Kids Need Science is devoted to demystifying and explaining science, technology, engineering and math words, names, and concepts. Check back often for a science, technology, engineering or math word defined and explained every day.
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D16. Sur la route du Grand Canyon, petit détour par Meteor Crater (un immense cratère spectaculaire causé par la collision d’une météorite), puis...
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New cluster of crater impacts on Mars discovered by Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter
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Mickey Mouse Spotted on Mercury ! NASA image acquired: June 03, 2012
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While the expression ‘it’s Ancient Greek to me’ is used to mean something incomprehensible, the truth is that Ancient Greek is both accessible and still very much alive in Modern English. Today’s word, star, is a great example. If you were to get in a time machine and travel back to to Ancient Greece you would be able to share many words that are virtually unchanged. You could point to the night sky and say ‘a star’ which is so close to the Ancient Greek aster (αστερ) they would understand it immediately. You could perform this time travel trick over a huge expanse of land and time with similar results: the Old English steorra, from Proto-Germanic *sterron, *sternon (and for other Proto-Germanic derivatives see also Old Saxon sterro, Old Norse stjarna, Old Frisian stera, Dutch ster, Old High German sterro, German Stern, Gothic stairno), the Proto Indo-European *ster- (see also Sanskrit tar-, Hittite shittar, Latin stella, Breton sterenn, Welsh seren). Some words play such a powerful role on the imagination and and culture that they pass down from generation to generation like valuable treasure. Today star has dozens of metaphorical and poetic uses, from Shakespeare’s star-crossed lovers to soccer stars and five star restaurants. We wish upon stars, celebrities are known as stars, and we still treat the word with the highest metaphorical value: a star is distant, beautiful and inspiring.
Image courtesy NASA, in the public domain.
While there has been some minor solar activity lately, the sun has been actively evolving for hundreds of millions if not billions of years. On September 1, 1859 a massive solar flare known as the Carrington Event was felt around the globe. Beginning August 28 and lasting until September 2, sun spots and flares were recorded by British Astronomer Richard Carrington and independently noted by astronomer Richard Hodson; the resulting effects were felt by hundreds of millions around the world. Carrington noted the reports and recordings of disturbances in the Earth’s magnetosphere recorded at Kew Observatory and connected the solar activity with electro-magnetic disturbance on earth.
Following the Carrington Event, aurorae were seen all over the world, far further south than typically recorded-as far south as the Carribean. In the American Southwest, goldminers awoke in the middle of the night thinking it was dawn. At the dawn of the Electric Age, telegraphs world-wide were interrupted or showed disturbances ranging from disrupted signals to poles and equipment catching fire and emmitting sparks and electrical discharge. Scientists have calculated that such storms occur appoximately every 500 years.
On September 3, 1859, the Baltimore American and Commercial Advertiser reported, “Those who happened to be out late on Thursday night had an opportunity of witnessing another magnificent display of the auroral lights. The phenomenon was very similar to the display on Sunday night, though at times the light was, if possible, more brilliant, and the prismatic hues more varied and gorgeous. The light appeared to cover the whole firmament, apparently like a luminous cloud, through which the stars of the larger magnitude indistinctly shone. The light was greater than that of the moon at its full, but had an indescribable softness and delicacy that seemed to envelop everything upon which it rested. Between 12 and 1 o’clock, when the display was at its full brilliancy, the quiet streets of the city resting under this strange light, presented a beautiful as well as singular appearance.”
Image of Richard Carrington’s sunspot observations in the public domain, used courtesy Wikipedia.
Image of a solar flare courtesy NASA.
Excerpt from The Baltimore American in the public domain, used courtesy Wikipedia.
Happy World Ocean Day!
The word ocean appeared in English around the 13th century, crossing the English Channel from France where the Old French word occean predated it by a century of so. The Old French root derived from the Latin oceanus, which in turn came from the Ancient Greek okeanos ( Ὠκεανὸς), meaning the mythical body of water that surrounded the watery world that was Ancient Greece. This was to distinguish it from the Mediterranean and Adriatic Seas which were known to be finite and discoverable. Today we say there are five oceans: the Atlantic, Pacific, Indian, Arctic and Southern, though these are arbitrary and clearly overlap and flow into each other. The world’s oceans contain 1.3 billion cubic kilometers or 310 million cu mi with an average depth of 3,790 meters or 12,430 ft, covering approximately 70% of the earth’s surface.
Image of the ocean by Jeffpro57, used with permission under a Creative Commons 3.0 license.
