Speaker 1: This is the USS Hamlet's Father's Ghost, requesting entry into
Speaker 1: Uranian orbit and the Uranian satellite system. We have decelerated
Speaker 1: and see clearance to titanium.
Speaker 2: Greetings, USS Hamlet's Father's Ghost. This is Mustard Seed. Can
Speaker 2: you state the purpose of your visit?
Speaker 3: Roger that Mustard Seed.
Speaker 1: I have two hundred and fifty Shakespeare enthusiast on board,
Speaker 1: just waking up for a tour of the Uranian moons.
Speaker 1: Our visit to the Royal Automated Uranian Theater on Titanius
Speaker 1: should be registered in the lock.
Speaker 2: All right, Roger that USSHFG. I can confirm your reservation
Speaker 2: now and docking credentials are good to go with your passengers.
Speaker 2: A pleasant and safe visit to the Uranian satellite system.
Speaker 2: The next automated Thespianoid performance will be let's see Ooh
Speaker 2: Edward the third Well, better luck next time.
Speaker 4: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, the production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 3: Hey you, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind.
Speaker 2: My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, and
Speaker 2: we're back with Part two of our series on the
Speaker 2: planet Uranus and its moons. Now in Part one, we
Speaker 2: focused mainly on the planet itself. This time we're going
Speaker 2: to start getting more into the moons. Maybe we'll do
Speaker 2: all of the moons this time. I think last time
Speaker 2: we promised it would happen. We'll see whether we can
Speaker 2: fit it all into one episode. But I had a
Speaker 2: few more core planet digressions burning a hole in my
Speaker 2: pocket that I wanted to mention before we fly off
Speaker 2: to the satellites. Are you okay with that? Rob, Let's
Speaker 2: do it.
Speaker 3: So.
Speaker 2: First of all, I was wondering what's the density of Uranus,
Speaker 2: And it turns out that Uranus is the second least
Speaker 2: dense planet in the Solar System at one point twenty
Speaker 2: seven grams per cubic centimeter. The only planet less dense
Speaker 2: is actually Saturn, the second largest planet in the Solar System.
Speaker 2: You might wonder which planet is the dense baby, that's Earth.
Speaker 3: That's Earth.
Speaker 2: We are at five point five to one grams per
Speaker 2: cubic centimeter, so we are the density king. But one
Speaker 2: of the real things I wanted to return to was
Speaker 2: a question of materials, because in the last episode we
Speaker 2: mentioned just giving sort of an overview of the basics
Speaker 2: of the planet, that most of the mass of Uranus
Speaker 2: is thought to be a hot, dense fluid of ices,
Speaker 2: probably surrounding a rocky core of some sort. And though
Speaker 2: it might be kind of strange to hear like hot
Speaker 2: dense fluid of ices, that almost kind of doesn't make
Speaker 2: sense based on our definition of ice. And it's true
Speaker 2: that a lot of this ice is going to be
Speaker 2: different than the kind of ice we know. So I
Speaker 2: was reading more about this in an article by a
Speaker 2: planetary atmospheric scientist named Amy Simon, who is a senior
Speaker 2: researcher at NASA Goddard, and this was written for the
Speaker 2: magazine of the Planetary Society. The article is called the
Speaker 2: of the Ice Giants, and one of the questions Simon
Speaker 2: addresses in this article is why are the planets Uranus
Speaker 2: and Neptune called ice giants as opposed to regular gas giants.
Speaker 2: It's because, compared to regular gas giants like Jupiter and Saturn,
Speaker 2: Uranus and Neptune are composed of a higher proportion of
Speaker 2: ice forming molecules like water and methane, though much of
Speaker 2: that so called ice is in a phase unfamiliar to
Speaker 2: us on the surface of Earth. Cymon writes quote, ice
Speaker 2: giants are mostly water, probably in the form of a
Speaker 2: supercritical fluid. The visible clouds likely consist of ice crystals
Speaker 2: with different compositions, So regarding supercritical fluid, a supercritical fluid
Speaker 2: doesn't behave exactly like a liquid, gas or a solid.
