So today’s APOD describes Spica as bright bluish.  Well you’re slowly getting there guys, eventually you’ll cotton on.  If you check out the negativity of the B-V index you’ll find that Spica is in fact the 3rd bluest star in the entire sky after Zeta Puppis and S Monocerotis – it is actually the brightest star of all 3.  So Spica is the brightest (very) blue star up there.  Maybe you’ll get it right 3rd time around?  Have you actually even seen Spica through binoculars or a low power telescope?  You can’t have I guess as it looks like a celestial sapphire blazing away with a deep blue hue.

Today’s APOD is a nice Mars, Ceres, Vesta image, but the words to go with the image are a bit of a let down.

We read – “Clearly outshining bluish Spica ………..” – BLUISH SPICA!!  The brightest blue star in the night sky?  Get a grip guys.

First the positive.  90 pages of the new book completed, estimated total 250 pages.

Now the negative.  All my (5) observatory computers are XP-based machines as there are still plenty of astronomy bits running on ancient software.  As you know Microsoft no longer supports XP, this is apparently no problem for the 4 Intel machines – but a big problem for the Athlon which has now kindly locked me out.  Thank you very much Microsoft – like I need these unnecessary problems on top of trying to maintain a parallel imaging array.

I had discussions with a book publisher yesterday to see how he felt about a “photography book” project I have been mulling over for around 2 or 3 years now.  I am pleased to say that he thought it was a good idea, so now the hard graft begins of putting it all together.  This is a “specialist” book, so it’s not about going out and taking snaps with your new DSLR, it includes Deep-Sky imaging, photomicroscopy, macrophotography, high-speed photography, pinhole camera photography, special effects photography like “Little Planet” images, and there is even an Appendix on Computer Generated Imagery.  I estimate this to be around 250 pages long, coffee-table book size (in landscape format) and printed to an extremely high quality to bring out the best in the images.  Current estimate for draft completion – around September/October this year.  We’re off!!

Last night I managed to get out imaging for the first time in over 2 months.  After an imaging session with the mini-WASP array (which I had almost forgotten how to use) I shut down the observatory and came outside for a last look at the evening’s sky in the south.  WOWSER!!  What a sight.  Blazing away in the south east above the mini-WASP dome was a beautiful colour-contrasting pair.  Bright red Mars and bright blue Spica.  I ran indoors to grab the Canon 5D MkII and a 28mm lens and captured the image below.  What a great way to finish off the evening

Sirius “Louey” honorary human – 18th May 2006 – 5th March 2014, far too soon

I deleted an earlier post about belief in God as I don’t think it gave a true representation of my feelings on the subject.

Why is there a discussion on “belief in God” at all on an astronomy web-site?  Because it is a question I am often asked when giving talks on  deep-sky imaging to clubs and societies.

I still stand by my statement that I do not “believe” in God because I do not believe in anything - I either know something, or I don’t (or at least I think I know something, even if I am actually incorrect).  My belief, or non-belief in a God has absolutely nothing to do with God’s possible existence.  God can of course exist whether I believe in the existence of God, or not.

So maybe the more discerning question is not whether I believe in God or not but whether God exists or not – and that question is a lot tougher to answer.

It would be inappropriate for me to use the word “believe” in this piece, so to avoid that contradiction I will use the word “think”  I think that the question of God’s existence is intimately bound up with the existence (or not) of infinity.  From the earliest times the idea that the Ein Sof, the absolute infinite, and God were inextricably linked (if not indeed the same thing) has been discussed by philosophers and mathematicians alike.  I do not see any evidence that a true infinity of anything exists in the Universe (although we must remember that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence).  Very, very big numbers are involved of course, but even the biggest numbers we contemplate, say the total number of photons in the Universe) fall far short of infinity.  The only place I know where infinity exists is in the mathematical world, but I do not equate mathematics with God as I have already stated in an earlier article. Mathematics is just an example of where true infinity not only exists, but thrives.  Let us not also forget that mathematics describes the physical world extremely well, so although a true infinity as such may not exist in the real physical world, a thought system (mathematics) which can accommodate infinity, can also very accurately describe a system in which actual infinities do not occur.  Perhaps this is not surprising. A highly complex system can always contain a less complex system as a subset.  For example, Newton’s Laws can be found as a low-velocity case in considering Einstein’s Special Relativity.

Can we get any further?  Perhaps just a little.  If this Universe is ultimately finite without any infinite quantities contained within it (I don’t consider the asymptotic infinity considered to be at the “centre” of a black-hole to be an example of an infinite quantity – but I could be wrong!) then if we equate God with true infinity it appears that God must be extra, or ultra-Universal.  I don’t really have a problem with that.  An infinite God that transcends the whole Universe is what it’s all about after all, isn’t it?

So although God is not Mathematics, Mathematics allows us to work with infinity, so Mathematics  might give us a clue as to what God might be.  The Absolute Infinite was contemplated by Georg Cantor as an infinity that transcended the transfinite numbers.  It should be noted that Cantor also equated the Absolute Infinite with God!  Cantor believed that the Absolute Infinite possessed mathematical properties including the reflection principle which states that every property of the Absolute Infinite is also held by some smaller object.  It is sad to relate that Georg Cantor, along with several other famous mathematicians/physicists who dared to venture into the realm of the infinite encountered severe mental problems which ultimately led to death.

How is it possible for a finite human Mind to contemplate and work with infinite quantities, in other words, how is it possible to know God?  I suppose the trite answer is that the human mind cannot in fact do this, and it leads to madness and death, which in itself is extremely interesting observation, because as we all know “Whom the Gods would destroy, they first make mad”.  But now consider the reason our finite minds can work with the Infinite is due to the reflection principle, so that every property of the Absolute Infinite is also held by some smaller object – ourselves for example!

I therefore postulate that  it is possible for us “smaller objects” to know “the Mind of God” (if God exists) – but that particular quest is fraught with extreme danger.

But does this answer the original question of God’s actual existence?  No it does not.  But in giving an example of a true infinity, an Ein Sof, we are at least provided with the possibility of the existence of a God, and that has to be a good place to start.

Where are the peer-reviewed Journal papers in a quality publication to back up your claims??

But will we get 10-minutes of clear sky to be able to image it?