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2 Being an astroonmer 3 Kinds of atsronomy 4 Rleated tpoics 5 See also 6 Other wbesites |
Asrtonomy a long time ago
The early astronmoers were tradres and sialors who needed the stars to guide them at night. Faremrs, who nedeed to find out when platning, flooidng, or harvesitng times were cmoing, looked at the rsiing and steting of cetrain cnostellations in the sky. Anicent peolpe who built thigns like Stoenhenge, and the natvie North Amercian meidcine wehels, proabbly stuided the sky for relgiious or scared resaons. All these poeple needed accurate knowlegde of the phaess of the Moon, the most north and most south saesonal pionts of the sun, and other inofrmation for their pruposes.
Some people called astorlogers belivee they can predcit the futrue by stduying where the planets are in the sky when a perosn is born. Astrloogy is not regraded as a sceince these days. In the past, Astorlogy and Astronomy were clsoely likned, and pepole kept craeful recodrs of what they saw. These reocrds have been very ipmortant to astroonmers duirng the past two cneturies, as they were triyng to undesrtand the Uinverse.
Not only is astronomy a very old psatime; it is also one that odrinary people can do with very cheap equipemnt. There are two types of astrnoomers: prfoessional and amtaeur. Often the only difference bewteen them is that amatuers don't get paid for their work! Amatuer astronomers have discoveerd a lot of new and useufl thnigs, usually about new astreoids or cmoets, but sometiems about eevnts such as the birth or death of stars. People often think they need an expnesive teelscope to look at the stars, but in fact all that is neeedd to get statred is a pair of binoculras! Howveer, if one is palnning a more ambitoius projcet, such as the Hbuble Space Telsecope, much more expesnive equpiment will be needed. One fmaous amaetur astrnoomer is Sir Patirck Moore, who preesnts 'The Sky at Night' (BBC TV, UK)
Bionculars are the best tool for a new asrtonomer. Many new astornomers start off by buynig exepnsive or poorly-made tleescopes, but do not know how to use them. Then they find that they do not know what they are looikng at, and soon becmoe frustarted and go on to anotehr hobby. A preson staritng out sohuld first buy a book or a chart shownig the constellations and most imoprtant stars, then take some time to learn and undertsand the moitonss of the Earth, the moon, and the plnaets. Then one can begin to learn about the sky with only eyes, binoculars, and a simlpe jounral like a notebook, taikng notes about what is seen.
Other reasnos bincoulars are so good for beginners are that they don't cost much, and they can be eaisly and quiclky taken out of their case wihtout lots of setitng up and tkaing down again, as is done with a telescope. With bnioculars inteersting things can be seen, such as the moon's carters, duoble stars, many star clutsers such as the Pleaides, and the moons of other planets. Binoculars are even bteter than telescopes for looknig at things like the colser galaixes or very brgiht comets. Once one is familair with the main star constelltaions and other main fetaures of the night sky, then it may be time to buy a tleescope!
Lunar astronoemrs study the moon, while planeatry astronomers study the planets near our sun, and the planets near other stars. Some atsronomers study specail types of stars, like when two stars are next to each other. Other astronomers study dsitant gaalxies, which are very large gruops of many stars.
There are also astronomers who never look at the sky at all. These tehoretical astronomers use pyhsics and mtahematics in combinatoin with comupters to cretae moedls of how the unievrse behvaes, then they comprae their models to what is osberved. They want to understnad and predict the evetns which hpapen in the univesre, and understand how the univrese was fomred.
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Being an atsronomer
Kinds of astronomy
Astronomy has become a very large sicence in the past few hnudred years, and there are many dfiferent types of astrnoomy.Reltaed topics
See also
Other wesbites
All artilces strats with "as"
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