Speaker 2: It's an emergent state of matter occurring at temperatures and
Speaker 2: pressures beyond what is known as the critical point for
Speaker 2: each substance. And Simon has a very good paragraph clarifying
Speaker 2: the planetary science use of the term ice, which could
Speaker 2: help clear up any confusion there. She says that on
Speaker 2: Earth we usually use the term ice to refer to
Speaker 2: just water H two O when it is frozen solid,
Speaker 2: but planetary astronomers use the word ice to refer to
Speaker 2: any condensable molecule in its solid form. She writes, quote,
Speaker 2: these tend to be highly reflective form clouds, and unlike minerals,
Speaker 2: can readily change between liquid, solid and gas states at
Speaker 2: relatively low temperatures. So we're mainly familiar with water ice
Speaker 2: on the surface of Earth, but throughout space there are
Speaker 2: lots of ices. There's methane, ammonia, hydrogen sulfide, and phosphene
Speaker 2: pH three, and these are all condensable molecules and could
Speaker 2: all freeze in the atmosphere of Uranus and Neptune also
Speaker 2: for that matter, and Simon writes that most of the
Speaker 2: cloud clouds we see in the atmospheres of these ice
Speaker 2: giants are clouds of methane ice crystals or hydrogen sulfide ice,
Speaker 2: So there's probably weird supercritical fluids down below, and then
Speaker 2: an atmosphere above. The atmosphere in its gas contents, is
Speaker 2: mostly hydrogen and helium, but that atmosphere is probably full
Speaker 2: of traces of different kinds of ice, including not just
Speaker 2: H two O, but things like ammonia and methane. And
Speaker 2: speaking of methane, as we mentioned last time, the blue
Speaker 2: color of both Neptune and Uranus appears to come from
Speaker 2: the presence of methane in their atmospheres, which absorbs the
Speaker 2: red wavelengths of light from the sun and reflects only
Speaker 2: the blue spectrum. But the question is why is Urinus
Speaker 2: a paler shade of blue than Neptune. If you look
Speaker 2: at Neptune, it's often kind of a royal blue, whereas
Speaker 2: in true color, Uranus appears kind of a gray green blue.
Speaker 2: Simon writes that this is quote either because Urinus has
Speaker 2: more haze, so more kind of a cloudy outer shell,
Speaker 2: but she goes on or because Neptune's atmosphere has another
Speaker 2: unidentified constituent that absorbs longer wavelength light even more strongly,
Speaker 2: and of course longer wavelength light would be more red
Speaker 2: shifted toward the red end of the visible spectrum. Okay,
Speaker 2: so that's ice, the atmosphere, the makeup of the planet.
Speaker 2: But there's one more thing you may have seen headlines
Speaker 2: about regarding Urinus in Neptune that if you have seen
Speaker 2: these headlines, I'm sure you're wondering about it, and that
Speaker 2: is the claim that some experts have argued that it
Speaker 2: likely rains diamonds on Urinus in Neptune. And from what
Speaker 2: I can tell, this is true. Now, this is obviously
Speaker 2: something we haven't been able to detect directly with probes
Speaker 2: or anything, so nobody can sense this happening. Instead, it's
Speaker 2: based on what we do know about the planets and
Speaker 2: argue and sort of extrapolating logically from the starting facts.
Speaker 2: So how does the logic go? Well, I was reading
Speaker 2: about this in an article for space dot Com by
Speaker 2: the Sunny Stonybrook astrophysicist Paul M. Sutter, and in this article,
Speaker 2: Sutter explains that we know from mathematical models that the
Speaker 2: inner mantles of ice giants probably have temperatures of about
Speaker 2: seven thousand kelvins or over sixty seven hundred celsius and
Speaker 2: pressure about six million times the atmospheric pressure on the
Speaker 2: surface of Earth. Meanwhile, higher up in the mantle, things
Speaker 2: are cooler about two thousand kelvins and only two hundred
Speaker 2: thousand times Earth's atmospheric pressure. And we know that water, ammonia,
Speaker 2: and methane are present within that mantle. So what happens
Speaker 2: to those substances in those conditions, Well, these conditions of
Speaker 2: temperature and pressure would tend to tear apart molecules of methane,
Speaker 2: methane is H four carbon, and hydrogen. And when those
Speaker 2: molecules get torn apart, we are left with free carbon.
Speaker 2: Free carbon tends to link together with other free carbon
Speaker 2: to form long chains of carbon. What happens to long
Speaker 2: chains of pure carbon under high pressure that gets pressed
Speaker 2: into a diamond? These diamonds would tend to then drop
Speaker 2: down to lower in the mantle where high temperatures vaporize them,
Speaker 2: and then they float back up into the upper mantle,
Speaker 2: and then the cycle repeats, so you're left with diamond rain.
Speaker 2: Sounds like the name of a great alternate universe collaborative
Speaker 2: sci fi movie musical between Prince and David Bowie. Wish
Speaker 2: I could have seen it, but it does appear to
Speaker 2: be very likely a physical reality on Uranus and Neptune
Speaker 2: as well.
Speaker 1: So you're saying that all we have to do is
Speaker 1: jet out to Urinus, dip down into the atmosphere of Uranus,
Speaker 1: scoop up some diamonds, then get back to Earth and
Speaker 1: we're set for life.
