"SPACE BYTES" 2006 -- Columns by Astronomer THOMAS WM. HAMILTON

PSEUDO-SCIENCE FRAUDS & FAKES

SPACE BYTES #9 By THOMAS HAMILTON

There is a certai n charm to many frauds and fakes. The con man concept is a lot older than the 19th Century story of the Confidence Man and plays well in American fiction, including movies and television. But it's not so funny for those who fall for a scam and lose money to it. Astronomy has been one of those felds where frauds have accumulated and that's what we'll take a look at this time.

I mention the 1835 Moon Hoax perpetrated by Richard Adams....

[The claim for the photo shown here is that it is a picture of a UFO, but others say that it is the blur of a flying insect passing by the camera. Such fuzzy, ambigious UFO photos mar what tries to pass for science.]

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THE INTELLIGENT DESIGN CONTROVERSY

SPACE BYTES #8 By THOMAS WM. HAMILTON

The issue of Intelligent Design, so-called, has been rolling the ranks of science for a decade. Recent remarks by President Bush have increased the controversy (full disclosure: I am very distantly related to both Presidents Bush). I thought it might be worthwhile to take a look at how it impacts astronomy. Scientists in the biological sciences have been the most vocal on this issue, but astronomers are also concerned. At least one professional organization in the field of astronomy has been polling its members on whether it has to make a stand on the subject....

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TRIPLE STAR SYSTEMS

SPACE BYTES #7 By THOMAS WM. HAMILTON

With the recent discover of a "hot Jupiter" in a triple star system, the idea that triple star systems cannot have a planet would seem to have received the most definate of all possible refutations: a counter-example. Astronomers, however, should be accustomed to this sort of thing, as the field has lived for centuries with popular and well-established ideas that suddenly collapsed upon the presentation of a counter-example.

One of the earliest, of course, was that the Earth is flat....

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GALAXY CONCEPT EVOLUTION

SPACE BYTES #6 By THOMAS WM. HAMILTON

The word "galaxy" goes back to ancient Greeks, from the word for milk. Because one of the goddesses had a slight accident feeding an infant, milk spilled across the sky, giving the Latin name Via Galactica to what we call (in perfect English translation) the Milky Way. Once the telescope had proved the glow came from many thousands of stars (a concept Aristole considered and then tossed out, along with the idea that a moving Earth was leaving behind what we call a contrail), astronomers realized that the Sun was a member of a large system of stars that became know as our galaxy.

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