Professor Mondo has a very nice write up about the solar eclipse, and of course the Czar had prepared you for it a long time ago. The Czar took the family out to unscenic Rockwood, Illinois, under the pretense that … Continue reading →
Funny, huh, how astronomers are all giddy to the gills about comet ISON, named after famed Russian comet hunter Professor Исондровсков, which was promised as the Comet of the Century! Get ready, armchair astronomers, because this bad boy will light … Continue reading →
The mysteriously named “Don” writes in to notify the Czar that, like so many other government-related catastrophes, there are free workarounds that make one wonder why the government is doing any of this at all in the first place. Astronomy … Continue reading →
Once we repair the hyperdrive, we’re SO there! The Czar is the one who typically provides commentary on scientific journalism, however this article caught Dr. J.’s eye. The long and short of it is that yet another exoplanet (planet outside … Continue reading →
Very long-time fan (so listen up, yo) ScottO writes in to a couple of us: Dear Dr. J., and with deferent regard to His Awfulness The Czar, You can learn a lot about time and the Earth’s position in space … Continue reading →
Dr. J. saw our friends over at IMAO link to this on teh twitterz this morning: New blog post: Pluto’s moons goo.gl/fb/ywlzO— Frank J. Fleming (@IMAO_) February 13, 2013 Apparently we have observed that the flagship Dwarf Planet Pluto (the 9th … Continue reading →
Science writer George Dvorsky has a really fascinating and informative piece up at io9 cleverly titled “Intense Magnetic Fields Around White Dwarfs Reveal an Entirely New Class of Molecular Bonding,” in which he reviews how the incredible magnetic fields around … Continue reading →
There’s a little black spot on the sun today, but it’s not the same old spot as yesterday… See you again in 105 years. h/t T.J., Dr. J.’s childhood BFF captured this image of Venus in transit across the sun. … Continue reading →
There is an astronomical event next week that you should really try to see. It happens in 8-year offset pairs and then a gap of over a century – it’s the transit of Venus. A transit of a planet is … Continue reading →
Are you ready for SuperMoon? Oh, you gotta be ready for SuperMoon! “Supermoon alert: Biggest full moon of 2012 due Sat.” screams FoxNews! “Weekend ‘Supermoon’ Will be 2012’s Largest” promises KSEE, Fresno. “That’s not just a full moon this week, … Continue reading →
The Czar has sure been busy lately, and has fallen a bit behind in his mail. First up chronologically is DT, who lined up six cesium atoms to spell out the following email: Your Mustachioed Magnificence, I just read about … Continue reading →
NBC News reported this morning that astronomers have found a planet capable of supporting life. Why, here is a picture of the happy guy right here. Except, as you can predict by this essay’s very existence, they got every piece … Continue reading →
See this picture? It’s actually a bit of a first. The weird rosette-like things can be ignored; instead, look at the hook-shaped blob in the center, hiding slightly. That’s a black hole. So what, you might wonder, aren’t there billions … Continue reading →
The Los Angeles Times features a neat science story that, rara avis, gets its facts straight in a presentable manner. Nice work. The story reminds us that there is still much to be learned about the dwarf planet Eris, but … Continue reading →
'PuterAlways right, unless he isn’t, the infallible Ghettoputer F. X. Gormogons claims to be an in-law of the Volgi, although no one really believes this. ’Puter carefully follows economic and financial trends, legal affairs, and serves as the Gormogons’ financial … Continue reading →
More science news. Which is good news, because ‘Puter can sleep a little later knowing he can skip anything with learnin’ in it. This NPR headline caught our eye: Messenger Reveals Mercury Is Not What Scientists Theorized. It’s not a … Continue reading →
Mercury is in retrograde, and has been so since August 2nd, and will last until August 26th. This website describes the phenomenon nicely. In general, Mercury rules thinking and perception, processing and disseminating information and all means of communication, commerce, … Continue reading →
Glad we’re all still here. Now we have to get this cleaned up. GorTGorT is an eight-foot-tall robot from the 51ˢᵗ Century who routinely time-travels to steal expensive technology from the future and return it to the past for retroinvention. … Continue reading →
At 1:14pm EDT a small asteroid the size of a bus will make an extremely close pass by the Earth but it poses no threat to the planet. 2011MD (the asteroid) will make its closest approach at 1714 GMT on … Continue reading →