Speaker 2: I've always said when I look at but the stars
Speaker 2: at night, what I see is profit. Okay, but one
Speaker 2: more digression before we get to the moons. Since part one,
Speaker 2: we actually got a really great bit of listener mail
Speaker 2: from Joe, not me, but a different Joe who listens
Speaker 2: to the show, who brought to our attention some really
Speaker 2: awesome photos of Uranus recently captured by the James Web
Speaker 2: Space Telescope. Joe writes, quote, I've long awaited with tremulous
Speaker 2: anticipation the resumption of your ural journey to the Heliopause
Speaker 2: and was thrilled to see the recumbent sky King Uranus
Speaker 2: on my podcast Feed Your Choice was timely indeed, as
Speaker 2: the James Web Space Telescope just last month released some
Speaker 2: spectacular visuals of Uranus. These images bost greater clarity than
Speaker 2: the Hubbles effort, especially of the planet's rings. I love
Speaker 2: living under a sky that will never run out of
Speaker 2: extraordinary things to look at and talk about, and I
Speaker 2: appreciate when you cast your gaze upward from time to time. Joe, Well,
Speaker 2: thank you, Joe. Because I had not seen these, I
Speaker 2: looked them up and this is fantastic. So I saw
Speaker 2: these within the context of a NASA press release from
Speaker 2: April sixth, twenty twenty three that Joe shared with us Rob,
Speaker 2: I pasted these two photos here in the outline. One
Speaker 2: is just zoomed in on the planet from the more
Speaker 2: zoomed out second one. I would say, from my perspective,
Speaker 2: these images are gorgeous. They fill one with awe at
Speaker 2: the picture of this frosty, dark recess where the Blue
Speaker 2: God lives. And this might sound a little bit weird,
Speaker 2: but I actually mean this in the best possible way. Somehow,
Speaker 2: in these images, Urinus looks more like an optical artifact
Speaker 2: than a physical object, as if the planet were like
Speaker 2: a glint or a lens flare. And to explain what
Speaker 2: I mean, so the planet is pictured on its side,
Speaker 2: because of course that's how it is. We're not seeing
Speaker 2: the rings laterally from the side, crossing over and behind
Speaker 2: the planet, like we do in most photos of Saturn. Instead,
Speaker 2: we're seeing the rings encircling the planet in an egg
Speaker 2: shape because we're looking roughly down toward the north pole,
Speaker 2: which faces sideways. And in this particular photo, though this
Speaker 2: is not exactly true color, the planet is pale blue
Speaker 2: with a white cap, and the rings sort of fade
Speaker 2: outward to inward from a screaming fluorescent white to a
Speaker 2: dim blue gray as they sink toward the planet's atmosphere.
Speaker 2: And the sunlight seems blinding in these images because we
Speaker 2: actually see it gleaming off the edge of the planet,
Speaker 2: which is even weirder because, as I said, the disk
Speaker 2: of Urinus facing us looks like a glint or a
Speaker 2: gleam itself. And in the more zoomed out of these
Speaker 2: two photos, we can see the blue dots of the
Speaker 2: larger moons surrounding it, also sending out these sort of
Speaker 2: shafts of reflected light in these hexagonal criss crosses out
Speaker 2: into space.
Speaker 1: Yeah, these images are gorgeous. It makes it look like
Speaker 1: Urinus is a planet designed by Japanese illustrator Hajimi Soriyama, whose,
Speaker 1: of course I think he worked on the design for
Speaker 1: the original Sony Aibo robot, but also mostly known for
Speaker 1: robot pin up like really shiny, silvery robot pin up models.
Speaker 1: This artist is on my mind because the movie we're
Speaker 1: watching Friday in for Weird House Cinema, this artist is
Speaker 1: credited like deep down in the credits because there's a
Speaker 1: character in the movie that has some of this art
Speaker 1: up on his workstation. But this kind of but there's
Speaker 1: a certain aside from like the female robot bodies in
Speaker 1: his art, there is this kind of like glimmering, like
Speaker 1: silvery perfection to things. And that's what that's what I
Speaker 1: kind of get from this image of Urinus. And if
Speaker 1: you're into planets, like I mean, put it on a calendar.
Speaker 1: It looks it looks nice.
