people make the wrong choices in life, while smart people make the right ones. So when you see someone promoting a pseudoscientific idea, you likely think they’re stupid. When you argue against their ideas by saying “you’re wrong,” what they’ll hear is “you’re stupid.” They’ll see it as a personal attack, and they’ll respond accordingly. Assuming someone is stupid isn’t a way to build a bridge of communication and understanding.

One of the things I love about science is how deeply ennobling it is. Humans working together openly and honestly can do amazing things. We have developed a deep understanding of the universe around us. We didn’t gain that understanding by being stupid, but we have been wrong many times along the way. Being wrong isn’t stupid.

Sometimes it’s the only way we can learn.

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