Skepticism on all sorts of topics:

The SkepticWiki http://www.skepticwiki.org/wiki

Account creation: send an e-mail with real name and requested moniker to skepticwiki AT gmail.com

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"If lightspeed has something to do with speed.
how come things can move fast in the dark?"
-James Driscoll (Spaceman), kook, imbecile, idiot.

Greenwich Royal Observatory has an online beginners course.

Let's not forget the basics:

http://www.lightandmatter.com/area1book1.html
Clearest textbook I have seen to date and it's free for the downloading.

This one, or Thompson's original version, can be had at little cost in used book shops:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/cus...views.start=11

As an incorrigible tilter at windmills and kicker of sacred cows I am compelled to reccommend this text. On the other hand, it probably should be read in conjunction with a standard calculus textbook, many good ones of which are available from vendors of used books.

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There is no God and Dirac was his prophet.

I definitely appreciate the lists posted recently on the forum on web resources.

For newbies just getting back into astronomy/related sciences and browsing online, does anyone have any suggestions on criteria these web resources should meet? How could someone know what is reliable from what is edited/spinned?

Hello,i am a high school student doing a projcet on how the universe was created and i need someone who knows about it to interview,C an anyone help me out?

Thank you.

Amazing thread, this will keep me busy for months. Thanks very much.

An e-zine specialized on the news of new breakthroughs and discoveries in the field of extrasolar planets XSM #3 is now online.

http://www.xsmagazine.co.nr

Also, if anyone would like to contribute a story to the MyWorld section of XSM, feel free to contact me at xsmagazine@gmail.com

Cheers,
Jovan

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:: eXtraSolar magazine :: http://www.xsmagazine.co.nr

Visit XSM site and join our mailing list, for the latest news on exoplanets. There weren't any spectacular news for the last couple of weeks, as you might've noticed with a lack of stories on ESPs in Universe Today.. but the field itself is of course very exciting and ever-changing, so - stay tuned for the great discoveries and breakthroughs that are basically quite frequent in this relativelly new field of astrophysics.

Cheers,
Jovan

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:: eXtraSolar magazine :: http://www.xsmagazine.co.nr

I received this from the moderator of this forum, not a site, but both PDF-files are very to the point, with explanations accompanied by formulas to prove things and let you find out yourselves.

Quote :
"However, this paper, by Davis and Lineweaver, provides a good, succinct account of some popular misconceptions of modern cosmology.

Davis and Lineweaver have also written a less technical account. It was published in the magazine Scientific American, in March 2005. However, you can get a (PDF) copy from Charles Lineweaver's webpage - click on the link to it (it's at the bottom of the webpage).

If you don't understand anything in either, please just ask.

I think that you should first understand the basics of the "Big Bang" theory, before trying to understand how Dark Energy fits into the concordance model

Spaceman Spiff recently posted an article describing Caltech cosmologist Sean Carroll's Preposterous Universe site and its Cosmology Primer and FAQ pages.

Current FAQ questions:

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This has become a daily favorite of mine:

http://www.lpod.org/

The Lunar Photo of the Day.

(I didn't see this one listed, yet.)

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Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend.
Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.
- Groucho Marx

I don't know if I posted this already but
www.nasaspaceflight.com

Is SETI at home (?) still going, or is that ATM.

Kidding.

I didn't see it listed so it may not fit the criteria.

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'Sir........, I don't like these numbers.'
'Then hire somebody that can change them!'
("`-/")_.-'"``-.,,
\. . `; -._( );, `)
(v_,)' _ )`-. \ ``'`
_.- _..-/ /((.'
((,.-' ((,/

I hope you'll consider the two sites in my signature line. Science news, daily sky charts, podcasts featuring interviews with scientists, blogs, great community ...

Come on over!

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Deborah Byrd
Earth & Sky: a clear voice for science
EarthSky Blogs

I suspect this will be useful next time someone asks about how the moon moves, and looks: Lunar Phase Simulator (Flash animation)

A product of the Nebraska Astronomy Applet Project, NAAP. The project appears to be ongoing, with more animations and exercise modules to come.

Some current animations:

• Solar System Models
• Basic Motions and Seasons
• The Rotating Sky
• Motions of the Sun
• Planetary Orbit Simulator
• Lunar Phase Simulator
• Filtered Light Simulator
• Blackbody Simulator
• Hydrogen Atom Simulator
• Eclipsing Binary Simulator

Good stuff.

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Why didn't someone tell me this was available on the Web?

Cliffs Notes: Astronomy

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Seen on Planetary Society Weblog: Solar systems in motion:

Solar Systems Visualizer (Flash)

Zoom in and out on our system. Investigate a particular planet's system of moons. Do the same for other systems (with less detail, of course).

It's part of the University of Maryland Astronomy Workshop, itself worth a visit.

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I'm loving the thread, but I'm wondering... is it okay also if we list good software we find that is very informative with pretty much foreseen quality information and methology behind it?