Movember, Guy Fawkes' Night, and Kepler (the satellite)

It's November! This means two seasonal things, and there's been a bonus for astronomy this month as well.

Movember has inspired pictures all over social media of the suitably bewhiskered, so it seems churlish not to participate. Here we have a nice comparison picture; on the left is Kepler, and on the right is his sometime employer/mentor/sparring-partner, Tycho. Which do you think had the finer facial hair?

Of course, the night sky was also lit up on the fifth with celebrations of Bonfire Night, a.k.a. Guy Fawkes' Night. At least one astronomer was caught up in the aftermath, when many suspicious characters were rounded up and questioned: you can read all about Thomas Harriot by clicking the link. Partly, he was caught up in the wake of his patron, a local lad (to me), the Wizard Earl of Northumberland.

Also this week, a satellite named after Kepler has busy spotting exoplanets (those which orbit distant stars). It's now likely that about one in five stars have planets! Not a new idea, of course; as far back as the fifteenth century, Cardinal Nicholas of Cusa (a.k.a. Cusanus) has speculated that the stars were distant suns, complete with their own planets.

And for those of you who haven't seen it, here's the review of my book,  from Sky at Night magazine.

Have a great week!

BOOK OF THE MONTH

BBC Sky at Night magazine listed New Stars For Old as book of the month in their November issue (#102)!

"New Stars For Old brings the history of astronomy to life through a series of 20 highly readable short stories, each of which mixes facts with a good dose of fiction to introduce us to some of the important characters involved. From the Earth-centred theories of Aristotle and Ptolemy through to the visionary genius of Isaac Newton, the basic theme of the book is to outline the often turbulent path taken in the growth and development of the way we think about the Universe.

The chapters are a mixture of letters, narrative accounts and diary entries, which collectively remind us that the figures involved are not simply names drawn from textbooks, but were people in their own right.

The text focuses throughout on the interplay between astronomy, astrology and science, as well as offering an insight into the influences of religion and political culture on the way astronomers worked. Other characters, both fictional and real, are brought into the stories. The ‘Notes’ sections that follow each chapter inform us of which characters are real and which are imaginary, and provide historical background to the science.

In one of the tales, Johannes Kepler remarks that he followed “where (Tycho) left off, and he picked up from Copernicus who followed Regiomontanus, who relied on Peurbach and all the way back to Ptolemy, no, further, to Callipus and Aristotle, to Eudoxus, to un-named Babylonians.” New Stars For Old tells this story very well and brings history to life in an entertaining and informative way."

5 stars (Outstanding)

Brian Jones
Sky at Night Magazine

Sky at Night magazine is available online and from all good newsagents.
www.skyatnightmagazine.com

www.candy-jar.co.uk/marcread