When She Says She Doesn’t Send Nudes

Neptune ♆

On this day in 1846 was discovered the planet Neptune.

The ice giant Neptune was the first planet located through mathematical predictions rather than through regular observations of the sky. (Galileo had recorded it as a fixed star during observations with his small telescope in 1612 and 1613.) When Uranus didn’t travel exactly as astronomers expected it to, a French mathematician, Urbain Joseph Le Verrier, proposed the position and mass of another as yet unknown planet that could cause the observed changes to Uranus’ orbit. After being ignored by French astronomers, Le Verrier sent his predictions to Johann Gottfried Galle at the Berlin Observatory, who found Neptune on his first night of searching in 1846. Seventeen days later, its largest moon, Triton, was also discovered.

Neptune is invisible to the naked eye because of its extreme distance from Earth. Interestingly, the highly eccentric orbit of the dwarf planet Pluto brings Pluto inside Neptune’s orbit for a 20-year period out of every 248 Earth years. Pluto can never crash into Neptune, though, because for every three laps Neptune takes around the Sun, Pluto makes two. This repeating pattern prevents close approaches of the two bodies.

Nearly 4.5 billion kilometers (2.8 billion miles) from the Sun, Neptune orbits the Sun once every 165 years. 

Uranus’ blue-green color is also the result of atmospheric methane, but Neptune is a more vivid, brighter blue, so there must be an unknown component that causes the more intense color. 

Despite its great distance and low energy input from the Sun, Neptune’s winds can be three times stronger than Jupiter’s and nine times stronger than Earth’s.

Winds on Neptune travel faster than the speed of sound.

In 1989, Voyager 2 tracked a large, oval-shaped, dark storm in Neptune’s southern hemisphere. This “Great Dark Spot” was large enough to contain the entire Earth.

Neptune has five known rings. Voyager 2’s observations confirmed that these unusual rings are not uniform but have four thick regions (clumps of dust) called arcs. The rings are thought to be relatively young and short-lived.

Neptune has 14 known moons, six of which were discovered by Voyager 2.

Triton, Neptune’s largest moon, orbits the planet in the opposite direction compared with the rest of the moons, suggesting that it may have been captured by Neptune in the distant past. 

To know more about the planet Neptune click here and here.

Images credit: NASA/JPL- Caltech (some images processed by Kevin M. Gill)

Han Solo & Princess Leia

My little monbebe heart :(( this is the best thing that has ever happened

I miss them so much...

Luke Skywalker

for crx!!! these kids go thru a lot but they’re so strong when together;;

The Most Influential Popular Science Books

Here is a list of legendary books on scientific discoveries and ideas that changed the world: true classics that are recommended for everyone.

Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems by Galileo Galilei (1632): “The most proximate cause of Galilei being brought to trial before the Inquisition. Using the dialogue form, a genre common in classical philosophical works, Galileo masterfully demonstrates the truth of the Copernican system over the Ptolemaic one, proving, for the first time, that the earth revolves around the sun. Its influence is incalculable. The Dialogue is not only one of the most important scientific treatises ever written, but a work of supreme clarity, remaining as readable now as when it was first published.” 

The Origin of Species by Charles Darwin: ”The publication of this book in 1859 marked a dramatic turning point in scientific thought. Selling out its first edition on its first day, The Origin of Species revolutionized science, philosophy, and theology. Darwin’s reasoned, documented arguments advance his theory of natural selection and his assertion that species started with a few simple forms that mutated and adapted over time.“ 

A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking (1988): “How did the universe begin—and what made its start possible? Does time always flow forward? Is the universe unending? What will happen when it all ends? Told in language we all can understand, A Brief History of Time plunges into the realms of black holes, quarks, antimatter, the big bang and a bigger God. Stephen Hawking brings us closer to the ultimate secrets at the very heart of creation.” 

Cosmos by Carl Sagan (1980): “Cosmos is one of the bestselling science books of all time. Cosmos retraces the fourteen billion years of cosmic evolution that have transformed matter into consciousness, exploring such topics as the origin of life, the human brain, Egyptian hieroglyphics, spacecraft missions, the death of the Sun, and the list goes on.”

Silent Spring by Rachel Carson (1962): “The marine biologist’s documented indictment of DDT led both to a U.S. ban on the insecticide and to the birth of the modern environmental movement. Carson argues that DDT not only indiscriminately kills insects, but also accumulates in the fat of birds and mammals high on the food chain, thinning eggshells and causing reproductive problems.”

Relativity: The Special and General Theory by Albert Einstein (1916): “In the early 20th century, scientists began to interrogate the Newtonian model of Physics that posits absolute time, intrigued by the possibility of a dimension in which space and time overlap. This text is Einstein’s philosophical explanation of the idea that changed the way we understand the physics of space and time.“

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