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By... not exactly popular demand, but certainly popular accidental suggestion, here's some Astronomy History with a focus on America, while drunk!
HAPPY 4TH! https://twitter.com/sayer_of_stuff/status/1279594826661539841?s=20
HAPPY 4TH! https://twitter.com/sayer_of_stuff/status/1279594826661539841?s=20
As long as there have been people, we have spent a lot of time staring at the sky saying "hey look at all the pretty lights" or "AAH THAT'S A VERY BRIGHT LIGHT" (daytime)
It was a major pastime in the days before Twitter.
*opens a bottle of hard cider and takes a swig*
It was a major pastime in the days before Twitter.
*opens a bottle of hard cider and takes a swig*
After you spend a little time staring at the sky night after night (because again, no Twitter), you start to notice that most of the pretty lights are in the same place every night. But some of them aren't!
The ones that stay the same always stay in the same pattern, and move across the sky in the same way the sun does during the day.
But they're kind of shifted around in different times of the year, but always the same relative to each other.
But they're kind of shifted around in different times of the year, but always the same relative to each other.
That shift is the same as how the sun is higher or lower in the sky, and it gets warmer and colder! Interesting! Even back in prehistoric times - some of these earlier events might even predate our own species (speculating) - humans were smart. We're good at seeing patterns.
Many, MANY ancient people made patterns out of the pretty lights, connected to stories.
*swig*
In places where people figured out how to make enough food that some people could just sit around and think all day, people started to try to explain why the pretty lights are like this
*swig*
In places where people figured out how to make enough food that some people could just sit around and think all day, people started to try to explain why the pretty lights are like this
There's astronomy from a LOT of cultures but we're trying to get to America so I'm going to just do ancient Greece.
It pains me to skip the others but we gotta keep moving.
It pains me to skip the others but we gotta keep moving.
[this cider is only like 5% abv. I still have a little spirits left *shot*]
there we go
In the Hellenic world, which was the Eastern Mediterranean after the Greeks did the 3rd century BC equivelant of what the West did in the 1700s and made everywhere Greece...
there we go
In the Hellenic world, which was the Eastern Mediterranean after the Greeks did the 3rd century BC equivelant of what the West did in the 1700s and made everywhere Greece...
...some people had ideas about hte sky that lasted a very long time. Most famously, Aristotle and Ptolemy.
Aristotle thought that the stars are fixed and rotate around the Earth, and the planets (="wanderers", also includes Sun and Moon) go around the Earth on their own orbits.
Aristotle thought that the stars are fixed and rotate around the Earth, and the planets (="wanderers", also includes Sun and Moon) go around the Earth on their own orbits.
Another guy, Ptolemy (no relation), said "Hey that's cool but how about my improved version!"
And added a bunch more circles and crystal spheres.
This sounds crazy knowing what we know now but given the accuracy of his observations, the Ptolemaic model actually fit really well
And added a bunch more circles and crystal spheres.
This sounds crazy knowing what we know now but given the accuracy of his observations, the Ptolemaic model actually fit really well
It's only obviously wrong in hindsight, because we have better data than we did. Ptolemy was a genius, he just didn't have our technology.
http://www.polaris.iastate.edu/EveningStar/Unit2/unit2_sub1.htm
http://www.polaris.iastate.edu/EveningStar/Unit2/unit2_sub1.htm
Even in the Hellenistic world some sky-watchers, most famously Aristarchus of Samos, proposed that the Earth goes around the sun.
His idea was picked up about a thousand years later by Copernicus
His idea was picked up about a thousand years later by Copernicus
*swig*
Scientific revolution astronomy is easily its own drunk thread HOLY SHIT DO I HAVE SOME EPIC TYCHO BRAHE STORIES but that's another time
(Sidenote: I have no doubt that Brahe would have immensely approved of this drunk thread)
Scientific revolution astronomy is easily its own drunk thread HOLY SHIT DO I HAVE SOME EPIC TYCHO BRAHE STORIES but that's another time
(Sidenote: I have no doubt that Brahe would have immensely approved of this drunk thread)
Anyway in the 16th century this guy Mikołaj Kopernik who we remember as Nicky Kapernick said "hey maybe Aristarchus was right" just as he was dying and it became a whole THING.