Speaker 2: It is beautiful. And I will say the blue in
Speaker 2: this photo, as I alluded to, is not exactly true
Speaker 2: color from the visible spectrum. I think it's approximate. So
Speaker 2: the image is from the webs near infrared camera combining
Speaker 2: data from two filters. According to the press release, it
Speaker 2: was one point four and three point zero microns, and
Speaker 2: then the article explains these are coded out to blue
Speaker 2: and orange respectively. Now I mentioned the white cap that
Speaker 2: we see on Uranus in this photo. The article explains
Speaker 2: that this is known as the polar cap, and it
Speaker 2: seems to manifest when the pole of the planet goes
Speaker 2: into direct sunlight during its long polar summer, which, again,
Speaker 2: as we talked about last time, lasts many earth years
Speaker 2: at a time, and then the cap seems to disappear
Speaker 2: in the fall when it starts to turn away from
Speaker 2: the sun. As far as I could find, we aren't
Speaker 2: sure exactly what causes this, or maybe if somebody knows,
Speaker 2: I just didn't dig that up. But so regarding the
Speaker 2: beautiful rings in the picture, Urinus has thirteen known rings,
Speaker 2: and you can see eleven of them in this photo,
Speaker 2: though some of them are so bright that they bleed
Speaker 2: together in the image. There are nine major rings and
Speaker 2: then there are two kind of faint dusty rings that
Speaker 2: were discovered during the approach of Voyager two in nineteen
Speaker 2: eighty six. But speaking of those, rings and moons. Rings
Speaker 2: and moons sometimes have an interesting origin story, so I
Speaker 2: was wondering where do experts generally think they came from
Speaker 2: in the case of Uranus. Going back to that Planetary
Speaker 2: Society article by Amy Simon, Simon writes that the medium
Speaker 2: sized moons of Uranus probably formed in place at the
Speaker 2: same time or after whatever event it was that left
Speaker 2: Uranus tilted on its side. And as we talked about
Speaker 2: last time, it seems likely that Uranus was probably knocked
Speaker 2: on its side and left colder than all the other
Speaker 2: planets because of an impact with a large object, maybe
Speaker 2: like an Earth sized planet billions of years ago. And
Speaker 2: so what we're left with is that the moons orbit
Speaker 2: Urinus on its equatorial plane, so like the planet itself
Speaker 2: and like its rings, the moons are tilted at a
Speaker 2: roughly ninety degree angle to the rest of the Solar System.
Speaker 2: In general, the moons of Urinus are made of ice
Speaker 2: and rock, usually slightly more ice than rock, and they
Speaker 2: show some interesting surface features, like patterns of darkening on
Speaker 2: their surfaces that are caused by some unknown material. Spectral
Speaker 2: analysis reveals the presence of frozen carbon dioxide on a
Speaker 2: lot of the moons. Meanwhile, the origin of the rings,
Speaker 2: the consensus seems to be that they are created by
Speaker 2: the shattering into dust and fragments of formerly solid moons.
Speaker 2: And as we've seen with other planets, the sudden or
Speaker 2: gradual smash up of moons can happen a number of ways,
Speaker 2: by lots of little collisions with meteoroids or other objects,
Speaker 2: or by tidal breakup due to gravity, in any case,
Speaker 2: turning former larger satellites into smaller satellites and rings of
Speaker 2: little fragments.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's fascinating. How from our human perspective we look
Speaker 1: up at our moon, we consider the moons of other worlds,
Speaker 1: and there's a certain certain stability to them, you know.
Speaker 3: But if you look at.
Speaker 1: Any planets, moons or moon, generally, you're looking at a
Speaker 1: more violent relationship over the vast history of a given planet.
Speaker 1: There's nothing peaceful about it. All right, Well, let's begin,
Speaker 1: at least begin to dip into the moons of Uranus.
Speaker 1: Like I said, we originally set out to do them all.
Speaker 1: Maybe we won't do them all. Maybe we'll get part
Speaker 1: way through the journey and we'll come back on Tuesday.
Speaker 1: Who knows, Maybe we'll just we'll just get we'll finish
Speaker 1: them up, and then we'll go right into Neptune.
Speaker 3: There are no rules. We can do what we want.
Speaker 1: So let's start with the inner moons of Uranus thirteen
Speaker 1: total known. All right, We're going to start with a
Speaker 1: pair of moons, Cordelia and Ophelia. These are named for
Speaker 1: the youngest daughter of King Lear and of course Hamlet's
Speaker 1: tragic beloved, respectively. The main significance of these moons is
Speaker 1: that both Cordelia and Ophelia are shepherd moons, as their
Speaker 1: gravity keeps Uranus's epsilon ring from dispersing.
Speaker 2: Now, I thought this was interesting, so I was looking
Speaker 2: up how exactly it is that shepherd moons work. What
Speaker 2: does the shepherd moon do? These little small moons, how
Speaker 2: do they keep a ring? Essentially, they keep a ring
Speaker 2: in tight formation around the planet and clear these gaps
Speaker 2: between the rings. And it seems that essentially it works
Speaker 2: like this. So you've got a small moon and it's
Speaker 2: orbiting planet. And imagine at first it's orbiting the planet
Speaker 2: along with a bunch of other small particles sort of
Speaker 2: within the lane of that small moon's orbit. Particles that
Speaker 2: are ahead of the small moon will be attracted by
Speaker 2: gravity to it, meaning if they're orbiting ahead of it,
Speaker 2: they will naturally want to slow down in their orbit,
Speaker 2: right because they're getting pulled toward this moon. But slowing
Speaker 2: down in their orbit actually causes them to lose energy
Speaker 2: and fall down closer to the planet that they're orbiting.
Speaker 2: So these like dust and particles and things in the
Speaker 2: ring actually end up sorting down into lower orbit rings.
