January 26 – February 8, 2015
Editor’s note: The following article may inspire a desire to examine our sun more closely. But be cautioned that the sun should only be photographed with extreme protection. The H-alpha filters referred to below are the most expensive filters for astrophotography.
“The sun rules your life and mine…… But it was the dark, starry heavens with their magical cobalt galaxies that pulled at my spirit, and the Sun was the night’s greatest enemy. Even so, it kept tugging at my sleeve: stars are impossibly distant dots, but this one is right here, offering its secrets, as deep as they can be, in exquisite detail.”
— Bob Berman, The Sun’s Heartbeat, page 4.
Woodstock, N.Y. — When asked, “Why astronomy as a career?” astronomer and author Bob Berman answered with the characteristic injection of thought-provoking worldliness and humor that are ever present in his writing and teaching. “There’s no such thing as free will. Astronomy was my destiny. My first memory of life is looking into the night sky from my carriage or stroller. I memorized every star in the sky and their spectral classes by the time I was 12 or 13 years old, and have subscribed to the Observer’s Handbook of The Royal Astronomical Society of Canada since then. As a teenager I read every book in the 500’s in the library.” Berman spent his boyhood in the Bronx, Brooklyn and Long Island. Are there children here under Berkshire skies on this path?
I followed up with the question, “What’s most important to you concerning the human connection to the cosmos?” The gist of his reply was that each individual experiences the “utterly mysterious” universe through the impact of personally viewing “the sky, the sheer beauty of galaxies, globular clusters, Saturn and southern hemisphere glories.”
He continued, “Princeton physicist John Wheeler, who coined the term ‘wormholes,’ stated that no phenomenon is a real phenomenon until it is observed. We are really connected with the cosmos: it is correlative with us. True celestial appreciation is best accessed through direct observation, far exceeding the study of photographs or at monitors. Conversely, astronomy learning is moving away from the hands-on to more inquiry through computers.” This direction aids scientists but distances the student and layperson from experiencing life-enhancing, deeply stirring contact with the cosmos.
“There are two branches of astronomy: study of the parts and study of the universe as a whole. Knowledge is real as regards the parts whereas pondering the universe as a whole lies almost in the area of metaphysics. We are in our infancy. We don’t know many of the basics, such as whether or not the universe is infinite, even if we can presently observe 200 billion galaxies.”
Tune in to Bob Berman’s Strange Universe spot every Sunday morning, 9:34 a.m. on WAMC.org live streaming or 105.3 or 90.3 FM Northeast Public Radio. On the same station, participate in his “Astronomy” show on Vox Pop. Usually the first Thursday of the month from 2-3 p.m., his next appearance will be the second Thursday, February 12.
Berman’s two most current books are Zoom: How Everything Moves from Atoms to Galaxies to Blizzards and Bees and The Sun’s Heartbeat, both published by Little, Brown and Company. His column, “Strange Universe” is prominent in every issue of Astronomy Magazine. Many of the region’s astronomy enthusiasts have attended Bob’s spring workshop series near Woodstock, N.Y. There are practical and theoretical presentations as well as telescope viewing at Overlook Observatory. Let’s have a Berkshire contingent participate this year: four Fridays beginning May 8. For more information go to https://skymanbob.com.
