Coley Image Astro - loosely termed art

Astro Art - Coley Notes

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Converse-In-Universe

Some video's of universal size.

Starting with a 3d universe map.

Earth motion tilt

The Bird's of Prey

The Eagle Had Landed

Eagle Land?

Birds of prey are birds that hunt for food primarily via flight, using their keen senses, especially vision. 

They are defined as birds that primarily hunt vertebrates, including other birds. 



Their talons and beaks tend to be relatively large, powerful and adapted for tearing flesh. In most cases, the females are considerably larger than the males. The term "raptor" is derived from the Latin word rapere (meaning to seize or take by force) and may refer informally to all birds of prey, or specifically to the diurnal group.

Because of their predatory lifestyle, often at the top of the food chain, they face distinct conservation concerns.

EAGLE GOLDEN

Definition

Taken literally the term "bird of prey" has a wide meaning that includes many birds that hunt and feed on animals and also birds that eat very small insects. 

In ornithology, and the definition used here, the term has a narrower meaning for birds that have very good eyesight for finding food, strong feet for holding food, and a strong curved beak for tearing flesh. Most birds of prey also have strong curved talons for catching or killing prey. 

Birds of prey generally prey on vertebrates, which are usually quite large relative to the size of the bird. Most also eat carrion at least occasionally and the vultures and condors eat carrion as their main food source. By way of an example, the narrower definition excludes storks and gulls, which can eat quite large fish, partly because these birds catch and kill prey entirely with their beaks, and similarly bird-eating skuas, fish-eating penguins, and vertebrate-eating kookaburras are excluded.

Owl Scowl 

Using this cluster of anatomical and behavioural features, the species listed below are usually known to be birds of prey in ornithology. They can be divided into species that hunt during daylight, the raptors, and into species that hunt during the night, the owls. The raptors and the owls are distantly related and are classified in separate orders; however, their evolution has been convergent, both groups of birds adapting to a predatory lifestyle.

Double Golden Eagle - Coleynotes

Coleyartastro Loves Babylonian Astronomy - Part 2

Old Babylonian astronomy               

Babylonian?

Part ll

Old Babylonian astronomy refers to the astronomy that was practiced during and after the First Babylonian Dynasty (ca. 1830 BC) and before the Neo-Babylonian Empire (ca. 626 BC).

The Babylonians were the first to recognize that astronomical phenomena are periodic and apply mathematics to their predictions. Tablets dating back to the Old Babylonian period document the application of mathematics to the variation in the length of daylight over a solar year. Centuries of Babylonian observations of celestial phenomena are recorded in the series of cuneiform tablets known as the Enûma Anu Enlil—the oldest significant astronomical text that we possess is Tablet 63 of the Enûma Anu Enlil, the Venus tablet of Ammisaduqa, which lists the first and last visible risings of Venus over a period of about 21 years. It is the earliest evidence that planetary phenomena were recognized as periodic.

The MUL.APIN contains catalogues of stars and constellations as well as schemes for predicting heliacal risings and settings of the planets, and lengths of daylight as measured by a water clock, gnomon, shadows, and intercalations. The Babylonian GU text arranges stars in 'strings' that lie along declination circles and thus measure right-ascensions or time intervals, and also employs the stars of the zenith, which are also separated by given right-ascensional differences. There are dozens of cuneiform Mesopotamian texts with real observations of eclipses, mainly from Babylonia.

Planetary theory

The Babylonians were the first civilization known to possess a functional theory of the planets. The oldest surviving planetary astronomical text is the Babylonian Venus tablet of Ammisaduqa, a 7th century BC copy of a list of observations of the motions of the planet Venus that probably dates as early as the second millennium BC. The Babylonian astrologers also laid the foundations of what would eventually become Western astrology. The Enuma anu enlil, written during the Neo-Assyrian period in the 7th century BC, comprises a list of omens and their relationships with various celestial phenomena including the motions of the planets.

Cosmology

In contrast to the world view presented in Mesopotamian and Assyro-Babylonian literature, particularly in Mesopotamian and Babylonian mythology, very little is known about the cosmology and world view of the ancient Babylonian astrologers and astronomers. This is largely due to the current fragmentary state of Babylonian planetary theory, and also due to Babylonian astronomy being independent from cosmology at the time.  Nevertheless, traces of cosmology can be found in Babylonian literature and mythology.

In Babylonian cosmology, the Earth and the heavens were depicted as a "spatial whole, even one of round shape" with references to "the circumference of heaven and earth" and "the totality of heaven and earth". Their worldview was not exactly geocentric either. The idea of geocentrism, where the center of the Earth is the exact center of the universe, did not yet exist in Babylonian cosmology, but was established later by the Greek philosopher Aristotle's On the Heavens. In contrast, Babylonian cosmology suggested that the cosmos revolved around circularly with the heavens and the earth being equal and joined as a whole. The Babylonians and their predecessors, the Sumerians, also believed in a plurality of heavens and earths. This idea dates back toSumerian incantations of the 2nd millennium BC, which refers to there being seven heavens and seven earths, linked possibly chronologically to the creation by 7 generations of Gods.

