Alpine Conjunction (APOD 2009 Jan 2)

[orin stepanek]

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap090102.html

A beautiful photo, and I will add it to my collection. I 'm not sure which one of the pin pricks above the photographers head is Neptune. There are the three above his head and than there is one; just barely above his head, that you can hardly see.

Orin

[Chris Peterson]

A beautiful photo, and I will add it to my collection. I 'm not sure which one of the pin pricks above the photographers head is Neptune. There are the three above his head and than there is one; just barely above his head, that you can hardly see.

It's the one closest to his head:

[orin stepanek]

A beautiful photo, and I will add it to my collection. I 'm not sure which one of the pin pricks above the photographers head is Neptune. There are the three above his head and than there is one; just barely above his head, that you can hardly see.

It's the one closest to his head:

Thanks! 8) I figured that may be the case; but the three above his head were just pin pricks to me also.

Orin

[Rocky Planet]

By what miracle of science do the photographer and camera both appear in the frame?

[neufer]

----------------------------------------------------------------------
<<The planet NEPTUNE was discovered by German
astronomer IOhann GALLE, near Deneb Algedi
(δ Capricorni) on September 23, 1846, which is reasonable
as Capricornus can be seen east at 4:00am in September.>>

----------------------------------------------------------------------
. The Tempest [1612 ]> Act V, scene I
.
PROSPERO: Ye elves of hills, brooks, standing lakes & groves,
. And ye that on the sands with printless foot
. Do chase the ebbing NEPTUNE and do fly him
. When he comes back; you demi-puppets that
. By moonshine do the green sour ringlets make,
-----------------------------------------------------------
<<Galileo's drawings show that he first observed Neptune on December 28, 1612 , and again on January 27, 1613; on both occasions, Galileo mistook Neptune for a fixed star when it appeared very close—in conjunction—to Jupiter in the night sky. Hence he is not credited with Neptune's discovery. During the period of his first observation in December 1612, it was stationary in the sky because it had just turned retrograde.>>
...............................................................

The circle with the solid line through it shows Galileo's measurements of Jupiter and its moons on the night of December 27, 1612. The object labeled "fixa" at the extreme left, which Galileo assumed was a "fixed" star, is thought to be the first ever observation of the planet Neptune (magnitude ∼8), more than two centuries before its official discovery.
http://www.pacifier.com/~tpope/Accessin ... cripts.htm
...............................................................
<<A more certain NEPTUNE observation by Galileo
was recorded in his notebook on December 28. 1614:
"Beyond a fixed star", another followed in the same
straight line, which was also observed the previous night,
but then seemed further apart from one another.">>
-----------------------------------------------------------
_______ GAL(i)LE(o)
.............................................................
IOhann GALLE finds Le Verrier's NEPTUNE: September 23, 1846
Urbain Jean Joseph Le Verrier dies: September 23, 1877

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deneb_Algiedi
<<Delta Capricorni (δ Cap / δ Capricorni), also traditionally named Deneb Algedi and or Scheddi, is a quaternary star system approximately 39 light-years away in the constellation of Capricornus (the Horned Goat). The primary star in the system is a white giant star. The traditional names are from the Arabic ذنب الجدي ðanab al-jadiyy, meaning "the tail of the goat." As it represents the fishlike tail of a celestial goat, Deneb Algedi is astrologically flexible, associated with good and bad fortune alike. It was one of the fifteen Behenian stars of medieval astrology, associated with chalcedony, marjoram and the kabbalistic symbol . Because it is near the ecliptic, Delta Capricorni can be occulted by the Moon, and also (rarely) by planets.
-------------------------------------------------------------
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capricornus

<<Despite its faintness, Capricornus has one of the oldest mythological associations, having been consistently represented as a sea-goat for over three thousand years; its earliest representations are on tablets from ancient Babylon. The constellation may owe its antiquity to the fact that at that time, the northern hemisphere's Winter Solstice occurred while the sun was in Capricorn. The concern for the sun's rebirth might have rendered astronomical and astrological observation of this region of space very important.
.
Due to the precession of the equinoxes, the December solstice no longer takes place while the sun is in Capricorn, but the astrological period called Capricorn begins at approximately the same time as the solstice. The sun's most southerly position, which is attained at the northern hemisphere's winter solstice, is now called the Tropic of Capricorn, a term which also applies to the line on earth where the sun is directly overhead at noon on that solstice.
.
. Mythology
.
This constellation is sometimes identified as Amalthea, the goat that suckled the infant Zeus after his mother Rhea saved him from being devoured by his father Cronos in Greek mythology. The goat's broken horn was transformed into the cornucopia or horn of plenty. Some ancient sources claim that this derives from the sun "taking nourishment" while in the constellation, in preparation for its climb back northward.

However, the constellation is more often depicted as a goat with a fish's tail. One myth says that when the goat-god Pan was attacked by the monster Typhon, he dived into the Nile; the parts above the water remained a goat, but those under the water transformed into a fish.

The apparent paucity of stars within Capricornus, and the contrasting abundance within Sagittarius (which contains the brightest part of the Milky Way, was given a mythological explanation in Ancient Greece: due to early Greek beliefs that sin accumulated throughout the year, causing the darkness to increase, together with the sun's descent and pause at the Solstice, the ancient Greeks referred to this area of sky as the 'Augean Stable', where they considered the sun stabled during the year.>>

[DavidLeodis]

By what miracle of science do the photographer and camera both appear in the frame?

Good question. I did not pick up that point. As Tamas Ladanyi is credited with the picture I assume therefore that the photographer in the picture cannot be him, unless the camera in the picture is somebody else's and Tamas used a cable to operate the shutter on his off picture camera!