Do you see what I see!

The Orion Nebula as only Hubble can see it - the image is another reality in itself.

“The day you teach the child the name of the bird, the child will never see that bird again.” J. Krishnamurti

One of the major objectives at Driftway Observatory is allowing people to discover the universe for themselves and to that end I keep experimenting with the process.

I avoid the typical lecture/demonstration routine – that is, pointing the telescope at something and telling visitors what they are looking at. Instead, the challenge for me is to let them become rapt in awe through observing – I hope – and to ask them questions that help them to see.

Seeing is not easy, as any good artist who knows how to draw from the right brain is aware. In fact, one of my guests the other night brought out just that analogy as I explained the exercise she was about to do. “Oh, this is like learning to draw from the right brain,” she exclaimed. Yep! It is just like that and, of course, I learned to draw about 12 years ago with Betty Edwards’ wonderful book, “Drawing on the Right Brain.”

The point is actually quite deep and wrapped up in Buddhist philosophy as well – but it really comes home when you approach a task like drawing and begin to understand that if you know how to see, then drawing is ridiculously simple. The challenge isn’t putting your pencil to the paper and moving your hand correctly – the challenge is being able to see and establishing a direct route from eye to hand without your left brain, with all its fragmented concepts, getting in the way.

From the Buddhist perspective, it is the idea of “concepts” that is the problem. Our concepts prevent us from experiencing reality. This is not to say that concepts are not wonderful, nor extremely useful. They are. Communications could not exist without them, nor could science. But like so many things, they are a two-edged sword, and until you appreciate this, you can’t over-ride them and begin to really see.

A concept is simple. Star is a concept. So is American, or Christian, or hamburger. These are simply words that have meanings for us. Sometimes they’re easy to define, sometimes difficult, but if we know what they mean, they form our concept of something. The problem with concepts is they are not reality. There are two major differences.

• Concepts are fragments. Reality is whole.
• Concepts are static. Reality flows.

The fragments idea is captured neatly by surrealist artist Rene Magritte with his famous “This is not a pipe” painting.

No, it’s not a pipe – no more than the image at the top of this entry is the Orion Nebula. In a sense what Magritte has created is a fragment of a pipe. It shows you in two dimensions – with great realism – what a pipe looks like. That’s a fragment of reality. So is the word “pipe.” It is simply a seeries of sounds that, by general agreement, evokes in the English-speaking world the reality of a pipe. Or to put another way, the concept “pipe.”

Concepts are also frozen. Not only do they not allow for individual differences, but they don’t allow for change. Reality is a dance. The motion never stops and the change never stops. As the saying goes, you cannot step into the same river twice – both the river and you are always different.

This idea of concepts seems so obvious when we look at it that way, but it is incredibly easy to forget, which is what J. Krishnamurti was getting at when he said: “The day you teach the child the name of the bird, the child will never see that bird again.”

Please don’t get me wrong. I would never miss the opportunity to help one of my grandchildren identify birds that are at the feeder. Language is a great tool. Absolutely invaluable. But we need to also understand the restrictions it puts on us as we slip into a very unreal world of concepts that we routinely - subconsciously – apply to the reality that confronts us.

So when I have people who are, for all practical purposes, seeing the night sky for the first time, I try hard not to burden them with concepts at the outset. The concepts will come and they will be tremendously helpful. But I want them to have the opportunity to see things fresh, as they are – to experience reality whole and to think carefully about that experience.

How does that actually translate into practice? Here’s an example from a couple of nights ago. Three adults and a teenager were coming over for their third observing session. By now they knew the basics of how to point and focus a telescope. I set up the 6-inch SkyWatcher and pointed it in the general direction of M42, the Great Orion Nebula. But I didn’t tell my visitors that was what they were looking at. I simply made sure they could identify Orion and told them to point the telescope near the middle of the giant's sword. That was “Station 1” as described below.

