Voyager 1 keeps on going

Eleven billion miles away from the Sun is where Voyager 1 is estimated to be right now. To give you an idea how far this is, it’s 118 times the distance between Earth and our Sun (also known as one Astronomical Unit, AU for short). I’m hoping the probe will keep pressing on, escape our solar system to report back how empty the galaxy really is. Sounds depressing but I’m curious since interstellar travel could be hindered by particulate matter, radiation, etc.

Voyager 1 & 2 are impressive pieces of hardware from the Seventies. I doubt anything NASA, ESA or the Chinese make last as long, being cultures sucked into the economic fallacy of planned obsolescence.

In other Science news, Alamo Drafthouse appears to have added a new signature event to Girlie Night, Quote-a-long, etc. It’s called Hollywood Bullshit. Reminds me of a more blunt version of the History Channels History v. Hollywood. I think the event’s goal/joy is to point out how Hollywood deserves a D in Science, History and Civics. Unfortunately, the moviemakers’ errors permeate throughout the populace to be accepted as truth, much like how the SCLM operates. Cases in point in each category: explosive decompression (Science failure started by Outland), Richard III was a terrible king (Historical lie promoted by Shakespeare) and villains beating the system for reasons of insanity (too many to cite).

Anyway, Alamo is going to rip Armageddon a new one in January during a major Astronomical/Astrophysics gathering. This terrible movie which uses explosions to cover plot holes (see anything by Michael Bay, JJ Abrams and Jerry Bruckheimer) is the bane of all Astronomers. When I saw it in 1998, even I knew the heroes’ solution was the stupidest possible thing to do if a Texas-sized asteroid were headed Earth’s way. If you had the good fortune to avoid or forget, let me remind you…Bruce Willis and his crew of cliches, drill a hole, insert a nuclear weapon and blow up the asteroid. Earth is saved. WRONG. Instead of Texas fall on us, we’d have a million VWs fall on us. I immediately thought of Dr. Phil Plait since I didn’t recognize Alamo’s host. He actually answered me personally in a day and said thank you but he won’t be in Austin then. However, Dr. Plait will be visiting for SXSW so I continue to have a standing offer to take him to a movie. He stated how he would like to see Alamo due to it’s growing, national status.

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