We should set ourselves the goal of doing things in space that make people here and elsewhere look up and say, “Wow, the Kiwis are doing that? That’s AWESOME!”
Category: New Zealand
Birthday Boy
You know those little cartoon atoms that are a graphical shorthand for “science”? The key idea they express – the central nucleus wrapped by a cloud of electrons – is Rutherford’s. The proton? Discovered by Rutherford and his collaborators. Turning the atom of one element into another, fulfilling the dreams of alchemists? Also Rutherford.
This Is Not A Test
Once upon a time, the “tyranny of distance” defined the Pākehā experience of New Zealand, locating immigrants from Britain 12,000 miles from the country they often referred to as Home. But in the years to come that distance might be the best thing that ever happened to the people of these islands.
Dark Stars
These images will show us the environment of the black hole itself, test Einstein’s understanding of gravity, and give unprecedented proof that black holes truly exist in our universe. Because seeing really is believing. Even for scientists.
We Don’t Need No Education?
My mother and father – whose own childhoods took place against the backdrop of the Pacific War and the Blitz, respectively – hoped that their children’s lives would be safer and more comfortable than their own. But parents today should have no such illusions about what our children could face in the anthropocene if climate action does not begin right now.
Its Dark Materials
Each galaxy lives within its own three-dimensional halo of dark matter whose gravitational field corrals the stars within it. Without the stars, the halo would still be there, albeit invisible to our eyes; but if the halo vanished, the stars would scatter into the depths of the universe – just as a Christmas tree remains a tree with or without the pretty lights. Whereas without the tree, the lights would merely be a puddle of colour on the snowy ground.