Each visitor got a clipboard and a pencil – there was a red light at each station to preserve night vision, yet allow them to take notes. For the next 30 minutes I just walked from station-to-station making sure there were no technical problems and doing a little coaching if needed. On the clipboard was the following:

Do you see what I see?

Tonight we have four “stations” and at each one you will focus on a different object and answer questions about what you see. When everyone has seen all four, we’ll compare notes.

Station 1 – 6-inch refractor

1. Find and keep it pointed at Orion’s sword.

Questions:

What is the size of this object relative to your field of view? That is, estimate how much of the field of view it occupies – all? half? 10%???? __________________

Do you detect any color? ______________________________

What is the texture of this object? Smooth, granular, billowy? __________________

Is the object of uniform brightness? If it varies, describe:

Would you say this object is transparent? translucent? or opaque? (circle one)

Other notes:_______________________________________________________

Station 2 – 10X50 binoculars

Point your binoculars at Pollux, the easternmost - lower - of the Gemini twins. Put Pollux near the left hand edge of your field of view – at about 9 o’clock, Now count the number of stars you see. Put number here: _________________

Point your binoculars at Aldebaran – the star that is the eye of Taurus the Bull. Put it near the left-hand edge of your field of view – at about 9 o’clock. Now count the number of stars you see. Put number here: _________________

Station 3 – 8-inch LX-90, Observatory

How many stars do you see in the cascade? (Area between two bright stars.)

Station 4 – 15-inch Obsession, Observing Deck

What is the size of this object relative to your field of view? That is, estimate how much of the field of view it occupies – all? half? 10%???? __________________

Do you detect any color? ______________________________

What is the texture of this object? Smooth, granular, billowy? __________________

Is the object of uniform brightness? If it varies, describe:

Would you say this object is transparent? translucent? or opaque? (circle one)

Other notes:_______________________________________________________

That was it? Did my approach work? Yes. Maybe. No. Maybe. Probably part way. I’m learning. One problem: I had too much for them to do. Three or even two items would have been better, especially since it was windy and in the low 20s - just too cold. But the response was good. And I am convinced they saw these objects with fresh eyes and probably saw some details in them that I miss. However, under the conditions, we didn’t have time to study their notes.

But I am convinced I am on the right track with this approach. I just need to gain experience with it and keep refining it. I need to make sure there will be enough time for the observers to compare notes, for example.

As it was, what really happened is I supplied the basic concepts after they had observed all four objects and we did a little reviewing of the objects seen, this time using the 15-inch for everything. Conceptually, the experience was simple. By looking at M42, they were seeing the birth place of stars. By looking at M1 they were seeing the remnants of a dying star. And by studying the two clusters – M35 and the Hyades, they were getting some perspective on how stars, after being born in an environment like the Orion Nebula, tend to hang out together for a few hundred million years or so, attracted by the pull of mutual gravity.

Again – because I think concepts really are important – and because I have very little confidence in the staying power of the spoken word, I followed up the observing session with an email the next day. This, too, is what I routinely do. Here’s what that email said:

Good morning:

Great fun last night – though a bit chilly. Sorry we didn’t have time to discuss the notes you took. If you want to share anything, please do so by responding to this email.

Meanwhile, here’s a quick report on what you saw:

Through the 6-inch – Station 1:

M42,M43 – these two objects were seen in a single field of view and together are usually called the Great Orion Nebula. Stars are mostly hydrogen and helium and that’s what you are looking at here. If a star is a second generation – as the ones being born here are – then also in the dust and gas will be some heavy elements, like carbon, the same thing you and I are made of. The 4 stars you all noticed near the center are called the Trapezium. The brightest of those stars is the most powerful, and these stars have blown a hole in the surrounding gases, which is why the stars are so easily visible. Also, the energy from the new-born stars is causing the gases to glow, else we would not see the nebula at all. It’s about 1,500 light years from us.

