Thanks, Joe - it's a good read. I didn't post comments at DesNews but I enjoyed reading the blog and the comments that followed. I'm not surprised at all by the plethora of worlds being discovered these days. Since I was a child I always thought they would be there (and not because of my LDS faith.) As someone else wrote, it is indeed an exciting time to be alive. And remember, you're in Utah. If you know how NOT to provoke a religious debate, please let me know. Kim -----Original Message----- From: utah-astronomy-bounces@mailman.xmission.com [mailto:utah-astronomy-bounces@mailman.xmission.com] On Behalf Of Joe Bauman Sent: Friday, February 04, 2011 12:41 AM To: Utah Astronomy Subject: Re: [Utah-astronomy] Details and comments about Kepler's discoveries Thanks, Patrick -- It's really hard for me to know how people are going to react. Sometimes I think I've got a really interesting subject and I get no responses at all, which makes me feel bad. Then there's this one. I sure didn't want to start any religious debate. Best wishes, Joe --- On Fri, 2/4/11, Patrick Wiggins <paw@wirelessbeehive.com> wrote:

From: Patrick Wiggins <paw@wirelessbeehive.com> Subject: Re: [Utah-astronomy] Details and comments about Kepler's discoveries To: "Utah Astronomy" <utah-astronomy@mailman.xmission.com> Date: Friday, February 4, 2011, 12:37 AM Good one Joe but, my goodness, have you noticed the religious flame war your blog inspired?  Interesting to that so many people with such strong opinions hide behind pseudonyms. 

Also I think it says something that our local papers went with wire stories of the event and the only local coverage was your excellent blog.  Sigh...

patrick

On 03 Feb 2011, at 03:02, Joe Bauman wrote:

...

Hi, I just had to blog about the exciting Kepler findings. Please take a look and comment, if you will:

http://www.deseretnews.com/blog/47/10011341/Nightly-news-astronomy-Millions- of-Planets.html

...

-- Thanks, Joe

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Thanks, Don! How's the weather down there? I'm thinking about packing today and driving down tomorrow. (Still haven't decided.)The dinner party I thought we had turns out to be the following Saturday. Best wishes, Joe --- On Fri, 2/4/11, Don J. Colton <djcolton@piol.com> wrote:

From: Don J. Colton <djcolton@piol.com> Subject: Re: [Utah-astronomy] Details and comments about Kepler's discoveries To: "'Utah Astronomy'" <utah-astronomy@mailman.xmission.com> Date: Friday, February 4, 2011, 11:51 AM Joe,

Your blog readership is much larger than we may have thought.  Get a controversial subject and you find out - Deseret News ought to pay you for your efforts.  Great write up.

Don

-----Original Message----- From: utah-astronomy-bounces@mailman.xmission.com [mailto:utah-astronomy-bounces@mailman.xmission.com] On Behalf Of Patrick Wiggins Sent: Friday, February 04, 2011 12:37 AM To: Utah Astronomy Subject: Re: [Utah-astronomy] Details and comments about Kepler's discoveries

Good one Joe but, my goodness, have you noticed the religious flame war your blog inspired?  Interesting to that so many people with such strong opinions hide behind pseudonyms. 

Also I think it says something that our local papers went with wire stories of the event and the only local coverage was your excellent blog.  Sigh...

patrick

On 03 Feb 2011, at 03:02, Joe Bauman wrote:

...

Hi, I just had to blog about the exciting Kepler findings. Please take a look and comment, if you will:

http://www.deseretnews.com/blog/47/10011341/Nightly-news-astronomy-Millions- of-Planets.html

...

-- Thanks, Joe

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Well, there's the other view . . . perhaps they already know about us and want nothing to do with us, were too primitive or warlike. Kinda of like that one neighbor in the neighborhood everyone scorns. Another thought I had today was about a galaxy, NGC 3621 found here: http://www.eso.org/public/news/eso1104/ where it discusses that this galaxy has no central bulge but is a pure disk galaxy. What is interesting about this galaxy (and these pure disk galaxies are now thought to be common) is that it has an active super massive black hole at its core. This has occurred because astronomers feels that NGC 3621 is out there by itself and hasn't had any collisions to cause gravitational instabilities that build up stars in the central region, forming the bulge. Anyway, what is interesting to me is that it is 22 million ly away. So lets say there is a highly technological society on a planet in NGC 3621 IF there who has built a telescope capable of seeing planets in another galaxy (yes, highly unlikely) and they were looking at us, or the light that came from us say today, they would be looking back 22 million years to the early Miocene epoch on earth. The apes that we are descendant from didn't even come around until around 15 my years ago and there would be no evidence by studying the spectrograph of the light coming from earth that there is any type of technological civilization here. So would they just skip us and move on looking for advance life that was around 22 my? Or would they be patient or get to the point that they perhaps don't care about finding life and have moved off their planet and colonized space around them by this time? Perhaps they have built the first and second Foundation by now? Bottom line Joe, a fine entry that day. BTW, for fun, we are getting a close shave today by an asteroid that is about 2-3 m in size. 2011 CQ1 will pass us by just under 12,000 KM or 7500 miles. It was discovered yesterday by R. A. Kowalski few hours ago in the course of the "Catalina Sky Survey" <http://www.lpl.arizona.edu/css/> with a 0.68-m Schmidt + CCD. The object was moving at roughly 6 "/min and it was of magnitude ~19. According to its absolute magnitude H=32 this is a very small object, in the order of 2-3 meters. Here's the info on it at this blog site: http://remanzacco.blogspot.com/2011/02/2011-cq1-very-close-approach.html On Fri, Feb 4, 2011 at 4:16 PM, Patrick Wiggins <paw@wirelessbeehive.com>wrote:

On 04 Feb 2011, at 11:51, Don J. Colton wrote:

...