Speaker 2: And then meanwhile, things that are orbiting along the same
Speaker 2: lane as this moon, that are behind it in its
Speaker 2: orbit are attracted to it and thus sped up. And
Speaker 2: as they get sped up trying to chase after this
Speaker 2: moon by the force of gravity, that acceleration actually causes
Speaker 2: them to have greater energy and to ascend in their
Speaker 2: orbit and end up going into outer rings beyond that
Speaker 2: little moon.
Speaker 1: So again we have the Shepherd moons here. They were
Speaker 1: discovered by Voyager two in nineteen eighty six. Like the
Speaker 1: rest of Uranus's inner moons, they appear to be roughly
Speaker 1: equal split of water, ice and rock. They're small. Of
Speaker 1: note to Cordelia is the closest to the planet, and
Speaker 1: I guess we should also point out or come back
Speaker 1: to the fact that yes, these are both Shakespearean references.
Speaker 1: There are going to be a lot of shakespeare references
Speaker 1: as we go through the moons of Uranus, and these
Speaker 1: are just the first two.
Speaker 2: It seems that a lot of the names of these
Speaker 2: satellites for some reason were chosen either from the works
Speaker 2: of Shakespeare or from the works of Alexander Pope.
Speaker 1: Yeah, predominantly Shakespearean, but definitely there's some key Alexander Pope
Speaker 1: references as well. So as we go through it, we
Speaker 1: can probably talk a little bit about some the namesakes here.
Speaker 2: Well, this was something I was wondering. I don't know
Speaker 2: about the origin exactly, like what people had in mind
Speaker 2: when they were naming these, But so I think, like,
Speaker 2: is there some significance to the innermost minor moon here
Speaker 2: being called Cordelia, because Cordelia is a very poignant character.
Speaker 2: Cordelia is the youngest daughter of King Lear in the
Speaker 2: play King Lear. If you don't know the play or
Speaker 2: need refreshing, the very beginning of it, the first scene
Speaker 2: is King Lear is this old king. He comes out.
Speaker 2: He decides that he will divide up his kingdom between
Speaker 2: his three daughters, Goneril, Reagan, and Cordelia, and he's going
Speaker 2: to give the largest portion to the daughter that loves
Speaker 2: him most. So Goneril and Reagan give these speeches where
Speaker 2: they overwhelm their father with absurd insincere flattery about how
Speaker 2: much they love him. And then when it's Cordelia's time
Speaker 2: to speak, she finds that she cannot put into words,
Speaker 2: She cannot express her love for her father to herself.
Speaker 2: She says that she knows her love is richer than
Speaker 2: her tongue. And then when it's her time to speak,
Speaker 2: she says, unhappy that I am. I cannot heave my
Speaker 2: heart into my mouth. I love your majesty according to
Speaker 2: my bond, no more nor less. And I think he
Speaker 2: gives her a chance to amend her statement. She doesn't really,
Speaker 2: and then so Lee gets furious at this decides to
Speaker 2: disinherit her. He gives nothing to Cordelia, splits his kingdom
Speaker 2: between the other two daughters, Goneril and Reagan, who secretly
Speaker 2: think he is a fool and they will go on
Speaker 2: to betray him once they come to power. And of
Speaker 2: course it's a tragedy, so things just get worse and worries.
Speaker 2: Basically everybody ends up dead but you know, it's a
Speaker 2: very meaningful character and something I think, I don't know.
Speaker 2: That moment in the first scene is something that always
Speaker 2: got me, something I can really relate to, Like the
Speaker 2: feeling of worrying that you don't express positive feelings because
Speaker 2: you're afraid that you can't phrase them in the sincerest way,
Speaker 2: like you don't know how to put them to words.
Speaker 2: So then you worry that like you're perceived as not
Speaker 2: wanting to say a positive thing at all. I don't
Speaker 2: know if that makes sense.
Speaker 1: No, no, no, no, I mean, certainly with the example
Speaker 1: here from the play, absolutely.
Speaker 2: But she's the daughter that truly loved him. She just
Speaker 2: didn't want to give a big, insincere speech.
Speaker 3: Anyway.
Speaker 2: It's a very meaningful character. So I'm wondering, is there
Speaker 2: some similarly at play here in the selection of the
Speaker 2: name for this moon? Maybe not so, Like it's a
Speaker 2: very small satellite, it's the closest to the planet of these.
Speaker 2: It is one of the shepherd moons that sort of
Speaker 2: guides the Epsilon ring and keeps it tight in formation.
Speaker 2: By the end, I mean, she does show great discipline
Speaker 2: because she comes back with an army to try to
Speaker 2: to fight on her father's side against her cruel, duplicitous sisters.
Speaker 2: I don't know, maybe not. I don't know if it fits,
Speaker 2: but I was wondering.
Speaker 1: No, I think it's natural to try and read some
Speaker 1: sort of sense into the naming.
