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Mircea Pteancu

27 Apr 2011 19:26


Asteroid self-discoverer

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Va prezint mai jos un mesaj al lui Peter Abraham despre o caricatura si un mic articol glumet aparut in 1873 intr-o revista germana de umor, despre un ipotetic telescop automat pentru descoperirea asteroizilor si cometelor.
Pentru a viziona caricarura urmati linkul de mai jos,traducerea din germana in engleza a articolului insotitor  o gasiti in textul mesajului lui Peter.
ATS este acronimul lui Antique Telescope Society al carui membru activ as fi devenit de saptamana aceasta daca eu as fi fost aradeanul care a castigat cele 10 milioane de Euro.
Dar ,pe scurt,nu ma inscriu in ATS .....inca!
Mircea
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At the last ATS meeting, in Virginia, I opened my 
presentation with a drawing that I only knew as 
German, 19th century, showing an 'asteroid 
self-discoverer'. I recently searched for the 
periodical, as I have been doing for over a 
decade, and discovered that the entire run of the 
German humor magazine was now available on 
line. So I found the issue, and as hoped there 
was an explanatory text, and a far better copy of 
the illustration, which I continue to find vastly amusing.
I posted the illustration, and (with help from 
machine translators), I translated the brief 
text, which was brief enough but in black letter 
which can really confuse the modern reader.
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http://home.europa.com/~telscope/temp/Asteroiden.Selbstentdecker.jpg
673kb
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Ein Asteroiden Selbstentdecker. Fliegende 
Blätter (Flying Leaves) No. 1470, Vol. LIX, 1873.

An Asteroid Self-discoverer.
We managed to construct an instrument that 
discoveres the asteroids, comets, and other 
unknown celestial bodies, in a purely mechanical way. The setup is as follows:
A telescope-like instrument, with a combination 
of lenses constructed on the principle of the 
camera obscura, is placed facing the sky. This 
projects all celestial bodies in the visual 
field, onto a strip of paper which is stretched 
across two rollers. Using a clockwork, the paper 
is moved past the focus of the instrument, as the 
stars move across the field of the instrument.
On this paper, all known fixed-stars, planets, & 
asteroids, are precisely placed, like a map of 
the sky, and marked by black dots. The remaining 
area of the paper is chemically prepared so that 
the slightest impression of light that is not 
onto these blackened dots, results in an instantaneous ignition of the paper.
If this traversing star chart is properly 
oriented, the image of a star will always fall 
onto a black dot on the map, but if somewhere in 
the sky there is a star (asteroid or comet) that 
is not yet recorded on the paper, i.e. has not 
previously been detected, and that object is 
formed as an image on the chemically prepared 
surface, then there is a point of light, the 
paper ignites, the sparks fall on the powder 
filled fuse, which inserts into a small cannon, and a shot is fired.
This shot awakens the astronomer sleeping quietly 
in the next room. He jumps up, rushes to the 
instrument, and in the small parallel telescope 
next to the large telescope, he sees the newly 
discovered star. Klinkerfues, Luther, and the 
other famous asteroid discoverers need no longer 
brave the cold winter night air, and to get colds 
and flu in their strenuous undertaking with comet 
seekers. Unfortunately it is not possible to 
have this epoch-making tool displayed in a world 
exhibition. It is expected that the large number 
of small planets, which are located between Mars 
and Jupiter, might cause a shot every quarter of 
an hour, which shot will show all peoples of the 
world, the discovery of another new asteroid.

Peter Abrahams telscope@europa.com abrahams.peter@gmail.com
The history of the telescope and the binocular:
http://home.europa.com/~telscope/binotele.htm
10040 NW Thompson Rd., Portland, Oregon, 97229-3822, USA


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Mircea Pteancu

01 Mai 2011 16:40



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Inafara de partea umoristica,ceea ce este frapant la caricatura si articolul de mai sus,este un fapt evidentiat de Bart Fried.Si anume,ca metoda lansata in gluma a fost de fapt o inovatie lansata mult inaintea timpului sau.In articol telescopul este stationar si functioneaza ca o ''camera obscura'' proiectand imaginea pe o harta care urmareste firmamentului.In realitatea noastra, un principiu similar a fost de fapt utilizat la spectrometrul MAP utilizat multi ani la Allegheny.Sau cu marile placi metalice pre-gaurite folosite de Sloan Digital Sky Survey.Diferenta este ca  placile folosite in Sloan Survey se miscau impreuna cu telescopul in miscarea diurna.

O gluma care dupa un secol a devenit o metoda de cercetare foarte serioasa.Deci iata o gluma serioasa!
Mircea

