What We Know About Space

By: Johnny Lira

Introduction

• Space invites us • Space intrigues us • Space – the vast space that

surrounds our planet inspires us

The Final Frontier

• Describing space as “the final frontier”, the starship Enterprise from Star Trek invites us, “To boldly go where no man has gone before”.

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The Final Frontier

In recent times, mankind has learned a lot about this vast universe that we inhabit, and yet despite our best advances, space still remains a mystery full of untold stories.

Earliest Studies•The earliest peoples

studied the sky and the patterns of the stars. They studied the effects of the planets on our own planet.

•Through observation, they began to understand the connections between the sun, the moon, and the stars in our sky.

•They began to create theories on how everything was connected.

•The vastness of the sky, of space, intrigued them.

• In the earliest times, they tried to explain what they were seeing through their mythology.

Astronomy

•Scientists studied the effects of the planets on our own planet.

•They began to create theories on how everything was connected.

Definition

• ASTRO› relating to space, the planets, stars, or other objects in space, or to a structure in the shape of a star

•Most early societies became interested in different types of astrology, a belief that the positions of the heavenly bodies have an effect on the lives of human beings and events on Earth.

•At this time, astronomy and astrology were the same.

Theories

The earliest theories were contained in myths which have come down to us from cultures such as the ancient Greeks or the Native Americans

During the Greek times people worshiped gods and named planets after them

Neptune was named after the Greek God Poseidon who was known as the god of the sea

• The planet Venus was named after the Greek Goddess Aphrodite who was the God of Love and

beauty.

Every planet was named by the Romans.

Early societies

Most early societies became interested in different types of astrology, the belief that the positions of the heavenly bodies have an effect on the lives of human beings and events on Earth.

Is Earth the Only Planet Where Life Exists?

• Since the Egyptian times people have been speculating about life on other planets.

• Crop circles are said to be a sign of aliens trying to communicate with humans.

• It was speculated that aliens helped build the pyramids of Egypt.

Facts•There are many interesting phenomena in the

world that suggest that aliens do exist.

•Very recently astronomers have discovered a planet very similar to our own earth. Perhaps, there is life on this planet.

People studied the motions of the planets and used them to predict not only the behavior of the heavens, but also wars, natural disasters, the rise and fall of kings, and other earthly matters.

For hundreds of years, mankind believed that the earth was the center of the Universe

Astronomers

Around the time of Johannes Kepler, Galileo Galilei and Isaac Newton, astronomers came to realize that astrology was not very scientific. From that time on, the primary job of an astronomer was to use physics to understand what was going on in the sky.

Copernicus

• The notion that the Earth revolves around the Sun had been proposed as early as the 3rd century BC by Aristarchus of Samos but few people paid any attention until Copernicus revived and elaborated it.

• He proposed the theory of Heliocentrism, in which the Earth and planets revolve around a Sun at the center of the Solar System.

Heliocentrism

• The word comes from the Greek (Helios means "sun" and "center").

•In the following century, Johannes Kepler elaborated

upon and expanded this model to include elliptical

orbits, and supporting observations made using

a telescope were presented by Galileo Galilei.

Sun•The sun provides light and heat to our planet

•The sun is over five billion years old and is said now that it has already gone through half of its ten billion life cycles, which means that it has already gave away half of its helium and power since the sun was born.

Moon•The moon is a big reason why Earth is how it is now.

•Without the moon Earth would be practically considered an alien planet because before we had the moon, Earth was a big ball of lava and spun very fast and didn’t even have a core yet.

•The moon was formed by an asteroid the size of Mars that impacted into Earth which caused pieces of Earth flying and floated around the outside of Earth.

After the moon was formed it blocked off a lot of the sun’s heat which caused the rains on Earth to cool down our planet down a lot and become one giant solid planet. The Moon also made Earth’s days go from six hours to twenty four hours.

•Part of the Asteroid created Earth’s core.

•Some of the floating pieces got caught on to Earth’s atmosphere and starting merging into each other and then started orbiting around Earth - that’s how our Moon was created and born.

Mars•Supposedly Mars used to be a planet that could support life because scientists have found that there used to be water and oxygen on that planet. •Mars is now a deserted planet and cannot support life right now. •Mars is the second smallest planet in our solar system after Mercury.

• Astronauts explore Mars more than any of the other planets in our solar system because it is the only planet that we can actually stand on, but not breathe.

• People have been exploring Mars for a long time now.

THE FIRST TELESCOPE

In 1609 the Italian astronomer, Galileo, became the first person to point a telescope skyward.

LED TO MORE AND MORE POWERFUL TEELESCOPES

• Twentieth century astronomers developed bigger and bigger telescopes and, later, specialized instruments that could peer into the distant reaches of space and time.

• The new Hubble space telescopes can see and observe more things in space Scientist have been studying space using these giant telescopes for over a hundred years.

Rovers

•The First Rover, named Lunokhod, was sent onto the Moon on November 1970 and was the first rover ever to be sent into space.

•The mission that Lunokhod was involved with was called the Luna 17 Moon Voyage.

•It was known as the Apollo Lunar Roving Vehicle.

•It was sent into space for about thirty years and brought back a lot of materials and rocks from the moon which made scientist learn a lot more about the moon.

Buzz Aldrin

•Buzz Aldrin, born on January 20, 1930, was Neil Armstrong’s partner and pilot during the Apollo 11 voyage to the moon. •He was known to be the first person to land a rocket on the moon, but Neil was the first person to actually step on the moon.

The day and date of when Aldrin first stepped on the moon was after Neil on July 21, 1969. Aldrin was also the second person to walk on the moon. Like Neil, Aldrin was also an astronaut who served in the military before he became a famous astronaut.

Conclusion

•Neil Armstrong, the American astronaut who became the first person to walk on the moon famously said,

“That's one small step for a man, a giant leap for mankind”.

In the past hundred years, through the use of vast telescopes, and through the expansion of scientific research under Einstein and other scientists, we have come to understand more and more about our vast universe. And yet despite all our new knowledge, there is so much that we cannot fathom, so much we do not know yet about space.