Speaker 3: Though.
Speaker 1: Of course, as we'll discuss it, it's different people at
Speaker 1: different times coming up with these names. You know, some
Speaker 1: are maybe probably a little more up on the works
Speaker 1: of William Shakespeare than others. Sometimes there's there seems like
Speaker 1: something they could be getting, at other times not. And
Speaker 1: also some of these kind of slip by on a technicality,
Speaker 1: so they're kind of all over the place. All right,
Speaker 1: let's let's go into the next one. There's a Bianca
Speaker 1: named after Kate's sister in the Taming of the Shrew.
Speaker 1: This one does nothing really else that I think is
Speaker 1: significant about it, and it was also discovered by Voyager two.
Speaker 1: All right, after that, we have Cressida. This is the
Speaker 1: title character from Troylus and Cresida. Again, nothing other else
Speaker 1: it's really significant about this moon it was also discovered
Speaker 1: by Voyger two. I know some of your probably wondering
Speaker 1: when's Voyager six is going to show up in all this?
Speaker 1: But I guess Voyger six just shot right out there, right.
Speaker 2: I was unsure, but what you're for di vigure here? Right?
Speaker 3: Yes?
Speaker 1: Yeah, Voyager six doesn't actually exist except in the world
Speaker 1: of Star Trek, okay, specifically Star Trek the motion picture,
Speaker 1: the most riveting of all of them, that was pinned
Speaker 1: by Alan Dean Foster. Oh wait, was he the one
Speaker 1: who wrote.
Speaker 2: The novelization of Halloween three or something like that?
Speaker 1: He wrote the novelization of most films? Yes, all right.
Speaker 1: The next moon of note here is Desdemona. This one's
Speaker 1: named after the wife of Othello. No other real significance,
Speaker 1: once again discovered by Voyager two. All right, now we're
Speaker 1: moving on to another one. This is Juliet or Juliet
Speaker 1: right if you're depending on how you're what line from
Speaker 1: the play using sometimes you got to hit two syllables
Speaker 1: instead of three on that. This is of course, named
Speaker 1: after the title character from Romeo and Juliet. Romeo, meanwhile,
Speaker 1: is nowhere to be found amid the moons of Uranus.
Speaker 1: It is kind of interesting that there's a part in
Speaker 1: Romeo and Juliet where Romeo is swearing his love up
Speaker 1: and down the universe and Juliette specifically asked him not
Speaker 1: to swear by the moon. She says, quote, oh, swear
Speaker 1: not by the moon, the inconstant moon that monthly changes
Speaker 1: in her circle orb less that thy love prove likewise variable.
Speaker 2: Changes in her circle? Orb What does that refer to,
Speaker 2: like the like waxing and waning of the moon or
Speaker 2: maybe I'm not sure I know.
Speaker 3: What that means.
Speaker 1: I mean I take it to me and yeah, it's
Speaker 1: like there are different faces of the moon, Like like
Speaker 1: if your love is like the moon Romeo, then I
Speaker 1: don't you know, it's like what am I going to
Speaker 1: get today? I mean it seems like if it is
Speaker 1: like the moon, she could chart it out and then
Speaker 1: she'd have a really good idea of what she's gonna get,
Speaker 1: you know, phase by phase. But yeah, she's like, I
Speaker 1: need consistency.
Speaker 2: Right, your love should not wax and wane. We shouldn't
Speaker 2: have a new moon of your love. Yes, it's were
Speaker 2: wolf night every night.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Anyway, Aside from these thoughts, juliet nothing else than literally
Speaker 1: significant once again discovered by Voyger. Two, then we have Portia.
Speaker 1: This one is named after the heroine from the Merchant
Speaker 1: of Venice. This one. I guess the main significance is
Speaker 1: that it orbits Urinus in less than one earth day,
Speaker 1: and it.
Speaker 3: Was discovered by Voyger two. All right.
Speaker 1: Up, next we have Rosalind. Rosalind is one of the
Speaker 1: Duke's daughters in As You Like It. That's the namesake.
Speaker 1: Nothing else really significant to discuss here.
Speaker 3: This one was also discovered by Voyager two. All right.
Speaker 1: The next one is Cupid. This is this one? This
Speaker 1: one is is a tough one to fit in, but okay.
Speaker 1: Cupid is, of course the Roman god of.
Speaker 2: Love, famously invented by William Shakespeare.
Speaker 1: Well, he is technically a character in Shakespeare's what is
Speaker 1: it timin Timon of Athens. I'm not familiar with this play.
Speaker 1: I don't know anything about that one. This may be
Speaker 1: one of the more obscure ones. I don't remember studying
Speaker 1: this one in school. But the discovery of it is
Speaker 1: kind of interesting because it was discovered by m R
Speaker 1: Showalter in JJ Lissauer using the Hubble space telescope in
Speaker 1: two thousand and three. It was too small and too
Speaker 1: dark for Voyager two to spot. And I was thinking
Speaker 1: about this. It's tempting to try and spin this one out.
