Earth
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The Copernican Revolution
Nicolaus Copernicus lived from 1473-1543, a time when rebellion against the Church was at its height. And unfortunately for the astronomy of the time, it had gotten inextricably tied up with Christian teachings. In that time, heaven and hell weren’t…
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The Ptolemaic Universe
Claudius Ptolemy lived about five centuries after the Greek philosopher Aristotle’s time. Aristotle’s model for the universe — the first geocentric model, with Earth at the center — was still widely accepted, and Ptolemy sought to improve it. Ptolemy was one…
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Aristotle’s Universe
You might have heard of Aristotle. He’s the guy who said that we are what we repeatedly do. His words are often interpreted to mean that, for instance, a person who farms is therefore a farmer — or a person…
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From Classical Beginnings
The universe as we know it was born out of chaos. We have a pretty good idea of the scale of our universe and how it began — as an infinitely dense point of matter that blew apart in what…
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The Saros Cycle
Would it surprise you to hear the solar eclipses repeat? Now, I know we can’t go back in time to see past eclipses, and once the date of an eclipse — say, March 7, 1970 — has passed, that date…
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The Eclipse Seasons
There can be no doubt that solar and lunar eclipses are some of the most fascinating sights for the “naked” eye. (And I say “naked” under the assumption that you know never to look directly at the sun without approved protection!)…
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Lunar Phases and Motion
The lunar phases…who really understands ’em? We see them all the time. When we look up at the moon in the sky, we’re bound to notice that it looks just a little bit different from the last time we saw…
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Milankovitch and Climate
The Yugoslavian meteorologist Milutin Milankovitch is known for coming up with the idea of orbital forcing, also known as Milankovitch cycles. Orbital forcing is a fancy term for certain changes in Earth’s orbit, which are precession, obliquity, and eccentricity. I’ve written…
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Sunrise in Flagstaff
It’s 5:00 am and I’m up ungodly early to photograph the sunrise for a school assignment. So I figured I’d blog about it. Because, why not? 4:50: Okay, I’m up. Why do I have to be up so freaking early…
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Orbit and Climate
You have probably all heard of ice ages. And no, I don’t mean the Ice Age movies… Although, Ice Age is actually a pretty good example of what happens during a real-life ice age. I haven’t seen enough of the movies to…