This is officially cool. Check out the Photopic Sky Survey: it is a 360° x 360° photograph of the entire night sky, minus planets and moons. You can view it with information (click on the link), or optionally turn it … Continue reading →
You all know that the Gormogons love science dearly—although to be fair, ‘Puter dislikes the mathy-kind of science and likes the coloring-book-kind so much more. Once, he watched a high definition animation of an asteroid crashing into Earth and wiping … Continue reading →
A NASA astrobiologist claims that he has found fossilized evidence of alien life on a microbe. So why hasn’t the press been busting into your regularly scheduled viewing? Perhaps it is because the scientist, Richard Hoover, has done this before, … Continue reading →
Journalists, in an effort to infuriate the Czar ever more with incredible laziness, are playing a telephone game with a story about a planet way, way, way out around the Sun larger than Jupiter and quietly circling our sun. Not … Continue reading →
Would you like the Gormogons to move the planets around? Oh I do want. But what I really want—if we’re remaking the Solar System to order—is for Mars and Venus moved to our orbit. Let their temperature regulate to ‘close … Continue reading →
Question 1: What if you took away the moon, and instead put other celestial bodies at the same distance; how big or small would they appear to be? Question 2: Is this the sort of thing you would like the … Continue reading →
The Czar has an idea for GorT. Take a current Time magazine story back to the year 1936, and let the editors of that era read and comment accordingly. Bet that will be entertaining. In case you did not know, … Continue reading →
Three quick scientific updates. Remember the Czar going on about being careful with a claim about what the universe was like prior to the Big Bang? Fortunately, even the legendary Dr. Penrose is not above being lectured to. Evidently, other … Continue reading →
Before your local newspaper screws this up, the Czar thought he should try to explain a curious news item going around the scientific circles. The story is that famous physicist Roger Penrose has described evidence that supports a controversial theory … Continue reading →
Well, the Mandarin is too humble to say so himself, but this weekend another one of his projects came to a great success. He installed rockets on Saturn’s moon Enceladus. And why not? It will be available for a minimal … Continue reading →
The Czar has been spending time at his home in Muscovy, away from the Castle. Yesterday, he spent the evening with Царевич, the 5-year-old Grand Duke of Muscovy. We went for a nice walk after sunset, watching the moths come … Continue reading →
A high-school sophomore from West Virginia has discovered a new astronomical object—a rotating radio transient. Predicted theoretically, this is indeed the first ever confirmed hit, although some candidates had been identified. A rotating radio transient is like stuttering, slow pulsar: … Continue reading →
Readers may recall the Czar has a love-hate relationship with theater. He mostly hates it, and avoids it completely. Why? Check this out. Contact, the Musical. Yeah, the Carl Sagan book/Jodie Foster movie. How timely, too, since the book is … Continue reading →
Just remember that FoxNews is always your voice of doom. As you may have heard, something pretty big slammed into Jupiter last week. We don’t know what it was, because it hit on the far side. And nobody likes the … Continue reading →
If you aren’t up on these things, the planet Venus is shrouded under dense, lethal clouds. As a result, humans have never really seen what it looks like. Do not be fooled: we have maps and topographies and all sorts … Continue reading →
The Czar waits to see the spin on this. Specifically, he wonders when both sides of the climate change free-for-all will each claim conclusive evidence on a recent study. But let us back up a step. Climatologists have long known … Continue reading →
Well, by now, most astronomy enthusiasts have heard that we’re on our way to repair the Hubble Space Telescope one more time. The Czar thinks there is plenty of life left in the old bird, and for what we paid … Continue reading →
The International Astronomy Union declares February no longer a month, courtesy Bad Astronomy. Short and fun, unlike February, which tends to be only short. The Czar of MuscovyБожію Поспѣшествующею Милостію Мы, Дима Грозный Императоръ и Самодержецъ Всероссiйскiй, цѣсарь Московскiй. The … Continue reading →
So the geniuses in the Illinois General Assembly passed a bill with the following language: RESOLVED, BY THE SENATE OF THE NINETY-SIXTH GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that as Pluto passes overhead through Illinois’ night skies, that it … Continue reading →