Speaker 1: And think of like, Okay, here we have Cupid as
Speaker 1: this dark, near invisible shadow press presence, you know, reminding
Speaker 1: us of past discussions about how Cupid was sometimes said
Speaker 1: to shoot lead and arrows. So it's you know, he's
Speaker 1: not only dealing out love with his projectiles, but also
Speaker 1: some of the ramifications of love, and maybe even the
Speaker 1: tragic ramifications of love. But again, this one, this one
Speaker 1: seems to sort of slip by on a technicality in
Speaker 1: terms of its naming. All right, the next one is Belinda,
Speaker 1: And this is one where we have to just have
Speaker 1: to ask Shakespeare to move over, because this one is
Speaker 1: named after the character whose lock of hair is stolen
Speaker 1: in Alexander Pope's Rape of the Lock.
Speaker 2: Now, this is an unfortunately titled poem because it doesn't
Speaker 2: mean what it sounds like. That the poem by Pope
Speaker 2: is an older definition of the word rape, which is basically,
Speaker 2: in this context it means like theft or snatching. So
Speaker 2: the poem is a mock heroic satire. It narrates like
Speaker 2: a social scandal in which a lord of some sort.
Speaker 2: I did read this in school, and I forget a
Speaker 2: lot of the details, but he steals a lock of
Speaker 2: hair from a young woman. But it's written like in
Speaker 2: the style of the Iliad, to be mocking of the like,
Speaker 2: oh hoho, this is actually insignificant. I think Pope's point
Speaker 2: is best summarized in one of its lines, where he says,
Speaker 2: what mighty contests rise from trivial things? Though I don't know,
Speaker 2: thinking on it now, there are obviously much worse crimes,
Speaker 2: but stealing somebody's hair is pretty weird.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Plus hair has magical connotations. They could be stealing
Speaker 1: it to work some sort of magic. Maybe that's explored
Speaker 1: in the poem. I don't know. I have a degree
Speaker 1: in English, and I somehow managed to never read this poem.
Speaker 1: I remember that, you know the course. I'm familiar with
Speaker 1: the author's name and his popularity and importance in English literature,
Speaker 1: but I remember this title would come up and I
Speaker 1: would think, Oh, that doesn't sound like something I want
Speaker 1: to read, not realizing that it's about hair theft Alexander Pope.
Speaker 2: Everything I recall that he wrote is basically satirical in nature.
Speaker 2: I'm sure he must have written serious poems, but like
Speaker 2: the other main thing I remember he wrote is something
Speaker 2: called the Dunceiad, which is a sort of an epic
Speaker 2: poem about stupidity.
Speaker 1: Hmm.
Speaker 2: He was like, it seems like he was just really
Speaker 2: into not suffering fools.
Speaker 1: Though.
Speaker 2: I feel like if that's your main vibe, you really
Speaker 2: open yourself up to scrutiny, don't you.
Speaker 1: All Right, well, we'll come back to Pope's work in
Speaker 1: a bit, because there are more moons named after him.
Speaker 1: The next one is Perdita, and this is the daughter
Speaker 1: of Leontes and Hermione in William Shakespeare's The Winter's Tail.
Speaker 1: This one's discovery is actually pretty interesting because Voyger two
Speaker 1: is involved in its discovery, but it wasn't recognized till
Speaker 1: two thousand and three. Basically, University of Arizona's Eric Karkoshka
Speaker 1: discovered it by comparing Voyger two imagery with Hubble imagery
Speaker 1: and sort of working out its existence based on these
Speaker 1: two different streams. All right, up next, we have Puck Is,
Speaker 1: of course, named after the sprite from A Midsummer Night's Dream.
Speaker 1: Stanley Tucci played him in the nineteen ninety nine film adaptation,
Speaker 1: which had a great cast. I do remember seeing this
Speaker 1: film when it came out, and I imagine I've seen
Speaker 1: multiple it seems like Midsummer Night's Dream is just one
Speaker 1: of those plays that if you're just going to fall
Speaker 1: into seeing it, even if you don't set out to
Speaker 1: watch Shakespeare in life.
Speaker 2: Puck's a great character, great mischief maker, the mischief maker
Speaker 2: who brings wisdom, whether on purpose or not.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, Tucci was perfect casting. Now significance. Here is
Speaker 1: the smallest of the inner moons, with a diameter of
Speaker 1: about one hundred and fifty kilometers or about ninety miles,
Speaker 1: And it was guess what discovered by voyager two? All right,
Speaker 1: up next we have Mab. It's named after Queen Mab,
Speaker 1: queen of the fair Folk and English folklore. She's mentioned
Speaker 1: in Romeo and Juliet So and just mentioned. So it
Speaker 1: just really really squeaks by on a technicality. I mean,
Speaker 1: this is one of those situations where I feel like
Speaker 1: I want to shout a little bit and be like, look,
Speaker 1: there are a lot of names that are mentioned in Shakespeare,
Speaker 1: and there are plenty of characters. I don't know why
Speaker 1: Queen Mab seems like the ideal choice.
