Quick links to various main topics in my blog

Sadly it appears to be yet another retelling fixated on the idea that Thera's explosive eruption 3600 years ago is the source of the legend. C'mon, that's only ~500 years before the events of the Iliad.

Eric Ober

Bad idea on very very many levels. It could set back the open access that has been achieved by so many people's efforts, by decades.

Prof. Alexander Thom in his own words - well worth viewing.

This is excellent news.

...over 35,000 years. Kind of brings the timescale of how long humans have been human into focus and that's why I'm fascinated by ancient oral traditions, myths and legends.

So celebrate foxy's contribution to our feasting by honouring his memory with a handy dandy cut-out-and-wear mask.

http://elixia-dragmire.deviantart.com/art/Fox-Mask-130562919

It's peculiar in the extreme.

http://www.bautforum.com/space-astronomy-questions-answers/98521-drift-solstice.html

Noughties shortlist

They say "Winter Solstice at Stonehenge.Revellers watch druidic ceremonies and take photos near the Key Stone, away from the Stone Circle at Stonehenge as Druids and revellers celebrate the Winter Solstice".

Key Stone? They mean Heel Stone.

So what, who cares? Well, I do - enough to give the AP picture desk a quick call to let them know. They swear up and down that they've only released 3 pics today and none of them have that caption, despite me quoting the URL to them and their photo IDs.

It's in this way that misinformation gets promulgated - the wrong caption's on the BBC and (edit: BBC have fixed it) Guardian websites and by the end of the morning will be all over the 'net.

Useless.

Actually, I've been down there every day since Wednesday this week for the International Year of Astronomy event.

Here are some photos...

(if reading on Facebork, click the 'view original post' link to read more)

Oh wait, no, it's just a teeny bit of light pollution.

(if reading this summary on Facebook, use the "View original post" link to see the photo)

Ian "Harry" Harris, author of "HARRY_READ_ME.txt" in the 'documents' tree - you have my deepest sympathy. You're the designated shit/fan interface right now, and it isn't your fault.

Having georeferenced the official plan of the new Stonehenge Visitor Centre in QGIS (as discussed in an earlier post) I was able to determine the coordinates for the end points of the "Avenue" through the middle of it.

Armed with my GPS, I then went out to the location and planted sticks in the ground at those end points, then walked back to the previously determined observation point and took a few photos to assemble into a panorama.

Finally, I scaled and overlaid the west elevation of the architect's drawings for the new building on that panorama to get a (rough) idea of what it'll look like.

As you can see below (assuming you've got Javascript turned on and are looking at this article on my blog rather than via Facebork), the "Avenue" is aligned almost dead on to the gap in Fargo Plantation at the western end of the Cursus.

Sunrise on April and September 6th (or thereabouts) each year will be on this alignment, and the Sun will appear to rise out of the ticket booth :-/

I stress again, this is pretty rough and ready, but it's just to give me (primarily) an idea of how it may look.

(Apologies for the wide page the panorama requires to be viewed)

Now that the planning application's been put in and the detailed drawings are available (with OS grid refs and land levels), I've had a stab at it.

The fact that quantum mechanics could have some nonlinearities has been soundly rebutted in past literature, but this is a new proposal which may shed new light onto the subject. It would also change the way we need to think about quantum problems: not only would the particles in a given system need to be considered, but every particle in the universe, even those that do not participate, would need to be taken into account. It would also mean that a complex problem of two or more systems would need to take into account the entire history of the universe that each subsystem exists in from the begining of time to the present to accurately calculate a result.

http://home.arcor.de/axel.mellinger/

... and be sure to explore the zoomable Mercator projection, stunning. I mean, just *look* at all that structure!

That'll put the velociraptor amongst the pigeons.

Edit: Some more here

As a definition of how far ahead of ourselves and technology we were, this pretty much is it.

However, such a big meme needed a lot of brains to work on it so I'm grateful for two things.

1) That it's been created at all

2) That it's going to be open source

Now all I need is an invite...

It's often said that these are the days where night and day are equal - but that's not true.

In fact, depending on latitude, the dates of equal day and equal night aren't at the astronomical equinox.

This is because refraction by the atmosphere allows us to see the Sun slightly earlier at dawn and later at dusk when it is still actually below the visible horizon - lengthening the day beyond what it would be if there was no atmosphere at all.

At Stonehenge, the nearest actual September "equal night" of 12 hours (minus one minute) this year occurs on 25th/26th rather than 22nd.

Interestingly there are precise alignments at Stonehenge for the "equilux" dates, but not for the equinoxes - which is obvious when you realise the alignments are based on observational astronomy rather than our specific coordinate system.

So tomorrow morning when folk will gather at Stonehenge to celebrate the nearest dawn to the astronomical equinox, they'll be celebrating a concept of balanced day and night rather than the actuality of it.

http://www.sizes.com/

http://www.secretacademy.com/

The unified metrological system discovered by them both is a work of genius.