*swig*
*swig*
So then this Italian dude Galileo hears about this thing called a telescope which some kool kat in the Netherlands just invented and he's like "cool" and teaches himself lenscrafting and makes one that's WAY better because Galileo is an utter boss https://interestingengineering.com/a-brief-history-of-the-telescope-from-1608-to-gamma-rays
And then (the whole story is way more nuanced and interesting - for another time) he's like "hey the planets are actually like THINGS and Jupiter has moons and venus has phases and maybe Copernicus was RIGHT?"
and the Church is like "fuck you for your astronomy and for calling me an idiot" and put Galilio under house arrest and then they burned Galelio's contemporary/rival Giordano Bruno at the stake
They admitted Galillio was right... in 1992.
https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg13618460-600-vatican-admits-galileo-was-right/
But about Bruno they're still like "It's such a shame he forced us to torture him to death like that."
https://www.nytimes.com/2000/02/18/world/honoring-a-heretic-whom-vatican-regrets-burning.html
https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg13618460-600-vatican-admits-galileo-was-right/
But about Bruno they're still like "It's such a shame he forced us to torture him to death like that."
https://www.nytimes.com/2000/02/18/world/honoring-a-heretic-whom-vatican-regrets-burning.html
[rapidly running out of alcohol]
Oh god that was a lot of tweets without getting to America
The First Nations of what would become the United States were extremely diverse and had a corrospondingly diverse range of astronomical traditions.
Oh god that was a lot of tweets without getting to America
The First Nations of what would become the United States were extremely diverse and had a corrospondingly diverse range of astronomical traditions.
"Astronomy of the First Nations" is an entire goddamn book that I assume someone has written but I certainly can't do it justice in this thread.
Here's an article https://www.sciencefriday.com/articles/indigenous-peoples-astronomy/
Here's an article https://www.sciencefriday.com/articles/indigenous-peoples-astronomy/
The first white person to astronomy in North America was Thomas Harriot, a man who I only learned existed like twenty minutes ago but was apparently a FUCKIN' GENIUS
He did a lot of important science
He did a lot of important science
But what's important for us is that Harriot spent a lot of time looking through a telescope and was pen-pals with Johannas Kepler, who I haven't mentioned before but he was cool trust me
Harriot went to Roanoke Island.
"Are the indians dying because of sunspots? or a comet?"
"No it's because you keep killing them!"
"sorry i only heard 'exciting mineral wealth'"
He also may have invented smoking, and then may have invented dying of smoking-related disease.
"Are the indians dying because of sunspots? or a comet?"
"No it's because you keep killing them!"
"sorry i only heard 'exciting mineral wealth'"
He also may have invented smoking, and then may have invented dying of smoking-related disease.
There's WAY more to the life and times of Thomas Harriot than I'm covering here but MOVING ON
https://www.ncpedia.org/biography/harriot-hariot-or
https://www.ncpedia.org/biography/harriot-hariot-or
A lot of early colonial astronomy stuff is in paywalled academic journals and hasn't made its way to Wikipedia or the popular press.
For example, there's very little information on Thomas Robie, who was apparently a harvard grad who
For example, there's very little information on Thomas Robie, who was apparently a harvard grad who
in the early 18th century, published a paper saying "no actually comets aren't omens of doom they're just things in the sky"
(Sidenote: the explanation of why comets were seen as bad luck and why the church held onto the ptolemaic view is its own VERY interesting thread. I need to get to the America bit)
THE event of the 18th century in astronomy was of course the great Transit of Venus.
The Transit is when Venus goes between the earth and the sun, like a "venus eclipse" but venus is really far away from earth so it's not a real eclipse, you can't even see it with eyes.
The Transit is when Venus goes between the earth and the sun, like a "venus eclipse" but venus is really far away from earth so it's not a real eclipse, you can't even see it with eyes.
I don't understand the details, but basically by taking a lot of measurements of the Transit of Venus from around the world lets you figure out how far earth is from the sun. Because at this point everyone's on board with Copernicus being right. https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/06/for-scientists-of-the-18th-century-the-transit-of-venus-was-their-final-chance-to-measure-the-solar-system/258013/
Transits happen about every hundred years, in pairs. (The most recent was in 2012 so im sorry but you have to wait until 2117 for the next one)
So the Europeans sent out a bunch of ships, most famously Cptn. James Cook and most infamously Guillaume Le Gentil (LATER)...
So the Europeans sent out a bunch of ships, most famously Cptn. James Cook and most infamously Guillaume Le Gentil (LATER)...
to observe the Transit. Some of these observations were inevitably in North America.
In Boston, John Winthrop (great-great-grandson of the colony's founder. they're still kicking around in MA today! the Winthops, i mean. john is probably dead)...
In Boston, John Winthrop (great-great-grandson of the colony's founder. they're still kicking around in MA today! the Winthops, i mean. john is probably dead)...
...went to Newfoundland to observe the Transit. At this point, Newfoundland was controlled by France and the French and British were of course at war (the Seven Years' War, a VERY good drunk thread topic) https://www.researchgate.net/publication/252551205_Astronomy_Behind_Enemy_Lines_in_Colonial_North_America_John_Winthrop's_Observations_of_the_Transits_of_Venus