Through the binoculars – Station 2:

This is the Hyades (the “V” of the head of Taurus the Bull) , an open cluster that is viewed as a sort of Rosetta Stone for understanding our galaxy. The reason it is regarded so highly is we know the distance to these stars very well since they are close enough to measure accurately. It is about 151 light years. There are about 200 stars in this group. This is very similar to the Pleiades cluster, which is better known and very pretty – but that’s because it is small enough (from our vantage point) to look especially nice in binoculars or a small telescope. But the Pleiades are about 400 light years away and that’s past the point where we can get super-accurate measurements. We believe the stars in the Hyades are just 625 million years old. We know they were all formed about the same time, from the same ingredients – a gas and dust cloud much like you saw in Orion. Knowing this makes them especially interesting to study and helps us understand all other stars. Right now the Hyades stars are all hanging out together, held by the tug of their mutual gravity – but they will, over time, drift apart. (Our sun is 5 billion years old, so you can see why these are regarded as young stars.)

In the Observatory, Station 3:

– From here you looked at M35. There is nothing real special about this cluster – I just think it’s pretty. However, if you think of the Hyades, the Pleiades, and M35 all being roughly the same size – but looking quite different – then you begin to appreciate the distances involved. You can see lots of individual Hyades stars with your naked eye and they’re spread out quite a bit – and 151 light years from us. While sharp-eyed folks can see six Pleiades (about 400 light years away) with their naked eye –some even more – you really need binoculars to see 25-50 and they are a much smaller bunch.

If you know exactly where to look, you can find M35 in binoculars, but you really need a telescope to see it well. It’s about 1,500 light years away. So together these three clusters begin to give you some intuitive feel for astronomical distances. As for counting the stars in the “cascade,” that’s just a good way to get yourself to focus on the details of the cluster which becomes more interesting as you notice the number of faint stars and the color some stars display. Had we had the time you would have found it interesting to look at this same cluster in the 15-inch and count the stars visible with that telescope in the same cascade. This would have demonstrated the extra light grasp of the 15-inch.

The first object you looked at in the 15-inch – station 4 - was not overwhelming, I’m sure. In fact, I imagine you weren’t even sure exactly what you were supposed to see. It is just a faint puff. But that faint puff is the dying gasp of a star that exploded – a supernova – and was recorded among others by the Chinese in 1054. This is known as M1 , or the Crab Nebula, and is about 6,500 light years away – so yes, Ed, the star did not really explode in 1054 – you are right, it exploded many years before then – well, about 6,500 years before then. But that’s not a long time, or very far, as astronomical distances go. This cloud of gas is expanding at a measurable rate and at its center – invisible to our small telescopes, is a neutron star – the collapsed remains of the original star.

So what you got tonight was a little tour through the life cycle of a star – you saw stars being born; you saw star nurseries (the open clusters); and you saw a star in its death throes.

Generally things don’t change fast enough in astronomy for astronomers to watch them change. So what we know is derived by, in effect, living with a snapshot – a moment in time – and trying to figure out how all the things we see represent different stages of star evolution. Sort of like taking a picture of a forest and from that one picture understanding everything about seeds, soil, small trees, large ones, young ones and old ones without anyone telling you which is which and no way to see them change.

Oh – and yes, you did get a peak at Saturn through the 15-inch. Cool, huh? It’s always mind blowing because, among other things, it looks so 3-dimensional. But it’s especially beautiful this year and over the coming months will be higher and higher in the sky at an earlier hour making it easier to view well. It also happens to be right next to another open cluster of stars, M44 or the Beehive, which adds a special touch to seeing it this year.

If you have binoculars you can revisit many of these things – try finding the Orion Nebula, Hyades and Pleiades – you can see them all with ordinary binoculars. Oh – and don’t forget the “pointer stars” in the Big Dipper – those are the best way to be sure you are looking at the North Star.

Clear skies!

So that’s it – a glimpse at what I’m trying to do. As always, suggestions and comments are welcome. Please email to gstone@umassd.edu