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68 Comments
- morphie, on 05/15/2008, -1/+27Looks like the Firefox logo.
- imnojezus, on 05/15/2008, -0/+10In relative terms, it's perfectly ok to say that the supernova is only 140 years old.
- DyceFreak, on 05/15/2008, -0/+8you guys are retarded... its all relativity. To us... ALL OF US ON EARTH, WHICH WE ALL HAVE IN COMMON, we can see the supernova as 140 years old. There is absolutely no current way of looking at this thing 28K years in the future for us. It is entirely impossible for us to view anything beyond our 140 years because it truely, due to time and space, has not happened yet relative to us. Time takes time, and without matter time stretches.
There is absolutely no need to be absolute in this situation, as we are all on earth so we all share a common relativity to the object - xB4R7x, on 05/15/2008, -0/+9"Yes, but it’s convention to use Earth observed time when speaking colloquially to make comparison with similar events. Unless the local time in the neighborhood of the event is important versus Earth-arrival time, or the meaning would be misunderstood, it’s simply easier to use the convention.
It’s the same as one would say “I am travelling 60 MPH” rather than “I am travelling 60 MPH with respect to the local ground based frame of reference, plus the velocity imparted by the rotation rate of the Earth, plus its velocity around the Sun, plus the Sun’s proper motion …” when the fiddly little details are absolutely correct but irrelevant to the discussion at hand." - drlha, on 05/15/2008, -1/+8Imagine if I showed you a picture of young person. Now I tell you the picture is 50 years old. Does the fact that the picture is 50 years old make it not a picture of a young person any more, but instead a picture of a 50+ year old person? No it doesn't. Astronomers know full well about light travel time, but to make our lives easier, we tend to talk about the ages of events in terms of when we see them, rather than when they actually happened.
- moomeep, on 05/15/2008, -0/+6more here (+ pics)... chandra source.
http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2008/g19/press_05 ...
http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2008/g19/more.htm ...
http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2008/g19/ - pyro12, on 05/15/2008, -0/+6Pretty cool, but I can't really see why they made us wait so long after the buzz generating press release a while back. Could it be NASA's adopting Hollywood marketing strategies?
- nullcodes, on 05/15/2008, -0/+6I am surprised there's like 28,140 people on digg genuinely confused about the 28000 + 140 years thing.
Astronomers believe the supernova (a big star exploding) happened about 28,140 years ago. Since light from where the star is takes 28,000 years to get here, the light from "explosion" flash would have reached us only 140 years ago. What we are now seeing is the light (actually not much visible light, but that's another story) from 140 year old remnants of that explosion (those remnants are now actually 28,000 years old but the light is just arriving here). - bigbill780, on 05/15/2008, -1/+7I hope this is the only young thing you are looking at through a telescope or Chris Hansen will be showing up at your house.
- thinman1189, on 05/15/2008, -1/+6Meaning that it's 140 years old in "that's when it was first visible to us" with a time lapse of 28,000 light years.
- zadadka, on 05/15/2008, -1/+6The object is 28,000 light years away...therefore what we see today is what happened 28,000 years ago.
The 140 years relates to the difference between the actual supernova event, and the state of the remnant we now see, or, in other words, we are looking at the remnant of an occurance 140 years ago in ITS history, not ours.
Those that are saying the supernova event was 28,140 years ago are quite correct. - xB4R7x, on 05/15/2008, -2/+6I'm no astronomer... but I know that a light year is the distance that light travels in one year on the julian calendar. Therefore, if this sucker was visible 140 years ago. That would make it 28,140 years old, not 140.
Just an observation. - uptwolait, on 05/15/2008, -0/+4140 years since the light first reached earth.
- twertyto, on 05/15/2008, -0/+3I didn't state my point clearly enough. The fact that the supernova is 28,000 light years away years is largely irrelevant. We are causally disconnected from the actual appearance of the supernova since we are so far away. If we were located right next to the supernova then we would see a 28,140 year old supernova but instead we see a 140 year old supernova. The fact that the supernova has actually been around for 28,140 years is irrelevant since it is not possible for us to view it.
- davebg8r, on 05/15/2008, -4/+12Im pretty educated and have an interest in such things but I am a little confused. If its 28,140 light years away, that means it takes light 28,140 years for the image to reach us. So if we are seeing the supernova now, that would mean the image we are looking at is 28,140 years old. So how does that make it only 140 years old?
- StaticThunder, on 05/15/2008, -0/+3From our perspective, this happened only 140 years ago. I hate to say this because it sounds like it needs a rimshot, but time is relative.
- BadAstronomer, on 05/15/2008, -1/+5It was discovered in 1985, but it was thought to be pretty old. It was only with the new observations that the age of 140 years was nailed down. So this is in fact a great discovery.
- ghank, on 05/15/2008, -3/+8While I agree that this probably very exciting for a select few people, most people are going to wonder why all the suspense for something that happened 28,140 years ago. also if they have images from 1985, why say it's been something that NASA has been looking for "for the past 50 years"? the 1985 pics suggest that they only had to look for 27 years. This is almost as disappointing as an Uwe Boll movie.
