Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · Jun 19

Of course, this is still better than many humans manage.

Katie Mack @astrokatie.com · Jun 19

Chatbots — LLMs — do not know facts and are not designed to be able to accurately answer factual questions. They are designed to find and mimic patterns of words, probabilistically. When they’re “right” it’s because correct things are often written down, so those patterns are frequent. That’s all.

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · Jun 6

Bad news, good news:

"The asteroid’s probability of impacting the Moon has slightly increased from 3.8% to 4.3%. In the small chance that the asteroid were to impact, it would not alter the Moon’s orbit."

#PlanetSci #K24Y04R #LunarRealEstateValuations

NASA’s Webb Observations Update Asteroid 2024 YR4’s Lunar Impact Odds - NASA Science

While asteroid 2024 YR4 is currently too distant to detect with telescopes from Earth, NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope collected one more observation of the

science.nasa.gov

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · May 29

Those Amazon drones are amazing!

#BlueOrigin #NotSpaceX #Moon #Astronomy (?)

Space Ops: Blue Origin Prepares To Leapfrog SpaceX To The Moon | Aviation Week Network

Blue Origin plans to attempt to land its MK1 on the Moon this year, and if successful, it would become the largest vehicle to touch down on the Moon's surface.

aviationweek.com

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · May 19

The 2025 Catalina Sky Survey Monsoon Workshop will be held in Tucson, August 1-5, as a splinter session of the ADASSx Summer Software Workshop, immediately following the Rubin Community Workshop.

Registration (free) and abstract submission are now open.

#PlanetSci #AstroMethods #PlanetaryDefense

Monsoon Workshop 2025 | Catalina Sky Survey

catalina.lpl.arizona.edu

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · May 14

Happy bee in a prickly pear bloom in the Sonoran desert. Not sure if either species is native.

#Pollinators #Insects #Angiosperms #Arizona

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · May 14

I wanted to call this "Agave and Adobe", but alas, the neighbor's house is stucco. The Century Plant, a rare modern example of truth in advertising, is a member of the Asparagaceae family.

#CenturyPlant #PatienceSometimesPaysOff

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · May 9

Where's Kosmos 482? To put the current NASA shenanigans into perspective, this Venus lander outlasted the country that launched it, and is landing on another planet entirely.

#PlanetSci

COSMOS 482 DESCENT CRAFT (ID 6073) | The Aerospace Corporation

aerospace.org

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · May 8

Yeah, but likely also deep dish pizza. I guess that's what qualifies as "dignified middle of the road" these days.

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · May 8

The future Leo XIV graduated with a BS in mathematics from Villanova, my alma mater, in 1977, the same year I matriculated with a joint major including math and astro/physics. VU math professors were some of the best I've ever had. (I ended up an agnostic with a math minor)

#LeoXIV #Villanova #Math

Philadelphia Inquirer @inquirer.com · May 8

BREAKING: What we know about Robert Prevost, the first U.S. pope and a Villanova graduate.

What we know about Robert Prevost, the first U.S. pope and a Villanova graduate

Prevost, 69, is a Chicago native and a Villanova graduate. He said his chosen papal name would be Pope Leo XIV.

inquirer.com

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · May 2

Been there, done that.

www.imdb.com/title/tt0702...

"The Six Million Dollar Man" Death Probe: Part 1 (TV Episode 1977) ⭐ 8.0 | Action, Crime, Drama

1h | TV-PG

www.imdb.com

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · May 1

Here's a second glimpse at Murderbot from Apple. They appear to be steering the production in a direction that understands the character.

youtu.be/wSCDyYOQgQA?...

Murderbot — An Inside Look | Apple TV+

YouTube video by Apple TV

youtu.be

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · Apr 19

"To stop the flow of music would be like the stopping of time itself, incredible and inconceivable." – Aaron Copland

#peace #love #music

#Heraclitus_and_Parmenides_are_unit_vectors_of_philosophy

Playing For Change | Official Website

Playing For Change entire library of Songs Around The World, Live Outside, PFC Band, Mark's Park videos. Featuring artists like Slash, Carlos Santana, John Paul Jones, Keith Richards, Sara Bareilles, ...

playingforchange.com

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · Apr 16

The production team and a broad swath of projects supported by NASA's Planetary Defense Coordination Office and the international near-Earth asteroid community did a great job with this documentary.

