Gfamily

Liverpool Astronomical Society, in conjunction with Liverpool Library and World Museum have arranged a day to mark the 50 years since the last Apollo mission. 10th December - 9:30 to 3:30 - free for all. There will be talks, activities, and Solar Observing (weather dependent) on the roof. It is hoped that 8 or 9 local astronomical societies will be there.

I get a redirect to a security enrolment page. I'm not going to follow it.

If you want to come in to Liverpool on Saturday 10th, there is a "50 years since Apollo 17" day at the Central Library and World Museum. There are talks etc, and it's hoped that there'll be 7 or 8 Astro societies from around the area. It's being organised by the Liverpool AS, but if you drop by the Mid Cheshire AG table I'll say hello. If you and your son are into camping - I can thoroughly recommend going to a Star Party with your scope. These are particularly good for people sharing advice, showing how they use kit and the like.

There is a Livestream - though it's currently offline https://video.ibm.com/channel/b4dEcL3bJKW Saw some lovely images yesterday Was amused by the info panel

Thanks for that; it's an interesting thought. My 'perspective' is that if the distance between the Earth and the Sun is scaled to 1 inch (the length of the tip of your thumb), then 1 light year is 1 mile (1.6km) and the nearest star is 4.2 miles (6.7km) away. When Bessel measured the parallax of the star 61 Cygni in 1838 it was the equivalent of measuring the parallax of something about 13 miles (21km) away just by comparing the view using the left eye and then the right.

There's been a recent thread about what people's favourite magazine, and to be honest, it's very much a personal choice. Unfortunately, it seems that the magazines on newsagents' shelves are usually released in plastic wrappers so you can't easily browse them to see which you prefer If you have a local astro society it may be worth getting in touch and seeing if anyone can bring some examples along to have a look at.

Which begs the question of when will the universe know that across the scale of the universe there is nothing else but photons - of course this can never be 'known' - at least not under the current cosmology.

Space is a measure of the separation between objects Another measure is the separation between events, and this is what we call time. Relativity tells us that they aren't independent - or at least people who understand relativity tell us this. One of the ways of understanding the expansion of the universe is that there is a 'scale factor' that determines how the space between objects is increasing as time progresses. I don't understand this either. ETA - But I have a telescope that shows me things, and other people have other devices that show me other things. And they give me joy (and sometimes a pretence of understanding).

I can see one way that that could be true ... Let us suppose that there are two options There is a real universe with laws and stuff - and we're in this. This Universe is real and exists. We are living in a simulation on some superior intelligence's super computer. We're all here, all existing, all interacting, all seeing, all detecting, all experiencing the simulation's laws and stuff If we are in the simulation, it's not likely that there's only one instance of the simulation - what would be the point of that? So, we expect that if it were a simulation, there are multiple simulations. Even if there are only two, that makes it a 2:1 shot that the universe is illusory - if 100, then it's 99% likely that we live in a simulation, and our experiences are illusory. Personally, I don't think there's any evidence that we do live in a simulation - but it's something to consider for a different perspective.

Do you mean in terms of "what it is", or "what it does" ? "What it is" is a semiconductor device with 3 terminals "What it does" is act as an amplifying device or as a simple switch. It is clearly possible that someone could imagine what a transistor does - after all, that's what thermionic valves can do, and the first valves date not much later than 1900. I'm not sure what this means in terms of thinking about alternative life forms, but it's clear that we can think of how we might recognise intelligence in other beings even if the beings aren't based on carbon and DNA, but there may be forms of intelligence that we wouldn't be able to imagine until we came across them.

It's possible that octopuses are already there - certainly they're capable of using tools, they are impressive problem solvers, so I wouldn't rule out being capable of conscious thought - not sure if they tell jokes though, they are primarily solitary living, so finding an audience may be an issue.

I don't specifically know about Mak Newts, but the Mirror cell on a Newt is often somewhat free floating from the tube walls, so although it's closed at the top, it's not necessarily hermetically sealed at the mirror end. I managed to leave one of my Mak Cass's stored without a cover to the visual back and got a spider inside. I can only guess it starved to death. An Oil Filter removal wrench* allowed me to remove the front correction plate and clear away my unwanted guest and the remains of its web * get one with a strap rather a chain** (hopefully you'd realise that a chain wouldn't be appropriate) - also, before removing the correcting plate, use 2 pieces of tape on the OTA and the end collar to allow you to return it to the original alignment. ** top tip - also useful for very stuck jamjar lids.

Calling it 'crewed spaceflight' is a significant progress for one !!! Not much less seriously was the following... At our Astro Club meeting this evening, I mentioned that it was the 49th anniversary launch of the last Skylab mission. This lasted almost 3 months and gave rise to a significant reappraisal of the workloads expected from astronauts. Less significantly, at the nom nom level, there have been advances in astronaut nutrition options - feeding a very "tech crew" for 10/20 days is very different to the expectations of a 'sci /maint crew' for multiple months

Apologies if I've missed it, but I don't think I've seen any mention of the newest Luke Jerram art creation on here. I'm sure many of us have seen his previous pieces, Museum of the Moon and Gaia (for those not familiar, they are 7 metre diameter globes with high resolution surface images of the Moon and Earth respectively). We've been to see these in a number of locations - although they are the same physical entities, I find that my response varies depending on their location - so it's worth travelling to see them in different locations if you can. Anyhow, I've just seen that his 2019 creation, Mars, is now touring - using NASA MRO imaging, it'll provide the same experience of the Red Planet. Until the 28th November, it'll be at the Morecambe Winter Gardens, and if you can't see it there, keep an eye on the https://my-mars.org/tour-dates/ website.

