CJLittleStarinAquariusMarch2017column
I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the Feb. 22nd announcement from NASA on the discovery of the Trappist 1 solar system in the constellation Aquarius. The announcement was met by almost feverish excitement by the space enthusiast community and what could be only be described as a short lived flurry of excitement by the rest of the world. It’s now April and I would suspect that the name “Trappist 1” barely registers on the radar for most people. I have noticed that this is what generally happens with many of the “big” announcements of science and space science in particular. And that’s because a lot of these announcements are based on deductions after months and in some cases, years–of observation and calculations. Science is laborious and can sometime seem plodding. It doesn’t produce instant images to dazzle our instant gratification world. We cannot “see” the 7 planets that are orbiting Trappist 1–but we know that they are there and scientists can calculate their mass, location and composition—through science.. ( which I won’t get into here but will be briefly explained in the attached article ) However, through the creative skill of artists, we can see a conceptual image that will fire our imaginations and drive home the magic and wonder of the discovery of brand new worlds….some, perhaps, not terribly unlike the one we currently occupy 🙂
The significance and implications of the discovery of brand new solar systems like Trappist 1 ( the first of what I suspect will be many) is exactly what this blog is all about and is one of the first steps in the journey of finding other worlds and redefining our place in the Universe. I’ve attached a short article with more information as well as one of those magical artist’s rendering of the Trappist 1 system. And, in the spirit of the old saying of “why reinvent the wheel? “–I didn’t have to get permission from the writer for this one. The words are my own and I hope you enjoy my March 13th column as it appeared in the Thunder Bay Chronicle Journal. 🙂
* Click on link at the top of the post
M.A.N.
PS / BTW—A short note about beer. If you, like me, kept thinking of monks every time you heard the word Trappist, there’s a good reason for that. Although the star is named after the telescope that first detected the transiting planets ( it’s an acronym- see column ), there is a connection to the monks. The Belgian scientists who discovered the system wanted to give a cosmic nod to the 16th century monks ( who are still in existence today ) famed for their superb beer! Would love to get my hands on some of that brew to see if it lives up to its “heavenly” reputation 🙂