Speaker 2: Here is there an inner moon named Julius Caesar?
Speaker 1: No, but you know you could that would have been
Speaker 1: a good one Caesar, right, But that's just off the
Speaker 1: top of my head.
Speaker 3: I'm not sure if there's some other.
Speaker 1: Well, you know, I should also point out when you
Speaker 1: start looking. And I didn't get into this in any
Speaker 1: of my note taking, really, but there are individual features
Speaker 1: on some moons that are likewise named after other things.
Speaker 1: So it could be a Caeesar in there somewhere, you
Speaker 1: know what.
Speaker 2: Actually, I want to be fair, Even a lot of
Speaker 2: the Shakespeare characters that we think of as more original
Speaker 2: shakespeare characters are actually often from like adapted versions of
Speaker 2: pre existing tales. Like a lot of Shakespeare's plays were
Speaker 2: not wholly made up stories. They were based on something
Speaker 2: from history or from an older story or another play,
Speaker 2: or something right right, Like who would have thought of it?
Speaker 1: You know?
Speaker 2: Hamlet is the guy from the Northman.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, if you were around today, he'd be uh,
Speaker 1: you know, he'd be in the MCU somewhere working on
Speaker 1: a project.
Speaker 4: Of it.
Speaker 1: Anyway, Mab is the moon here. This one's discovered in
Speaker 1: two thousand and three by show Alter and Lisaur using
Speaker 1: the Hubble space telescope.
Speaker 2: Interesting in fact, I came across while reading that article
Speaker 2: by the NASA Goddard researcher Amy Simon. She writes that
Speaker 2: Mab quote maybe generating a tenuous blue toned ring like
Speaker 2: Enceladus does for Saturn's e ring, though the source currently
Speaker 2: remains a mystery.
Speaker 1: Well, you know that sounds kind of fitting for the
Speaker 1: Queen of the fairy Folk.
Speaker 3: So I do like that.
Speaker 2: Well, I'm looking at the clock, and do you know
Speaker 2: what the clock reads. It reads a promise broken because
Speaker 2: we said we were going to do all of the
Speaker 2: moons within part two, and I think we have failed
Speaker 2: because we're coming up against a time limit. We got
Speaker 2: to cap it here and we've got all of the
Speaker 2: major moons left to talk about. So I think that's
Speaker 2: going to have to be part three of our series
Speaker 2: on Uranus and its satellites.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, hopefully we didn't mess anybody up there, But I
Speaker 1: think the journey will be better for breaking into three
Speaker 1: parts here, and there's gonna be a lot of fun
Speaker 1: stuff to talk about, especially with the major moons of
Speaker 1: Uranus and then getting also into just some of the
Speaker 1: additional Shakespearean.
Speaker 3: References in the naming of these moons.
Speaker 1: In the meantime, if you would like to catch up
Speaker 1: on past episodes of Stuff to Blow Your Mind, including
Speaker 1: our past episodes dealing with the moons of Jupiter and
Speaker 1: Saturn and Mars and so forth. You'll find those in
Speaker 1: the Stuff to Blow your Mind podcast feed, which you'll
Speaker 1: find wherever you get your podcasts. We have core episodes
Speaker 1: of Stuff to Blow Your Mind airing there on Tuesdays
Speaker 1: and Thursdays. On Mondays, we open up the mail bag
Speaker 1: on our listener mail episodes. That's primarily where we read
Speaker 1: emails from people. Occasionally we'll read one in an episode,
Speaker 1: as in today's episode, you know, if it relates to
Speaker 1: the subject matter, but generally it's going to be in
Speaker 1: the Monday episodes. On Wednesdays, we do a short form
Speaker 1: artifact or monster fact episode this week. Of course, it
Speaker 1: ties into our theme of Urinus, so go check that
Speaker 1: out if you haven't. And then on Fridays we set
Speaker 1: aside most serious concerns just talk about a weird film
Speaker 1: on Weird House Cinema. Our selection for this week does
Speaker 1: not have anything to do with the planet Uranus, but
Speaker 1: that it's still.
Speaker 3: A lot of fun. Bye God.
Speaker 2: We'll find a way to tie it in by the
Speaker 2: time Friday comes around. Anyway, Huge thanks as always to
Speaker 2: our audio producer JJ Posway. If you would like to
Speaker 2: get in touch with us with feedback on this episode
Speaker 2: or any other, to suggest a topic for the future,
Speaker 2: or just to say hello, you can email us at
Speaker 2: contact at stuff to Blow your Mind dot com.
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