A footnote to this. Prior to our visit, I had been looking out for somewhere that I might be able to divert to a decent astronomy equipment store. At the time, Scope City was fairly well established as a Bricks & Mortar store, but the only one we'd be near was in LasVegas. So, on our first morning in LV, we dropped by the store and had a look inside. When I said what I was looking for, one of the assistants gave me a sideways look and said "How about we go out on the terrace? " - with me a little bit unsure about what he meant, he picked up a scope and said out loud "Let's see what you think of this one". Once on the terrace, and out of earshot of any manager, he advised that we couldn't do better than getting in touch with Bill (who had the fairly well established online Telescope Warehouse store) - and gave us Bill's LV address and a phone number So we got in touch, and went to visit Bill (and his cats) while he gave us his suggestions for EPs and the Barlow. I have to say that Scope City have at least one very good staff member (or at least they did 20+ years ago) - though I'm not sure that Scope City would be happy to hear how they were helpful.

I've no idea why it's not letting you download the Windows version - of course, you can't run an Android app on a Windows PC (unless you use an emulator of course), but the Windows version should be downloadable and runnable - unless you're using a limited access profile on a PC / laptop provided by your employer or something.

First scope was a 4.5" Newtonian with GOTO - about 25 years ago. It originally came with 0.925" EPs, but I managed to get an adapter so that I could use 1.25" EPs. A trip to the USA included a trip to Las Vegas, where I met Bill Vorce ( a scope parts re-seller) who provided me with a couple of EPs and a Barlow lens for $100. I wanted to step up and have a more portable set-up, so bought a 102mm Mak on a Synscan mount - I would have preferred the 127mm, but finances and young family meant I had to settle for the smaller scope - which was really a disappointment; good for Moon and Planets, but inadequate for fainter DSOs - and too narrow a field of view for open clusters. As finances improved, I bought a Meade LS 8" scope - optically this was great, but the software was a constant source of frustration as GOTO was definitely flaky (by coincidence, FB has reminded me this evening that I bought it exactly 9 years ago). About 6 years ago, I found someone locally selling their 127mm Mak for a very good price - this very quickly became my favourite scope, especially when I paired it with the Az GTi mount I bought later. A couple of years ago I was offered the loan of a lovely 72mm ED refractor by Sue at Astrofarm France. As it was during the shutdown, Sue was happy for me to bring it home to UK on a long loan basis, returning it a year later. So if you go out to Astrofarm France, you too can enjoy it (alongside the larger scopes and mounts out there). I was happy to return it to Sue though, as I had found one on ebay, and was fortunate to buy it for a relatively low bid. This is now definitely my favourite scope - and has re-ignited my love for the hobby - crisp contrasty views, and (despite the short focal length) capable of taking decent amounts of magnification before getting too soft.

Are you downloading from https://skywatcher.com/download/software/synscan-app/ ? The download button is working for me - it looks grey, but mouseover turns it black You should be able to download version 2.0.13 direct from this link https://inter-static.skywatcher.com/downloads/synscanpro_windows_2013_repack.zip

Although Microsoft have taken down the link from their products page, the original MSIs are still available via Archive.org. 64 Bit version 32 Bit version

Whether planets are easy to see in the morning or the evening often depends on the angle that the ecliptic makes to the horizon. If the ecliptic is at a shallow angle, the planets won't be high above the horizon and are more likely to be lost in the twilight of the rising/setting sun. Here's the angle of the morning/evening ecliptic for my location in NW England in February and November - this from a couple of years ago - the planets visible in any specific year will vary of course. So, morning apparitions of Mercury are better in the Autumn and evening apparitions better in the Spring. (stellarium views)

'... before going to bed [...] at about [...] 9.30 pm ' Tell me you're an imaging astronomer without telling me you're an imaging astronomer 😄 Always nice to see a good one.

It's on a site to which I don't have automatic access. My contact was going to see if they could get out some time to take photos - but they have work to do, so it depends on time being free.

A highly recommended telescope that comes into your budget is the SkyWatcher Heritage 150P. The link is to the sponsoring company for this forum - they're good, though I think that most dedicated Astronomy Shops would be as good - if you have one local to you, then you might prefer to go there instead. I think most people here would say to avoid shops that aren't specialists though, assuming your husband wants to take the hobby further, he'll be grateful for the advice that specialists will be able to give - so buying from a specialist is the best way to start. If you're not sure, they'll be happy to take a call from you.

I think the problem is that it's currently out of print, so only available through re-sellers.

There are Molniya orbits which would have a high proportion of their orbital period over the UK at what would be reasonably high angles in the sky - and I suppose these could be configured so that they drop out of the high angles at night (assuming these are used as solar power collectors as per the OP). Molniya orbits are used for communications satellites for use at high latitudes - for example for Siberia and Northern Canada. The downside for communication is that the ground stations need to have steerable antennae. But, as others have said, not apparently feasible at this time