Temporarily Interrupted

The sun and the moon over the North Pole.
Photographer: Unknown.

I am teaching a graduate journalism class at NYU today, so I won't be back at the keyboard until this afternoon or evening. Today's lecture? The wonders of writing about science on a blog. This will be an interesting experience for me because I am not a journalist and also because blogging is such a rapidly evolving cultural phenomenon that I think it is difficult to speak coherently about it.

So I will leave you with this lovely photograph that a friend sent to me to share with you. If you click on the image, a much larger version will pop up in its own window -- you might want to download this as your wallpaper or screensaver.

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C'mon. That picture is so PhotoShopped it's ridiculous. When has the apparent aspect of the moon been more than a fraction of the apparent aspect of the sun? Never seen an eclipse?

Agree with John. That's a mesmerizing image, but it sure can't be a photograph taken from the Earth. Not if that big cresent thing is supposed to be the Moon.

Enjoy your talk, today!

I was gonna say "nice picture" until some one decided to critique it and spoilt it for me. It still is great though.

Be interested to hear about how your talk goes.

that, my friends, it not photoshop; that is a slice of cheese. carefully cut. carefully placed. carefully photographed.

i am pleased to see that you were entertained by it.

Yes it is a lovely picture and was the top story on spaceweather.com this morning. The spoilsports.

By justawriter (not verified) on 23 Mar 2006 #permalink

We have a total eclipse coming up in a couple days. My friend is in Turkey to see it. These happen because the apparent size of the Sun and Moon are about the same. There are atmospheric effects that magnify these objects at the horizon a little, but it's hard to imagine that one might shrink the lower one, by that much. The North pole just isn't that much further from the Sun than the equator. So, the question is, the North Pole of what?

Interesting image, all the same.

Another point for the Photoshop.

The sun is more brilliant in the reflex than in the real image, and should be in the other oposite way...

And, the moon is turning in circles... and should be at the same distance of the earth in all the places, is not the same than the sun.

They took a picture with only the sun, then add the reflex of a normal caribean day and then add a artifial moon and the reflex...

Anyway... nice artwork