Neat stuff! It's not often we get to see truly cosmic-scale events like this that are(relatively speaking) nearby and real-time.

GleeUnit: HopScotchNSoda: FTFA: The cloud, which is described in Nature, should meet its end in 2013.

Ah, in short, no, my ill-informed author. That already happened a long, long time ago. We'll just get to see it in 2013.

They didn't say in the article, but how many LY away is this?

FTA:
Our local supermassive black hole, dubbed Sagittarius A*, lies about 27,000 light-years away, and has a mass about four million times that of our Sun.

reading comprehension is your friend.

SithLord: GleeUnit: HopScotchNSoda: FTFA: The cloud, which is described in Nature, should meet its end in 2013.

Ah, in short, no, my ill-informed author. That already happened a long, long time ago. We'll just get to see it in 2013.

They didn't say in the article, but how many LY away is this?

FTA:
Our local supermassive black hole, dubbed Sagittarius A*, lies about 27,000 light-years away, and has a mass about four million times that of our Sun.

reading comprehension is your friend.

To be fair he is a TFer... oh shiat

HopScotchNSoda:

FTFA: The cloud, which is described in Nature, should meet its end in 2013.

Ah, in short, no, my ill-informed author. That already happened a long, long time ago. We'll just get to see it in 2013.

Which would be a big deal if you were 27,000 light years closer to it than you are... But so far as we're concerned, it "should meet it's end in 2013."

There are a lot of things to rag on science writers for, but I'm willing to give that one a pass. I'm pretty sure Einstein and Minkowski would as well.

Pixels embiggened:

maxheck: Neat stuff! It's not often we get to see truly cosmic-scale events like this that are(relatively speaking) nearby and real-time.

Closer to home, you can watch a sun-grazing comet meet its fiery doom (new window).

Came for the Galaxy Quest reference.

HopScotchNSoda: FTFA: The cloud, which is described in Nature, should meet its end in 2013.

That already happened a long, long time ago.

In a galaxy nearby.

That must where P3W-451 is. Better lock it out of the dialing computer now.

CheetahOlivetti: [i979.photobucket.com image 270x363]

"Red-thingy moving toward the green-thingy. I think we're the green-thingy."

UnspokenVoice: There was a neat show on the Science Channel about super-massive black holes tonight, actually. They have come a long way in what they're able to see now. It is impressive.

I watched that one, the one with Stephen Hawking right after too. Now watching Journey to the end of the Universe on NatGeo. I'm going to have some weird ass dreams tonight.

experts are wrong all the time... as far as they know, they think this is what is happening.

We can still save it! I think I saw a comic book once where you fly around the rim of the black hole at TWICE the speed of light while your face goes all flappy and there's this awesome light show, and then you make time go backwards and save everybody and everyone gets goatees afterwards!

f object three times as massive as Earth

ZOMG

Ivo Shandor: maxheck: Neat stuff! It's not often we get to see truly cosmic-scale events like this that are(relatively speaking) nearby and real-time.

Closer to home, you can watch a sun-grazing comet meet its fiery doom (new window).

very cool. thanks!

HopScotchNSoda: Ah, in short, no, my ill-informed author. That already happened a long, long time ago. We'll just get to see it in 2013.

Events propagate through space-time at the speed of light. To an observer near the event, the event would have happened 27,000 years ago. To an observer near Earth, it won't happen until next year. The reporter is correct.

maxheck: I'm pretty sure Einstein and Minkowski would as well.

They wouldn't give the reporter a pass- they'd point out that the reporter is entirely correct. The entire point of relativity is that events take time to propagate, they don't happen until the light from the event reaches you. It's also why FTL is probably impossible, but that's a whole other debate.

SithLord: GleeUnit: HopScotchNSoda: FTFA: The cloud, which is described in Nature, should meet its end in 2013.

Ah, in short, no, my ill-informed author. That already happened a long, long time ago. We'll just get to see it in 2013.

They didn't say in the article, but how many LY away is this?