- ePuck, on 05/15/2008, -0/+3"28,000" + 140 is right
- samcrut, on 05/15/2008, -3/+7"28,000 light years away, and it’s only at most about 140 years old"
Um... I'm no astronomer, but wouldn't that make it 28,140 years old? It's been VISIBLE for 140 years or so, but it's a hell of a lot older than that. - jsleno, on 05/15/2008, -5/+9GOD USES FIREFOX!!!
- SquigglyP, on 05/15/2008, -1/+4no, it's distance is everything.
"It’s located very near the center of the galaxy, about 28,000 light years away, and it’s only at most about 140 years old."
A light year is the distance light can travel in a year. If we can see the effects of the supernova from a star that is 28,000 light years away, then that supernova must have happened at least 28,000 years ago. samcrut is absolutely correct.
It has been visible to us for 140 years, which is how they should have worded it on the site. If the nova were actually 140 years old, we wouldn't have even seen it happen yet. - aldenhg, on 05/15/2008, -0/+2Because it's a blue circle with red wrapped around it.
- induren, on 05/15/2008, -0/+2What an ADORABLE baby! Politicians are lining up to kiss it. It's so cuuuuuute!
- jun2san, on 05/15/2008, -0/+2MOAR!
- pattyman5000, on 05/15/2008, -0/+2I was listening, too. Did you hear the question about moon crickets?
- elliott9, on 05/15/2008, -0/+2no stupid
http://technomanai.net/wp-content/uploads/2007/11/ ... - apmtt, on 05/15/2008, -0/+3I was listening to their conference about it yesterday. At the end, when they were taking questions from the press, someone got angry enough because of all the hype about whatever was found and realised what it actually was that they phoned NASA and shouted something about vaginas.
- f3l1x, on 05/15/2008, -2/+3Birth of a Firefox logo... Ahhh crap I'm the third person to denote this..
Ummm. It's a schooner! - davebg8r, on 05/23/2008, -0/+1No, the easy and correct thing to say would be that 'we observed this phenomenom 40 years ago'. Instead they state it (implying the event) happened 40 years ago. That is incorrect and misleading.
- kingmanic, on 05/15/2008, -0/+1The light we are receiving now originated 140 years after the super nova is what is meant but thats a bit cumbersome.
- fadetoone, on 05/15/2008, -0/+1Yeah, they need to say "140 years *by astronomical reference*" or something...
- drlha, on 05/15/2008, -1/+2Does this comment really need to be made 10 times in this thread?
- JasonCox, on 05/15/2008, -0/+1Can someone submit a story that explains how a Lightyear correlates with time? This is the second or third story like this in the past few weeks.
- plasticxme, on 05/15/2008, -1/+4*Shakes head*
Because its shape is circular? - ghank, on 05/15/2008, -4/+828,140 years, I really wish people would stop saying 140 years.
- stickynips, on 05/15/2008, -5/+6Maybe I'm missing something. How can the supernova be 140 years old, but 28,000 light years away. We shouldn't be seeing the light it gives off for another 27,860 years. Unless the supernova is actually 28,140 years old, and we're seeing is as it was 28,000 years ago.
- driftwood07, on 05/15/2008, -1/+2wow thats exactly what i thought when i saw the thumbnail .
- QsheiK, on 05/15/2008, -0/+1Aww it looks just like its mother.
- twertyto, on 05/15/2008, -2/+4We are seeing a 140 year old supernova. It's distance is irrelevant.
- inactive, on 05/15/2008, -0/+1It's in the sixth paragraph after the picture:
"But that’s changed. After searching for literally decades, astronomers have found a supernova in our galaxy! It’s official name is G1.9+0.3, which doesn’t exactly make your heart sing, I know. But it’s very cool. It’s a remnant, the expanding gaseous debris from a supernova blast. It’s located very near the center of the galaxy, about 28,000 light years away, and it’s only at most about 140 years old." - HyperJack, on 05/15/2008, -0/+1I spy a Champagne Supernova in the sky
- Synova, on 05/15/2008, -0/+1Not really. This galaxy does though: http://www.ksta.de/ks/images/mdsBild/1132660403592 ... ;)
- davebg8r, on 05/23/2008, -0/+1No, we talk about when events actually happened, not when we first knew about them unless we specifically state that. For example, we dont say the big bang happened 30 years ago when we came up with the theory. We say it happened 14 billion or so years ago (or whatever age they are saying these days).
- whalt, on 05/16/2008, -0/+1Does it still get carded?
- sevenvt, on 05/15/2008, -0/+1Well, no one in the civil war wouldve seen it for 28,000 years anyways... even if the light wasnt absorbed along the way, we shouldnt have the light reaching our planet for the number of light years it is far from us.
- saikyan, on 05/15/2008, -1/+2KHAAAAAAAAAN!!!!
- Enochrewt, on 05/15/2008, -0/+1But then they'd have to say that mouthful every time anyone brought up how old it is, which is exactly what they're trying to avoid with people in the first place. NASA has a hard enough time keeping people interested in what they do, they don't need to spout the same line unnecessarily over and over about their big discovery, it's just boring.
- verkon, on 05/15/2008, -1/+1A supernova that young must be a mininova.
- DavidTTT, on 05/15/2008, -1/+1i just dont want it around when it gets pissy in its teen years and gose all emonova
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