♦ nivek ♦ Posted August 1, 2007 Share Posted August 1, 2007 Who needs GPS?Quiet Bay by staff Learn celestial navigation! (publication date unknown) http://www.quietbay.net/Science/astronomy/nightsky/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HuaiDan Posted August 1, 2007 Share Posted August 1, 2007 That was fascinating and instructive. However, I don't think they ever mentioned why Betelguese is significant. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
♦ nivek ♦ Posted August 1, 2007 Author Share Posted August 1, 2007 Hdan.. Biggest star to reference off of. It can be seen by we in elNorte half of world no matter where we are. It is almost as good as Polaris for map and compass referencing, and is hundreds of time as bright and larger than almost anything else around Orion/Ursis Major. Found this surfing links off an e.mail recieved this morning... I paid good money to learn this shit.. Just to have it trumped in a few minutes by a damn flash game! Feel free to toss this along to anyone with an interest in the outdoors. kL Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grandpa Harley Posted August 2, 2007 Share Posted August 2, 2007 Something handy in urban areas on cloudy or light polluted nights. Satellite dishes in the northern hemisphere point at stuff in the Clarke Belt, and thus are just a few degrees off due south. Handy if you need an approx north. Usually no more than 30 degrees off, so over short distances its not too bad... In the UK theres only Sky (Astra 28.8E [of due south], Eutelsat 17E) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luke Wolf Posted August 6, 2007 Share Posted August 6, 2007 The star positions in relation to our night skies are changing though. What is accurate today may be complety off 10, maybe 20 years from now. I found it rather fascinating to look at astronomy books and charts from the 70's, and compare them to today books and charts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Marty Posted August 6, 2007 Share Posted August 6, 2007 The star positions in relation to our night skies are changing though. What is accurate today may be complety off 10, maybe 20 years from now. I found it rather fascinating to look at astronomy books and charts from the 70's, and compare them to today books and charts. I'm no astrnomer, but those star positions have been in place for thousands of years, why would all of sudden they start to move within a 10 or 20 year timne frame? Unless it's a sign of the impending rapture! I think you are probally misreading the older books. Or maybe you are thinking about the positions of the sun at the equinox and solstice? Those have changed in the last few thousand years, but it is caused by the tilt and wobblle of the earth, and given enough time, the sun will return to the same solstice spot it was at when Stonehendge was built. Celestial shifts happen, and are happening, but not on any scale that we would notice within 20 years...or even a few hundred, really. Navigating by the stars is older than the ancient Egyptians. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grandpa Harley Posted August 6, 2007 Share Posted August 6, 2007 The 'wobble' is called precession... it has a predictable ~24000 year cycle... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luke Wolf Posted August 6, 2007 Share Posted August 6, 2007 I think you are probally misreading the older books. Or maybe you are thinking about the positions of the sun at the equinox and solstice? Those have changed in the last few thousand years, but it is caused by the tilt and wobblle of the earth, and given enough time, the sun will return to the same solstice spot it was at when Stonehendge was built. I was being abit vague. The stars haven't moved. The earth has tilted, making it appear they have moved. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Marty Posted August 7, 2007 Share Posted August 7, 2007 I was being abit vague. The stars haven't moved. The earth has tilted, making it appear they have moved. That's what I thought. But even so, the relative positions of the stars remain the same. The Big Dipper will still be pointing to Polaris, it may be just a few degrees over in the sky. Navigating with them will still be accurate, I believe the only change would be the "north" star would no longer be Polaris, but we are talking thousands of years in the future. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grandpa Harley Posted August 7, 2007 Share Posted August 7, 2007 13,000 then it'll point at something in Draco again... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nomadic techno-gypsy Posted August 8, 2007 Share Posted August 8, 2007 13,000 then it'll point at something in Draco again... I believe the North star changes due to precession, but the constellations (including the big dipper) stay in their relative positions. . .so (and I may be wrong) the big dipper will point to Polaris, but polaris will no longer be the north star (like in ancient egypt, they aligned the pyraminds and such with the star in draco (north star of the time), but the big dipper still pointed at polaris ) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nomadic techno-gypsy Posted August 8, 2007 Share Posted August 8, 2007 That was fascinating and instructive. However, I don't think they ever mentioned why Betelguese is significant. Because Ford Prefect is from a planet somewhere in the vicinity of Betelguese Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grandpa Harley Posted August 8, 2007 Share Posted August 8, 2007 13,000 then it'll point at something in Draco again... I believe the North star changes due to precession, but the constellations (including the big dipper) stay in their relative positions. . .so (and I may be wrong) the big dipper will point to Polaris, but polaris will no longer be the north star (like in ancient egypt, they aligned the pyraminds and such with the star in draco (north star of the time), but the big dipper still pointed at polaris ) I meant the north pole of axis of rotation of the earth by 'it'... sorry I was unclear... And Betelgeuse is one of the few coloured (red) fixed stars in the northern hemesphere and when it's at it's highest around winter solstice... and is a genreal indicator of south... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grandpa Harley Posted August 8, 2007 Share Posted August 8, 2007 I had a fascination for astronomy as due to Carl Sagan and Patrick Moore... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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