In his new book ‘Helogland’, physicist Carlo Rovelli reveals how a young man’s self-imposed exile on a remote Atlantic island changed the world forever.
we could not yet be sure about where we were in the sole oar system. we didn t know how far apart the planets were from each other, how far we were from the sun. in 1716 in edmond haley s lifetime, that part of earth was very much a mystery. here s what he figured out, the planet venus, second from the sun, a nearly twin planet to earth, every so often the orbit of venus and the orbit of us line up in such a way that we can actually see venus between us and the sun. we re third from the sun, venus is second from the sun, and we can see it once in a really, really rare while as it scoots between us and the sun that we both go around. our boy edmond haley predicted that if we measured that, if we counted how much of time it took for this movement of venus across the sun, which we can see, we could figure out how far we are from the sun and how far we are from other planets and how far those other planets are from the sun. we could figure out how big the whole kit and caboodle is.
i m going go with hailey s comet. if you re old enough to remember your mom and dad hauling you out of bed so you could squint at haley s comet in your pajamas or if you just read about it in science glass, you have heard of edmond haley, a scientist, who let people know that people weren t seeing different comets. they were eing the same comet as it came around again and again on a schedule. that he figured out, the comet orbit, where it was in space and when it would come around again. that is the idea that edmond haley became famous for. but he had bigger ideas even than that. way bo way back in 1716, same dude realized human beings were going to get an amazing chance to figure out where we are in space. we knew already that we were on a planet and that our little planet went around the sun, but
we could calculate in a cosmic sense where we are, all from the transit of venus, that briefest transit across the giant sun of little itty-bitty venus. from such a little thing comes such a huge thing to know. how big the universe that we re in is, or at least our solar system. the transit of venus happens rarely. edmond haley died without ever seeing one, didn t happen until half a century after his theory was published. but his theory is right. the last time this event happened before this century was in the 1800s. but it is about to happen again. since we are the kind of tv show that has a really friendly in-house astrophysicist to explain all of this, we are all in luck. watch. so venus transiting the sun is going to look like that. like a little raisin or a tick. right. tiny tiny. you won t be able to see this with your eyes. you can see it with telescopes. you shouldn t try to see it with