Coleyartastro Loves Babylonian Astronomy

Where It All Started - Babylonian Astronomy

According to Asger Aaboe, the origins of Western astronomy can be found in Mesopotamia, and all Western efforts in the exact sciences are descendants in direct line from the work of the late Babylonian astronomers. 

Our knowledge of Sumerian astronomy is indirect, via the earliest Babylonian star catalogues dating from about 1200 BCE. The fact that many star names appear in Sumerian suggests a continuity reaching into the Early Bronze Age.


The history of astronomy in Mesopotamia, and the world, begins with the Sumerians who developed the earliest writing system—known as cuneiform—around 3500–3200 BC. 

The Sumerians developed a form of astronomy that had an important influence on the sophisticated astronomy of the Babylonians. Astrolatry, which gave planetary gods an important role in Mesopotamian mythology and religion, began with the Sumerians. 

They also used a sexagesimal (base 60) place-value number system, which simplified the task of recording very great and very small numbers. 

The modern practice of dividing a circle into 360 degrees, of 60 minutes each hour, began with the Sumerians.

During the 8th and 7th centuries BCE, Babylonian astronomers developed a new empirical approach to astronomy. They began studying philosophy dealing with the ideal nature of the universe and began employing an internal logic within their predictive planetary systems. 

This was an important contribution to astronomy and the philosophy of science, and some scholars have thus referred to this new approach as the first scientific revolution.  

History Babylonian

This new approach to astronomy was adopted and further developed in Greek and Hellenistic astronomy. 

Classical Greek and Latin sources frequently use the term Chaldeans for the astronomers of Mesopotamia, who were, in reality, priest-scribes specializing in astrology and other forms of divination.

Only fragments of Babylonian astronomy have survived, consisting largely of contemporary clay tablets with ephemerides and procedure texts, hence current knowledge of Babylonian planetary theory is in a fragmentary state. 

Nevertheless, the surviving fragments show that, according to the historian A. Aaboe, Babylonian astronomy was:

"The first and highly successful attempt at giving a refined mathematical description of astronomical phenomena" and that "all subsequent varieties of scientific astronomy, in the Hellenistic world, in India, in Islam, and in the West—if not indeed all subsequent endeavour in the exact sciences—depend upon Babylonian astronomy in decisive and fundamental ways."

Curious About The Curiosity Rover - Part One

The Robotic Curiosity Rover

Rover Self Portrait

The Curiosity rover is a car-sized robotic rover exploring Gale Crater on Mars as part of NASA's Mars Science Laboratory mission (MSL).

Curiosity was launched from Cape Canaveral on November 26, 2011, at 10:02 EST aboard the MSL spacecraft and successfully landed on Aeolis Palus in Gale Crater on Mars on August 6, 2012, 05:17 UTC. 

The Bradbury Landing site was less than 2.4 km (1.5 mi) from the center of the rover's touchdown target after a 563,000,000 km (350,000,000 mi) journey. 

The rover's goals include: investigation of the Martian climate and geology; assessment of whether the selected field site inside Gale Crater ever has offered environmental conditions favorable for microbial life, including investigation of the role of water; and planetary habitability studies in preparation for future human exploration.

Curiosity will serve as the basis for the design of an unnamed rover launching to Mars in 2020. In December 2012, its two-year mission was extended indefinitely.

Telecom Network

In April and early May of 2013, Curiosity went into an autonomous operation mode for approximately 25 days during Earth-Mars solar conjunction. 

During this time, the rover will continue to monitor atmospheric and radiation data, but will not move on the Martian surface.

Constellation of Corvus

Just seen my latest naked-eye constellation - Corvus the Crow.

Not bad going as I saw it from my window above houses across the street! It's not the biggest or brightest constellation in the sky - but it's another to the seen list.

Corvus

History and mythology

The Greek figure of Corvus is modeled on the Babylonian Raven, which was similarly placed sitting on the tail of the Serpent (Greek Hydra). The Babylonian constellation was sacred to Adad, the god of rain and storm; in the second Millennium it would have risen just before the start of the autumnal rainy season. 

One myth associated with Corvus is that of Apollo and Coronis. Coronis had been unfaithful to her lover, who learned this information from a pure white crow. Apollo then turned its feathers black in a fit of rage. 

Another legend associated with Corvus is that a crow stopped on his way to fetch water for Apollo, in order to eat figs. Instead of telling the truth to Apollo, he lied and said that a snake, Hydra, kept 

him from the water, while holding a snake in his talons as proof. Apollo saw this to be a lie, however, and flung the crow (Corvus), cup (Crater), and the snake (Hydra) into the sky. 

He further punished the wayward bird by making sure that it would forever be thirsty, both in real life and in the heavens, where the Cup is barely out of reach. 

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