FTA:
Our local supermassive black hole, dubbed Sagittarius A*, lies about 27,000 light-years away, and has a mass about four million times that of our Sun.

reading comprehension is your friend.

So technically we're going to time travel back to the year 25,000 BC. Heavy!

/like a super massive black hole

Relevant video (new window).

The stuff they can do with ground based telescopes these days is absolutely mind boggling but I can hardly wait to see what the JWST will show us...

Supermassive Black Hole on video? I prefer the original.

JonnyBGoode: CheetahOlivetti: [i979.photobucket.com image 270x363]

"Red-thingy moving toward the green-thingy. I think we're the green-thingy."

First thing I thought of. Galaxy Quest remains one of the most quotable movies ever.

Mike Chewbacca: JonnyBGoode: CheetahOlivetti: [i979.photobucket.com image 270x363]

"Red-thingy moving toward the green-thingy. I think we're the green-thingy."

First thing I thought of. Galaxy Quest remains one of the most quotable movies ever.

The highlight of my old gaming group was finding out who would be the first to work the term "rudimentary lathe" into the conversation. Loves me some GQ.

/This episode was badly written!

TyrantII: SithLord: GleeUnit: HopScotchNSoda: FTFA: The cloud, which is described in Nature, should meet its end in 2013.

Ah, in short, no, my ill-informed author. That already happened a long, long time ago. We'll just get to see it in 2013.

They didn't say in the article, but how many LY away is this?

FTA:
Our local supermassive black hole, dubbed Sagittarius A*, lies about 27,000 light-years away, and has a mass about four million times that of our Sun.

reading comprehension is your friend.

So technically we're going to time travel back to the year 25,000 BC. Heavy!

/like a super massive black hole

Technically we do that every night we observe stars, don't we? The only starlight that isn't some thousand years in the past by the time is reaches us is Solar, Y/N? Not that it's any less heavy.


Also I'd estimate the author's tense is properly selected. Even if this event happened in the past relative to itself, the evidence doesn't exist yet relative to us-- so conjugation in future perfect seems appropriate.

/maybe English needs a new tense unique to space discussion
//Reflexive Relative Past?
///"We'll all be able to see that cloud going to have met its end in 2013"? :|a

th0th: Mike Chewbacca: JonnyBGoode: CheetahOlivetti: [i979.photobucket.com image 270x363]

"Red-thingy moving toward the green-thingy. I think we're the green-thingy."

First thing I thought of. Galaxy Quest remains one of the most quotable movies ever.

The highlight of my old gaming group was finding out who would be the first to work the term "rudimentary lathe" into the conversation. Loves me some GQ.

/This episode was badly written!

Yes, we use that one all the time, too. And also, "Does the rolling help?" anytime the rogue tumbles about the room.

/You dropped your gun.

t3knomanser: They wouldn't give the reporter a pass- they'd point out that the reporter is entirely correct. The entire point of relativity is that events take time to propagate, they don't happen until the light from the event reaches you.

Relativity does not insist that you deny that an event occurred until the signal from it reaches you. An event is distinct from your observation of it. If the Sun exploded right now, we wouldn't know about it for eight minutes, just because the light from the explosion travels at a finite speed. But while we're waiting, the Sun has certainly still exploded.

Anyway, professional astronomers speak as if an event that is observed today on Earth happened today. They say (for example) "this star went supernova yesterday," not "this star went supernova five thousand years before yesterday because it's five thousand light-years away." To do otherwise would be needlessly cumbersome. Everyone gets that light takes time to get from there to here.

exactly three days: The only starlight that isn't some thousand years in the past by the time is reaches us is Solar, Y/N?

Well, no. Within 100 light-years of us, there are thousands of stars, the light from which will be at most a few decades old when it reaches your eyeball. The closest star to the Sun, Proxima Centauri, is a little over 4 light-years away, so that light is only about 4 years old when you see it.

RandomExcess: experts are wrong all the time... as far as they know, they think this is what is happening.

You are wrong all the time. Experts are wrong occasionally.