Camping with the grandkids...

Grandad!!  Look at all the stars!...and there's the Milky Way! 

Where’s the Southern Cross, Grandad?

See those bright stars above us – they point to the Cross, and see…the bottom of the Cross points to South. Like our blog 'Down-under 'n' lost' says, we can use it to find direction and even tell roughly what time it is – if clouds aren’t in the way. 

Really?? That’s clever!  So why are there stars in the sky?

The Bible tells us that they are there for 'signs and seasons'.

I can't see any signs up there - just dots.

When God first made the Earth He put what was called 'a firmament' up there - sort of a shell around the Earth to protect us. It was possibly made of compressed hydrogen which would have made the stars glow like your computer screen does.

Wow! What happened to the shell?

It broke! Apparently there was no rain, just mist, for the first 1656 years until Noah and his family were safely in the ark with all those animals. Then God broke up the ‘fountains of the great deep’ and opened the ‘windows of heaven’ because He’d had enough of Man’s wickedness.

So how many stars are there anyway?

Only God knows how many there are because He has counted them and named them all but astronomers tell us there are more stars than grains of sand on Earth.

Wow! God must have the biggest computer ever! 

Tragedy in Tuncurry, NSW

So did they all get scattered up there by the Big Bang?

Big Bang??  Did you hear about the house exploding in Tuncurry the other day?...all it left was a big mess - it didn't create life, it killed the owner.  

The Bible tells us that the Big Bang comes at the end of the universe.

So how did the stars get up there then?

God made them all on the 4^th day about 6000 years ago, putting them all in their place.

But stars are so far away, their light takes a lot longer than 6000 years to get here. Even sunlight takes over 8 minutes to get here.

We forget that God tells us about 10 times in the Bible how He did it – by stretching out the heavens like a tent, just like we erected our tent just now.

That’s just fantastic! I can’t get my head around that.  So how are we supposed to read the star signs?...Is that what the star page in the newspaper is for?

No way! Those notions are based on someone’s imagination and the signs are out by about a month anyway.                                                              

Now then, do you realize we are doing exactly what David in the Bible did when he was looking after his dad’s sheep?...admiring God’s handiwork in the stars.

How do you know that?

He tells us all about it in Psalm 19 – even telling us there’s a line up there around the whole Earth - with words!

Aw Grandad!...there’s no line up there with words on it!

Well the apostle Paul said that the words up there were the gospel about the Lord Jesus and that ‘their sound went into all the earth’ – ‘their words to the ends of the world’.

But isn’t that talking about missionaries taking the Good News about Jesus to all the countries of the world?

When Paul wrote that to the people in Rome there was no global travel in airliners, or internet, or satellite television – not even telephones. Paul hadn’t even been to Rome himself.  

Tell me…how could you possibly send a message all over the world to people who spoke different languages, without modern technology?

Sometimes people send messages in bottles in the ocean but that would be a bit slow.  I suppose the only way would be by using signwriting in the sky.

Just like God said!...signs in the firmament.                                                           

How about we talk some more in the morning.

NEXT:   'Brekkie 'round the campfire...'
 

http://discoveryiopna.blogspot.com.au/2013/07/brekkie-round-campfire.html

 

Image credits:                                                                               

stargazing/site.escapadedirect.com                                                                          

Tuncurry/Facebook.com                                                                                     

David/sonshineofmylife.com

Bears, bibles, dippers & dragon

IOPNA looks to the north of Cancer, the 11th constellation of the ‘Mazzaroth’ (Zodiac):

 Aha!!...so the Great Bear mentioned in the Bible keeps Cancer company. There’s the Lesser Bear too, with Polaris on his tail.

Maybe…maybe not. 


Align top to west

What do you mean - may be not? Didn’t you say that “Arcturus with his sons” in Job 9 and 38 is generally accepted to be the Great Bear with its cubs?  That’s what all the translations and concordances say.

The King James Bible doesn’t say that - it just leaves it as Arcturus meaning ‘keeper of the bear’ - but the original Hebrew name was ash meaning ‘group’.                    

Huh??...there’s something wrong there.                                                                  

Where are the cubs anyway?...I can only see one…and have you ever seen bears with long tails like that?

Well no, I suppose not. You don’t think this is all based on mythology do you?

Well the story goes they‘ve got long tails because that’s how Zeus threw them up there!

Aw, sure!

So let’s take a close look at this name ‘Arcturus’.  The Greeks have apparently invented this, with arktikos in Greek meaning ‘bear’, hence arcticus in Latin from which we have ‘arctic’ in English. We have assumed the Bible’s Hebrew couldn’t mean the brilliant star in Bootes because the original name meant ‘group’ so it must refer to a constellation, obviously the Great Bear, while overlooking the mythology or any flaw.   However…..                                                                         
If we could take a bird’s eye view from the North Pole, of the 30 brightest stars in the heavens only 9 are north of the ecliptic line …and guess which is the brightest of those?                                                           
Not Arcturus in Bootes?  Is that the brightest star north of the ecliptic?

It sure is – Arcturus is the brightest of ‘the group’!...followed closely by Vega and Capella, then Altair, Pollux and 4 more. It was the first star ever seen in the daytime – in 1635.

