Northern Sydney Astronomical Society

The NSAS General Meeting for March will be on Tuesday the 19th March at 7:30 PM at Regis Hall, Regis Campus, St Ignatius College, Lane Cove.

Our speaker this month is our own Kym Haines, who will be speaking on astrophotography. Details below.
Title: An introduction to astrophotography with a DSLR
Description: While it is easy to spend a lot of money on astrophotography, good results can be achieved with just a DSLR (digital SLR camera) on a tripod; and more can be done by combining a DSLR with an existing telescope.

We will keep the new meeting format. Just a short meeting starting at 7:30 to discuss NSAS matters, then straight into our guest speaker’s presentation. This will be followed by tea and coffee where you can socialise (and talk astronomy) with our guest speaker and other members.

As usual, visitors are most welcome!

Cheers
David Wallace

The NSAS General Meeting for February will be on Tuesday the 19th February at 7:30 PM at Regis Hall, Regis Campus, St Ignatius College, Lane Cove.

Our speaker this month is Dr David Farrant. He is a Principal Research Scientist at CSIRO, leading the Optical Systems team. His work encompasses the development of optical measurement systems for industry and science. His team was awarded the SPIE Technology Achievement award in recognition of advancements in the field of optics.

We will keep the new meeting format. Just a short meeting starting at 7:30 to discuss NSAS matters, then straight into our guest speaker’s presentation. This will be followed by tea and coffee where you can socialise (and talk astronomy) with our guest speaker and other members.

As usual, visitors are most welcome!

Cheers
David Wallace

Abstract
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The year 2015 marked a major milestone in physics, with the discovery of gravitational waves, 100 years after the prediction by Einstein’s general relativity. This achievement was recognised shortly thereafter with the 2017 Nobel Prize. CSIRO has played a major part in the development of the LIGO gravitational wave detectors for over 20 years. This talk presents CSIRO’s contributions to LIGO as well as other recent work in the field of space and optical astronomy.

The NSAS General Meeting for July will be on Tuesday the 17th July at 7:30 PM at Regis Hall, Regis Campus, St Ignatius College, Lane Cove.

Our speaker this month is Tibor Molnar. He is an Honorary Associate of the Department of Philosophy, University of Sydney. Tibor teaches Philosophy and Science at the university’s Centre for Continuing Education and the WEA. Tibor’s enthusiasm for Science in all its forms is well reflected in his presentation style. See the abstract below.

We will keep the new meeting format. Just a short meeting starting at 7:30 to discuss NSAS matters, then straight into our guest speaker’s presentation. This will be followed by tea and coffee where you can socialise (and talk astronomy/philosophy) with our guest speaker and other members.

As usual, visitors are most welcome!

Cheers
David Wallace

P.S. Just a reminder that this Saturday (7th June, i.e. tonight) is a member and visitor viewing night. There will be a member only viewing night next Saturday (14th July). The next solar observing will be on Sunday 19th August.

Abstract
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With ever-more-powerful instruments, we peer further and further into the unknown. And much of what we find is “unknown”: novel, unexpected, surprising. Indeed, this is what makes Science interesting and exciting – especially astronomy and cosmology. It is also what makes Science difficult. While technologically challenging, observation is the easy part. Description is even easier: a blue dot here; a red flash there; a vibration here; a difference there; etc. The hard part is the interpretation of what we see – the ‘making sense’ of patterns, correlations and invariances in our empirical data.

And not only is ‘making sense’ hard; it is, strictly speaking, not even scientific – observations/experiments don’t come with instructions for how to make sense of them. Rather, to the chagrin of many scientists, ‘making sense’ is a metaphysical issue… and metaphysics is something that scientists eschew with a passion!

In the absence of metaphysics, their preferred tool-of-choice is mathematics – the so-called “language of Science”. Produce the correct mathematical formulation, scientists say, and all is explained! Well, not so. Mathematics is powerful, but it is inadequate/unsuitable for the task of ‘making sense’. Mathematics can describe patterns and correlations, but it cannot make sense of them. Mathematics can describe relations between observations, but it cannot determine what those observations are of.

We all expect – nay, even demand – that Science ‘make sense’. In this presentation, Tibor Molnar explores this problem of ‘making sense’, and offers a little “Analytic Philosophy” to help achieve it.

The NSAS General Meeting for June will be on Tuesday the 19th June at 7:30 PM at Regis Hall, Regis Campus, St Ignatius College, Lane Cove.

Our speaker this month is Kirsten Banks, an undergraduate Astrophysics student at UNSW, and a proud Wiradjuri woman. Join Kirsten on a journey through the night sky from the perspective of an Indigenous Astronomer. Hear star stories and delve into the astronomical knowledge of Aboriginal Australians in a fun and engaging talk led by the wonderful Kirsten Banks.

We will keep the new meeting format. Just a short meeting starting at 7:30 to discuss NSAS matters, then straight into our guest speaker’s presentation. This will be followed by tea and coffee where you can socialise (and talk astronomy) with other members.

As usual, guests are most welcome!

Cheers
David Wallace

P.S. Just a reminder that this Saturday (16th June) is a members only viewing night. The next visitor night will be Saturday 7th July. Solar observing will be on Sunday 1st July.

The NSAS General Meeting for March will be on Tuesday the 20th March at 7:30 PM at Regis Hall, Regis Campus, St Ignatius College, Lane Cove.

Our guest speaker is Prof Orsola de Marco from Macquarie Uni Astrophysics. Abstract follows.

As usual, guests are most welcome!

Cheers
David Wallace

The common envelope binary interaction, a “grand challenge” problem.

When a star grows to giant size it can engulf a nearby companion orbiting it. This interaction leads to the shrinking of the orbital separation and the creation of either a compact binary or a merged star. Since the 70s we have hypothesised these interactions to give rise to compact binaries such as cataclysmic variables of X-ray binaries and to binaries that later on merge, giving rise to supernovae Ia and gravitational wave emission. Today, thanks to the advent of time-resolved astronomy on large scales, we have observed several common envelope interactions (which are fast, happening on day-month timescales) and we are therefore in a position to test our models. Here I will present the latest modelling efforts, the challenges and the benefits. I will also present a special class of common envelope interactions, happening between a star and its planetary system.