Your blog readership is much larger than we may have thought. Get a controversial subject and you find out...

You got that right Don. Maybe next Joe should blog about NASA's policy on guns in space. :)

patrick _______________________________________________ Utah-Astronomy mailing list Utah-Astronomy@mailman.xmission.com http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/utah-astronomy Visit the Photo Gallery: http://www.slas.us/gallery2/main.php Visit the Wiki: http://www.utahastronomy.com

-- Jay Eads

Great child-like minds think alike. Kim -----Original Message----- From: utah-astronomy-bounces@mailman.xmission.com [mailto:utah-astronomy-bounces@mailman.xmission.com] On Behalf Of erikhansen@thebluezone.net Sent: Friday, February 04, 2011 11:12 AM To: Utah Astronomy Subject: Re: [Utah-astronomy] Details and comments about Kepler's discoveries

Who, as a child, has not looked up at the night sky and not pondered the possibility of life around all those stars?

Erik Good one Joe but, my goodness, have you noticed the religious flame war

your blog inspired? Interesting to that so many people with such strong opinions hide behind pseudonyms.

Also I think it says something that our local papers went with wire stories of the event and the only local coverage was your excellent blog. Sigh...

patrick

On 03 Feb 2011, at 03:02, Joe Bauman wrote:

...

Hi, I just had to blog about the exciting Kepler findings. Please take a look and comment, if you will:

http://www.deseretnews.com/blog/47/10011341/Nightly-news-astronomy-Millions- of-Planets.html

...

-- Thanks, Joe

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Erik, I was referring to my comment earlier about my thoughts as a child, but I also acknowledge that I, too am an adult (not elderly - yet) child. I enjoyed reading the comments others made regarding Kepler's findings and Joe's article. I am fascinated by the ignorance that abounds in our society, about both science and religion. You would think that in the day of instant communications and information available literally at one's fingertips this wouldn't be the case. Apparently the availability of education doesn't necessarily equate to an increase in education. Kim -----Original Message----- From: utah-astronomy-bounces@mailman.xmission.com [mailto:utah-astronomy-bounces@mailman.xmission.com] On Behalf Of erikhansen@thebluezone.net Sent: Friday, February 04, 2011 2:27 PM To: Utah Astronomy Subject: Re: [Utah-astronomy] Details and comments about Kepler's discoveries

Hi Kim,

Yes, I am an elderly child. I think there are probably too many children that have not gotten the opportunity to experience astronomy. SLAS has done more to give children this opportunity than any other group I know of, we have had great volunteers through the years. I liked Joe's article, the most interesting comment I saw was that "science has finally caught up with religion". My thought is that science has always supposed life through out the universe, they are simply trying to prove it with Kepler. Erik Great child-like minds think alike.

Kim

-----Original Message----- From: utah-astronomy-bounces@mailman.xmission.com [mailto:utah-astronomy-bounces@mailman.xmission.com] On Behalf Of erikhansen@thebluezone.net Sent: Friday, February 04, 2011 11:12 AM To: Utah Astronomy Subject: Re: [Utah-astronomy] Details and comments about Kepler's discoveries

...

Who, as a child, has not looked up at the night sky and not pondered the possibility of life around all those stars?

Erik

Good one Joe but, my goodness, have you noticed the religious flame war

...

your blog inspired? Interesting to that so many people with such strong opinions hide behind pseudonyms.

Also I think it says something that our local papers went with wire stories of the event and the only local coverage was your excellent blog. Sigh...

patrick

On 03 Feb 2011, at 03:02, Joe Bauman wrote:

...

Hi, I just had to blog about the exciting Kepler findings. Please take a look and comment, if you will:

http://www.deseretnews.com/blog/47/10011341/Nightly-news-astronomy-Millions-

of-Planets.html

...

...

-- Thanks, Joe

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----- No virus found in this message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.com Version: 10.0.1204 / Virus Database: 1435/3422 - Release Date: 02/04/11

_______________________________________________ Utah-Astronomy mailing list Utah-Astronomy@mailman.xmission.com http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/utah-astronomy Visit the Photo Gallery: http://www.slas.us/gallery2/main.php Visit the Wiki: http://www.utahastronomy.com

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Every time I look at a galaxy through a telescope, I wonder, "what is out there looking back at me, asking the same question I am asking?". Rodger Fry -----Original Message----- From: utah-astronomy-bounces@mailman.xmission.com [mailto:utah-astronomy-bounces@mailman.xmission.com] On Behalf Of erikhansen@thebluezone.net Sent: Friday, February 04, 2011 11:12 AM To: Utah Astronomy Subject: Re: [Utah-astronomy] Details and comments about Kepler's discoveries

Who, as a child, has not looked up at the night sky and not pondered the possibility of life around all those stars?

Erik Good one Joe but, my goodness, have you noticed the religious flame war

your blog inspired? Interesting to that so many people with such strong opinions hide behind pseudonyms.

Also I think it says something that our local papers went with wire stories of the event and the only local coverage was your excellent blog. Sigh...

patrick

On 03 Feb 2011, at 03:02, Joe Bauman wrote:

...

Hi, I just had to blog about the exciting Kepler findings. Please take a look and comment, if you will:

http://www.deseretnews.com/blog/47/10011341/Nightly-news-astronomy-Millions- of-Planets.html

...

-- Thanks, Joe

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_______________________________________________ Utah-Astronomy mailing list Utah-Astronomy@mailman.xmission.com http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/utah-astronomy Visit the Photo Gallery: http://www.slas.us/gallery2/main.php Visit the Wiki: http://www.utahastronomy.com