Google Doodles

[Fran]

Today's doodle promotes iGoogle's recently introduced comics themes:

[Kelda]

Today's doodle promotes iGoogle's recently introduced comics themes:

Chuck will love this one!

[CellarDweller]

very cool!

Thanks for the link, Kelda!

Would've been nice to see the Wonder Twins on it!

[Fran]

http://www.examiner.com/x-8054-St-Louis-Astronomy-Examiner%7Ey2009m8d9-The-Perseid-Meteor-Shower-is-Here

The Perseid Meteor Shower is Here

Have you ever been outside after dark during the summer months and you happened to see an object briefly streak across the sky? If so, then chances are you saw a meteor from the Perseid meteor shower.
The Perseid meteor shower is the biggest shower of the summer and it is currently building in strength, with its peak expected on the night of August 12/13. When this peak occurs, observers far from city lights will be able to see 50-80 meteors every hour.

Many people refer to meteors as shooting stars. But meteors are not stars. They are, instead, little pieces of material ejected from comets. Meteors belonging to the Perseid shower were ejected from the periodic comet Swift-Tuttle, which orbits the sun once every 135 years. The particles range in size from a grain of sand to a pea. So, why are they so bright? Because these little particles are slamming into Earth's atmosphere at over 132,000 mph! Each meteor you see is not actually the particle itself, but the reaction of atmospheric gases to the tremendous friction caused by the particle.

The first written records referring to the Perseids appeared in Chinese historical texts and date back to AD 36 when "more than 100 meteors flew thither in the morning." Although activity from the Perseids was mentioned in various Asian and European texts during the following centuries, it was not until 1835 that Adolphe Quetelet (Brussels, Belgium) brought this meteor shower to the attention of astronomers, noting a shower occurring in August that emanated from the constellation Perseus. During the years that followed, the Perseids became one of the most studied meteor showers.

To enjoy the Perseids to the fullest, it is best to be as far from city lights as possible. The best equipment to use is a lawn chair that flattens out to allow a view of as much of the sky as possible. Don't stare at one area of the sky, but let your eyes drift about. Enjoy the stars, as you will note that some are bluish, yellowish, and orangish. While you enjoy the sky, you will catch occasional Perseids. Several minor meteor showers are also active around this same time, but the Perseids will be the most numerous and will be the fastest you will see during the night. To really enjoy the display, try observing after midnight, as that is when meteors are most numerous.

[Kelda]

very pretty!

[Shasta542]

I love today's Google Doodle!!!

I meant to look at the sky early this morning---I was up letting the dogs out. But I forgot. Guess I need to write myself a note. 

[Shasta542]

For the birthday of Hans Christian Orsted. I was reading it thinking it was going to say "Andersen". LOL.

Hans Christian Ørsted (14 August 1777 – 9 March 1851) was a Danish physicist and chemist who is best known for discovering that electric currents can create magnetic fields, which is an important part of electromagnetism. He shaped post-Kantian philosophy and advances in science throughout the late 19th century.[1] He was also the first modern thinker to explicitly describe and name the thought experiment.

Well. He and I would have had so much in common. NOT. 

[Fran]

What a clever doodle!

[Fran]

http://www.rferl.org/content/Four_Hundred_Years_Ago_Galileos_Telescope_Changed_The_World/1807134.html

Four Hundred Years Ago,
Galileo's Telescope Changed The World

By Breffni O'Rourke

Despite the summer heat, the Senate of Venice assembled on this day in 1609 to view a remarkable scientific instrument. It was built by the well-known astronomer and philosopher from Pisa, Galileo Galilei, and could make distant objects appear closer when viewed through one end of its long pipe. It was a telescope.

Not that Galileo had invented the instrument. Credit for that is generally given to a Dutch stargazer who is almost forgotten today, Hans Lipperhay, who unveiled his basic telescope only the previous year, in 1608.

But Galileo, ever the practical perfectionist, had already improved upon the basic essentials and produced a variable-focus instrument that increased the size of the observed object by eight times.

Why he presented it first of all to the assembled Venetian senators is not clear. But perhaps the Venetians, who had business and commerce in their marrow, saw this instrument as a way to boost their glass lens industry. After all, Venice along with Florence, was the leading center for high-quality ground glass for spectacle lenses and magnifying glasses.

Certainly Galileo made money building and selling his telescope to eager customers, until his designs were overtaken in a relatively short time by more sophisticated types.

The telescope, of course, revolutionized astronomical observation and had a profound impact on overall scientific methodology, by allowing more exact mathematical calculations.

Blasphemous 'Suncentricity'

It also brought into sharp focus the simmering dispute between those who followed the ancient belief of Greek and Egyptian proto-scientists that the Earth was the center of the universe, and that the planets revolved around it, and those who followed the Copernican theory that in fact our Earth is just one of a number of planets revolving around the sun.

Nicolaus Copernicus, the great Polish astronomer, had summarized his theories that the Earth revolved around the sun, instead of the other way around, some 60 years before Galileo intrigued the Venetian senators with his telescope.

Galileo, with his passion for exact observation and independent analysis, became ever more convinced through the use of his telescope that Copernicus was right. But it wasn't long before this brought him into conflict with the Roman Catholic Church.

Some churchmen began attacking Galileo in 1610, arguing that God had made the Earth the center of the universe as a home for man.

By 1616, the matter had come to the official attention of the church, with the formal condemnation of "suncentricity" as "false and contrary to scripture."

Galileo was warned to steer clear of such heresy, which he did for a number of years. But in 1632 he published a defense of his views. This landed him in front of that sinister body, the Inquisition. The Holy Office, as it preferred to be known, tried him, found him guilty of being "vehemently" suspect of heresy, and placed him under house arrest.

It also forced him to recant, which he did. Not very brave perhaps, but practical to the end, he may have thought it best to be a live astronomer than a dead ideologue.

It took the church 359 years to rehabilitate Galileo Galilei. Only in 1992 did the Vatican formally acknowledge that it had been wrong and Galileo right.

The astronomer died at his home outside Florence, still under house arrest, in 1642.

[Shasta542]

The King of Pop's Birthday

RIP, MICHAEL