Really? So Job highlights the starry southern sky as “the chambers of the south” then God reminds him of the northern constellations with: “Arcturus (Ash) with his sons”! That in itself was worth discovering!

God is thinking bigger than us….

…as usual!  Seeing mythology seems to have messed up the Redemption story at this point, can we briefly check what there is to see here?

In Ursa Major (Great Bear): the stars Alkaid, Mizar, Alioth, Megrez, Phad, Merak and Dubhe form the Big Dipper or Plough.  Mizar (2^nd last on the tail) is a quadruple star and has a twin, Alcor, which itself is a binary star….

…and together they make for the famous eyesight test known as ‘the horse & rider’ - once used by the Roman army!  

Now extend a line from Merak thru Dubhe on the bear’s flank leading direct to Stella Polaris marking the North Celestial Pole.                                          

Yes but apparently that’s only been the case since 1900 BC; precession of the Earth’s rotation shifted it from being marked by Thuben in Draco the dragon.
Interesting hey!?                                                                       

Polaris, Kocab, Pherkad and 2 other stars form the Little Dipper in Ursa Minor (Lesser Bear). At least that’s what they tell me – we might have a brilliant starry sky ‘downunder’ but we can’t see the Little Dipper.                                                                    

I know this hasn’t done much for our search for the Redemption story but it sure is remarkable.
Did you say 1900 BC?...wasn’t that Abraham’s era?

That was about when he went to sacrifice Isaac on Mount Moriah, where Jesus was finally crucified: “God will provide Himself a lamb”.

Whoa!!  God started to move with His plan of Redemption and so did Earth’s axis!  
So we didn’t draw a complete blank after all.                                                                       

Is there any other constellation associated with Cancer?

NEXT: Welcome aboard the ‘Argo’ - and don’t miss the comment below

 The series: Constellations of the 'Mazzaroth' can be found on hotspuds.blogspot.com.au

 

Acknowledgements:   
Stellarium 
Wallace K, Dawes G, Northfield P, Astronomy Australia 2013, Quasar Publishing 
Photo credit: Egnorance.blogspot.com.au                                                                                                                                  

A froggy went walking...

Here’s one of the tadpoles some of my students proudly introduced me to in their classroom. 

“What sort of frog will he grow into?”  

“We don’t know, Mr. K. but it’s called metamorphosis.”  

(Help! Is this how you spell it, kids?)                                                                                              

                        

Never mind. I promised to include frogs in our Discovery Safari anyway…but where should we start? Which one of the 5,550 species of frog should we feature?

Apparently all frogs are cold-blooded, tail-less, carnivorous, breathing with lungs (and through their skin as well!) with 4 long legs, bulging eyes, sticky tongue, 3-chambered heart, inner eyelid (nictitating membrane) and being amphibious (‘double-life’) - developed from a tadpole with external gills and no lungs.  Wow!

Now for the variety of design!....

·       every colour and pattern you could imagine
·       voice: croaks, clicks, whistles, growls, or none - even sound like golf-ball dropping into cup
·       toes: 3, 4 or 5, sometimes with webbing or pads
·       jump, crawl, walk, run, climb, swim, float, glide - even hitchhike into town among bananas!
·       found in rainforest, desert, lagoon, mud, sand, even offices, quarries, building sites, gardens, water tanks, houses, toilets, (in your bed perhaps?)... up trees, on mountaintops…   
What an extraordinary life! Begin underwater nibbling greenery and finish up a mountain tree, catching mosquitos.
·       defences?...some have spines, poisonous skin, goo, tusks, lie on back playing dead…so be careful!

Green Tree Frog

·       offspring – some grow in Mum’s stomach, or even Dad’s pockets! (yuk!!)
 ·       diets: insects, small bats, tadpoles, mice, cockroaches, other frogs….
 ·       size – up to 40cm long (bigger than a football!)
·       diurnal or nocturnal

So how long could you wait for breakfast, or even for just a drink?

The amazingly patient Cyclorana platycephala or ‘water-holding frog’ lives in the mostly dry claypans of central Australia. He will draw on the reserves of fat and water in body tissues while he hides underground…..for months?....no, for up to 7 years! By the way, central Australia can be freezing overnight but that’s no problem when you have your own reservoir of anti-freeze.                                                                                                              

Waiting, waiting, waiting for rain...then when it comes, listen for the sound of the motorbike – that’ll be Froggy saying: ‘thank you!’                                   

When your breakfast finally arrives can you use your eyes to swallow it?                    
Well that’s what a frog can do – sink his eyes back thru holes in the skull to force food down his throat. Nifty, hey? No more beans or broccoli stuck in your throat!

So is this all just accidental good luck…or very clever and diverse design?

·       Special thanks to KMM kindergarten class - 2013, Wauchope Public School, NSW, Australia.    “Thanks boys and girls!”...from Mr. K

Acknowledgements:  

Thomas Marent, ‘Frog’, Dorling Kindersley, London, 2008  

Martyn Robinson, Field Guide to Frogs of Australia, Reed New Holland, 1993                                                                      
Photo credit: Janette Hornsey