Astronomy

Fear

2006-04-10T11:22:00.000-04:00

I believe these great thinkers were scared because of the context of the society around them. During their life times the Roman Catholic church was the most powerful organization in Europe not only exercising power in this plane of existence but also in the next. To many these people were so close to God they were beyond human critics and to many openly criticsm them would be an act agaisnt God. Although they were scientist people like Kelvin and Newton were also Christians and they feared losing there soul for going agaisnt the church. Even if these men did not believe in God the power of the church on Earth was so great many believed the church officals could almost get away with anything even murder. This fear of chuch continues to this day with the great crusade against evolution in our schools and the idea of inteligent design.

Why these men were afraid

2006-04-09T21:28:00.000-04:00

I believe that these men were afraid to share their ideas because of what was on the line. Back in those times speaking out against the church was life threatening, which is what these men were going to have to do to share their ideas with the world. The church was the center of everything and to not belong to the church was unthinkable. These brilliant men had to decide whether they wanted to share their knoledge with the world or risk their lives. Most of the time the ideas they had would be recoreded but not shared with anyone.

A whole different world

2006-04-09T20:54:00.000-04:00

These men, Galileo, Newton, Fourier, and Kelvin, were in a world where people only trusted one thing, their religion. Religion was the main focus in life and it even influenced education. And to go against what you were taught was unheard of. Your life, your status, your integrity would be destroyed. You would be seen as betraying everyone. That's why these intelligent men were so afraid to even mention that they had an idea different from the church's.
I think it still does happen today. People don't like change that much, and when a person brings up a new concept, they just look at them like "are u kinding?" Still, its not as bad as it use to be (in most places) but it hard to except that what you have been taught and what has been known for decades could be wrong.

fear of change

2006-04-09T13:52:00.000-04:00

I believe that these men were afraid to share their ideas because society was under the influence of the Bible. Everything they did, said, or even thought had to come from and be approved by the church and the Bible. If they were to step up and tell someone about their ideas that went against the Bible they would be considered sinners and punished harshly. They had watched people with new and different ideas try to tell the world and were rejected. Why would they possibly want to go down the same way? Even just the idea of change and having different ideas about how the world works during that time period was dangerous. To openly admit to creating those ideas was even more dangerous. They had everything to lose; their lives, family, and place in society.

Why These Men Were Afraid

2006-04-08T13:07:00.000-04:00

I believe these men were afraid to share their ideas for a few reasons. One might be if they told someone else what they have discovered and thought, that person might copy them and get credit for it. Their ideas were created in a time where religion was everything and people strongly believed in what they grew up with. Informing the public about planetary motion, the universe, a spherical Earth, and heliocentric theory would not be believed by them. These scientists would be outcasted from the public and made fun of. I think this would still happen today if someone discovered something new and exciting, but didn't share it with anyone in case they stole their idea. The only reason why someone would be punished, hurt, or killed for their idea would be from a civilian that strongly disagrees.

afraid to announce ideas

2006-04-07T17:33:00.001-04:00

certain individuals such as Galileo, Fouier, newton and kelvin gained insight into the nature of science. they were often persecuted or afraid to publicly announce their ideas and information. i believe they were afraid to announce their ideas because this was something new that they found out about planets and the solar system. they didnt know how other people wound take their information. they were afraid people would think they were crazy

The edge

2006-04-07T11:53:00.000-04:00

I dont know much about the universe but this is what I do know. From Earth we cannot see the edge of our universe because we are far away but even if we had a super powered alien telescope we still could not see it. That is because the universe is expanding and by the time light from the edge reaches us the real edge of the universe will be far away.

Why be afraid?

2006-03-31T06:12:00.000-05:00

From our readings we have read how certain individuals such as Galileo, Newton, Fourier, and Kelvin gained insight into the nature of science, even defining it, but were often persecuted or afraid to publicly announce their ideas. Using these readings, and possibly other sources, as a resource (you may quote them if you cite the author)explain why you believe they were afraid to share their ideas. What forces were at play? What was the context in which their ideas lived? Are there contemporary examples of same processes or events (Does it still happen today)?

The assignment: Answer the question above as noted, and make at least one reply to another student's post.

2006-03-29T19:35:00.000-05:00

A black holes gravity is so strong that light can't even escape from it. But it doesn't act as a vaccuum... if the Sun was replaced with a black hole, the only thing that would change about the Earth is the temperature.

galaxies

2006-03-19T20:31:00.000-05:00

galaxies are large systems of stars and interstellar matter typically containg several million to some trillion stars.

Astronomy and the Milky Way Galaxy

2006-03-09T15:51:00.000-05:00

Astronomy is made up of many things called time and space as well as matter. Astronomy is a system of knowledge or beliefs about celestial phenomena and is also a scientific study in outer space, especially the positions, dimensions, and distribution, motion, composition, energy, and evolution of different objects that we study. The Milky Way Galaxy is a spiral Galaxy that contains over 400 billion spiral stars, plus gas and dust that are arranged into three general components. The Milky Way has a halo that is made up of a spherical distribution of the oldest stars in the galaxy, the next part is the nuclear bulge and Galactic Center, last part of the Milky Way is a disk which contains majority of the stars, including the sun and virtually all of the gas and dust. There are many other parts of the univerese that we could learn about facts and interesting details that makes Astronmy fun and exciting to learn new things.

The Crab Nebula

2006-03-08T16:31:00.000-05:00

The Crab Nebula is six light-years wide and is the remains of a star's supernova explosion that was witnessed by Chinese and Japanese astronomers over 1,000 years ago in 1054. The star was 6,500 light years away from the earth. The nebula has a bluish glow that comes from electrons whirling around its neutron star.

~ from Kira :)

It's all new...

2006-02-14T11:05:00.000-05:00

If you are visiting the blog site for the first time you'll need to poke around a bit to see how things work. At this point you have probably taken a username but I want you to be able to make a new posting as well as make comments on others. So make a new post (you have to sign in to be able to do that), and tell us some interesting fact about astronomy (planest, stars, nebulae, etc)...It could be anything that you already know, just found out, or just looked up for this post. Once you've done that make a comment on someone elses post. For example, "that is the most exciting and spectacular information about neutron stars that I have ever heard!" You get the idea...

Good luck, and ask for help in class or by email if you need it.

The beginning

2006-02-08T07:17:00.000-05:00

Astronomy is what it's all about...