#PlanetSci

Planetary Defenders (NASA+ Original)

YouTube video by NASA

www.youtube.com

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · Apr 16

Starlink and other megaconstellations are photobombing ground-based telescopes. And they are photobombing remote-sensing Earth-imaging satellites in higher orbits.

#astronomy
#space
#downinfront
#privilegeknowsnobounds
#didanybodyfigureoutthisstuffbeforegrantingthemalaunchpermit

Here’s how a satellite ended up as a ghostly apparition on Google Earth

Zoom in over rural North Texas for a spacey surprise.

arstechnica.com

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · Apr 10

Cautiously optimistic. Cast looks great. Hoping it's not a sitcom. No sign on IMDB that we meet ART in the first season. I think I see how they plan to minimize the first-person narrator. I don't think it can work if they create entirely new narratives.

#Pleasedonotmurdermurderbot #SanctuaryMoon

Martha Wells @marthawells.com · Apr 9

And lo, the trailer did drop: www.apple.com/tv-pr/news/2... #murderbot

Apple TV+ debuts trailer for “Murderbot,” premiering May 16

Apple TV+ unveiled the trailer for “Murderbot,” the comedic thriller series starring and executive produced by Emmy Award winner Alexander Skarsgård.

www.apple.com

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · Apr 3

I should have refreshed the feed before posting.

Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · Apr 3

Observations from JWST and Cerro Paranal have narrowed the uncertainties for that pesky asteroid 2024 YR4 to hit the Moon on December 22, 2032. The estimated impact probability is now 3.8%. The risk for the Earth on the same date is now too low to report. Near Earth = Near Moon.

#PlanetSci #MoonSci

NASA Update on the Size Estimate and Lunar Impact Probability of Asteroid 2024 YR4 - NASA Science

Since near-Earth asteroid 2024 YR4 was first discovered in December 2024, NASA and the worldwide planetary defense community have continued to observe the asteroid, which was ruled out as a significan...

science.nasa.gov

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · Mar 31

The Franklin Mint sold America in Space mini-coins in the 1970s. At the time, my father, Lew Seaman, was the Nimbus & Landsat Program Manager at the GE Space Technology Center. Dad managed four out of the 18 robotic missions in Series 2 & 3. All these spacecraft remain in orbit.

#Space #Satellites

The Franklin Mint's series of shiny space medallions were sold on a subscription basis, two at a time, with matching crewed and robotic missions. They also released a series of mini-coins in silver. These are four of the 18 robotic missions.

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · Mar 28

I could wish Bluesky did better with animations.

Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · Mar 28

ESA's NEO Coordination Centre (NEOCC) computes impact probabilities (tmp link: neo.ssa.esa.int/-/latest-news) including animations of the uncertainty shrinking as more observations of 2024 YR4 were reported. Note the difference between missing along-track (Earth) and cross-track (Moon).

#PlanetSci

ESA Planetary Defence Office’s NEO Coordination Centre (NEOCC) has released v5 of its Aegis software. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10569-024-10225-z

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · Mar 26

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

Review of asteroid, meteor, and meteorite‐type links

With the goal to determine the origin of our meteorites in the asteroid belt, video and photographic observations of meteors have now tracked 75 meteorite falls. Six years ago, there were just hints ...

onlinelibrary.wiley.com

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · Mar 25

"We now have the first outlines of a geologic map of the asteroid belt." – Peter Jenniskens

#PlanetSci #Asteroids #Meteorites

Meteorites and asteroids tracked back to their place of origin in the solar system

"This has been a decade-long detective story, with each recorded meteorite fall providing a new clue."

www.space.com

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · Mar 23

Revised a bit for clarity.

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Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · Mar 23

Changing the definition of UTC will certainly require changes to astronomical software, the astronomical almanac, etc.

The could have left UTC alone and simply recommended the use of TAI (and variations) for their own use cases.

Rob Seaman @robseaman.bsky.social · Mar 23

Earth's rotation is being slowed by the tides. Length of the day increases about one second every 50,000 years while the Moon recedes about a mile to carry off its angular momentum. Over human timescales, the Earth's rotation follows a random walk and sometimes speeds up.

#Astronomy #Science #Time

Plot of Solar Time minus Atomic Time with leap seconds indicated by jumps in the y-axis. Tenth-second calibrations are published by the International Earth Rotation Service (IERS). The Earth has recently been spinning up a bit, though the long term trend is tidal slowing causing the day to lengthen a few milliseconds per century.

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