Solar Eclipse from Space

[Hamma]

For those who don't know there was a solar eclipse today (Not visible in the states) they took a pretty cool shot of the moon's shadow over earth from the International Space Station:

http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/image_feature_538.html

[OneManArmy]

people on the coast of turkey just went blind.

[Peacemaker]

I wonder what is responsible for the very faded shadow edges. I wouldnt think the atmosphere would scatter the light to make it THAT blurry and the picture would be much more defined....

[OneManArmy]

are you talking about the shadow from the moon? are you serious?

go hold a golf ball up to a wall with a lamp shining on it. now move it closer to the lamp.... see how the shadow gets all blurry? more light is getting around the object.

[Peacemaker]

Light doesnt go "around things" light travels in a straight line in a vacume. The only exception is that it IS bent by massive masses (yes the earth bends light towards it) The shadow of objects here on earth get blurred by refraction of light through air.

[OneManArmy]

its called Diffraction. come on hoss.

here...

Diffraction of Light
Because light is a wave, it has the capability to "bend around corners". This is called diffraction, and is illustrated in the adjacent image. The intensity of light behind the barrier is not zero in the shadow region. diffractive effects occur generally when a part of a light wave is cut off by an obstruction.

http://csep10.phys.utk.edu/astr162/lect/light/diffraction.gif

[Infernus]

^What he said.

Diffraction does happen in space. Diffraction happens anywhere a light wave reaches an obsrtuction.

[Peacemaker]

Maybe Im just brain farting and thinking of sound :-P

Now that I think about it, considering light is a wave and a particle it should spread like waves on an ocean, so yea that makes sence. My bad.

[Geist]

Man,nothing cool happens near me.:cry:

[Infernus]

Maybe Im just brain farting and thinking of sound :-P

Now that I think about it, considering light is a wave and a particle it should spread like waves on an ocean, so yea that makes sence. My bad.

Well you were half right, in theory.

Einstein's Theory of Gravity proposes that Gravity is not a force but an effect of space itself. In general relativity he proposed that the fourth-dimensional (tesseract) space-time continuum is curved by the presence of matter. Every test to date has given the correct results.

Einstein's theory predicted the deflection of light by massive objects, and in 1919 during an eclipse, the light of distant stars that passed near the sun was deflected in agreement with Einstein's prediction. If an object is massive and dense enough (singularity) light leaving it will be totally bent back to the object, forming a black hole.

The theory is incomplete though - it doesn't say HOW masses curve space-time.

Also: Tesseracts are scary.

[Hamma]

They are shitty quality pictures compared to some of the other stuff we've seen from ISS. They should have spent more time on it :\