(August 22, 2017 at 10:13 pm)vorlon13 Wrote: BTW, Edmund Halley managed to calculate a ground track for a 1715 eclipse.  He nailed it down to within 20 miles and 4 minutes.

An amazing feat considering the difficulty of getting accurate elements to do the tremendous amount of calculations necessary to do it.

You don't look upon Newton without being struck blind unless your mathematical capabilities are at a minimum supernatural.

Besides, the dude is also cool because he explored with boats and diving bells and shit.

Realizing the state of the art technology in 1715 didn't include much of anything we would recognize as a precise scientific instrument. Ships were still becoming lost at sea and surveying the countryside accurately was barely possible.

That Halley was able to nevertheless generate a ground track map accurate to 20 miles is astonishing.

(August 23, 2017 at 10:08 am)Jehanne Wrote: Yet another cool article:

https://twitter.com/EricLiptonNYT/status...7414291456

And, don't forgot (read the article) that the next eclipse is on April 8, 2024!

I already told my Texan friends that we're a comin to stay over with the kids.

If you don't mind a fun ship voyage, there's a nice one in the South Pacific in 2019.

A side trip to Pitcairn Island (YES!! Pitcairn Island !!!!!!!) is possible, weather permitting.

(August 24, 2017 at 1:16 am)vorlon13 Wrote: If you don't mind a fun ship voyage, there's a nice one in the South Pacific in 2019.

A side trip to Pitcairn Island (YES!! Pitcairn Island !!!!!!!) is possible, weather permitting.

I hope the crew doesn't mutiny.

LOL, never had much of an urge to go on a cruise of any sort, 'ceptin barely an eclipse cruise, but a stop at Pitcairn Island is quite an inducement.

Bouvet Island would do it too . . . .

(August 24, 2017 at 1:16 am)vorlon13 Wrote: If you don't mind a fun ship voyage, there's a nice one in the South Pacific in 2019.

A side trip to Pitcairn Island (YES!! Pitcairn Island !!!!!!!) is possible, weather permitting.

I wonder which part of rum, lash, and sodomy will you explore on Pitcairn.

horny isolated needful mens, a literal vorlon paradise . . . .

Saw it once, think I'm done now.

(August 24, 2017 at 9:25 am)Anomalocaris Wrote:

(August 24, 2017 at 1:16 am)vorlon13 Wrote: If you don't mind a fun ship voyage, there's a nice one in the South Pacific in 2019.

A side trip to Pitcairn Island (YES!! Pitcairn Island !!!!!!!) is possible, weather permitting.

I wonder which part of rum, lash, and sodomy will you explore on Pitcairn.

If you're over 16, I suspect you might not get the sodomy, and since the Pitcairn natives are all Seventh-Day Adventists, it appears that rum might not be in the cards, except for Friday nights at Christian's Cafe and the duty-free Government Store, so if you expect any of the three, it might be the lash.

Also, on the subject of the eclipse, I mentioned trying to glimpse the eclipse bare-eyed to my therapist. She said that, the next time it comes around, she'll buy me a set of eclipse glasses herself so I don't have to do it again.