WEBVTT - The Moons of Uranus, Part 1 0:00:06.240 --> 0:00:10.959 What's the color of ice? I think about the wedge 0:00:10.960 --> 0:00:13.760 of ice broken from the lid of the lake in winter. 0:00:14.800 --> 0:00:18.680 It goes from dusky white to clear as it leaks 0:00:18.720 --> 0:00:23.400 itself into your hands. But when the glacier shears off 0:00:23.600 --> 0:00:28.320 and unveils its inner face, forged over one hundred thousand years, 0:00:29.280 --> 0:00:34.200 now you see a questioning blue. Now the glacier melts 0:00:34.200 --> 0:00:39.120 into the sea and it's gone, becomes green with algae, 0:00:39.400 --> 0:00:42.800 gray with mud, and a color that was once called 0:00:42.960 --> 0:00:47.320 wine dark. But what is the color of ice? That's 0:00:47.440 --> 0:00:50.920 not the ice we know that lies hidden behind a 0:00:51.000 --> 0:00:55.360 haze and swims in a darkness, crushed by diamond rain. 0:00:56.480 --> 0:01:01.200 We approach our destination along the orbital plain, great wide 0:01:01.360 --> 0:01:02.360 table of the sun. 0:01:03.760 --> 0:01:04.240 But as the. 0:01:04.200 --> 0:01:07.120 Planet comes into view, we're looking at the north pole. 0:01:08.440 --> 0:01:12.679 This is summer. The frozen eye reclines on its flank. 0:01:13.920 --> 0:01:17.039 There's the pole now bathing in the season of light. 0:01:18.160 --> 0:01:22.280 The hidden face the opposite pole now holds cord in 0:01:22.319 --> 0:01:27.120 the bitter cold of the stars. There's something about that blue, 0:01:28.120 --> 0:01:32.039 almost as cold as a thing can be, but joyful 0:01:32.280 --> 0:01:36.240 in the way it devours the sunshine. It reminds us 0:01:36.280 --> 0:01:41.240 of something something on Earth. That brings life, or invites 0:01:41.319 --> 0:01:44.000 the living, or is alive itself. 0:01:52.600 --> 0:01:56.840 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio. 0:02:02.360 --> 0:02:04.320 Hey you, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My 0:02:04.400 --> 0:02:05.600 name is Robert Lamb. 0:02:05.760 --> 0:02:08.360 And I'm Joe McCormick, and today we're going to be 0:02:08.440 --> 0:02:13.560 fulfilling a very common request. Years ago, we did a 0:02:13.600 --> 0:02:16.959 series of episodes where we looked at the moons of 0:02:17.080 --> 0:02:20.040 various planets in the Solar System, the moons of Jupiter, 0:02:20.240 --> 0:02:23.720 the moons of Saturn, the moons of Mars, and I 0:02:23.720 --> 0:02:26.080 think we even did one even though Venus doesn't have 0:02:26.160 --> 0:02:26.480 a moon. 0:02:26.520 --> 0:02:26.960 We did an. 0:02:26.919 --> 0:02:31.120 Episode sort of about the alternative universe where there would 0:02:31.120 --> 0:02:34.119 be a moon of Venus something like that. But today 0:02:34.360 --> 0:02:36.760 we're going to be talking about the moons of the 0:02:36.880 --> 0:02:40.639 seventh planet in our Solar System. In this first episode 0:02:40.680 --> 0:02:42.480 in the series, I think we're going to be focusing 0:02:42.520 --> 0:02:45.760 mainly on the planet itself, and then we will get 0:02:45.800 --> 0:02:49.040 more into the moons in the subsequent part or parts. 0:02:49.600 --> 0:02:52.600 And since this is an audio medium, the question of 0:02:52.639 --> 0:02:56.000 how to pronounce that planet's name is unavoidable. I thought 0:02:56.000 --> 0:02:58.440 we should tackle it right here at the beginning, because 0:02:58.440 --> 0:03:00.760 I know we have said it moultiple ways on the 0:03:00.760 --> 0:03:03.880 podcast before. I think I have said it multiple ways before, 0:03:04.200 --> 0:03:06.840 and the only thing to do is give ourselves preemptive, 0:03:06.919 --> 0:03:09.560 full absolution to pronounce it any which way we want. 0:03:09.960 --> 0:03:11.880 But basically, so I was trying to figure out, like 0:03:11.960 --> 0:03:14.720 what is actually the right way, and I think it 0:03:14.760 --> 0:03:19.160 goes like this. If you listen to astronomers and planetary 0:03:19.240 --> 0:03:22.720 scientists talk about this planet, most often you will hear 0:03:22.800 --> 0:03:27.000 them pronounce it urinus, basically the word urine and then 0:03:27.080 --> 0:03:30.400 the word us. On the other hand, there's sort of 0:03:30.400 --> 0:03:33.600 a dos Boot situation going on with this planet name, 0:03:33.720 --> 0:03:37.760 like for the most part, like the scientists might say urinus, 0:03:37.920 --> 0:03:41.040 but for the most part, just people say uranus, you know, 0:03:41.120 --> 0:03:42.880 at least they do in America. I don't know if 0:03:42.920 --> 0:03:46.400 it's different in other English speaking cultures or other languages 0:03:46.680 --> 0:03:49.760 where the name would be you know, a direct homophone. 0:03:49.760 --> 0:03:52.640 But anyway, Uranus is. It's sort of part of the culture, 0:03:52.680 --> 0:03:54.280 it's part of the world we grew up in, and 0:03:54.320 --> 0:03:56.680 there's really no fixing that. So I think that will 0:03:56.720 --> 0:03:58.640 probably come out of our mouths as well. 0:03:59.240 --> 0:04:02.680 Well. The tragedy of it is that I feel like 0:04:02.760 --> 0:04:05.880 most of the time. When you hear uranus as the 0:04:05.920 --> 0:04:09.680 pronunciation for the planet Uranus, it is coming out of 0:04:09.680 --> 0:04:12.120 the mouth of, say a of a talk show host 0:04:12.720 --> 0:04:15.560 or you know, late night news situation, a little bit 0:04:15.560 --> 0:04:18.320 of t he. Yeah, I mean not just a little 0:04:18.320 --> 0:04:20.960 bit of t he, but like a front loaded, like 0:04:21.080 --> 0:04:24.279 dump truck quality of t he to the to the 0:04:24.920 --> 0:04:27.560 to the detriment of whatever the actual news is. Like, 0:04:27.640 --> 0:04:32.480 it could be announced tomorrow that life was discovered on Uranus, 0:04:33.040 --> 0:04:35.960 but the the the late night talk show hosts would 0:04:35.960 --> 0:04:39.479 say you're anus, everyone would laugh and completely forget that 0:04:39.640 --> 0:04:44.000 the most breathtaking news in the history of our species 0:04:44.120 --> 0:04:50.880 was just revealed. Because Uranus if pronounced slightly incorrectly, I'm sorry. 0:04:50.880 --> 0:04:52.960 From my point of view, it sounds like you're saying 0:04:53.080 --> 0:04:54.440 somebody's anus. 0:04:54.560 --> 0:04:59.760 Right, a benevolent jellyfish inhabit the clouds. It's it's very interesting, 0:04:59.839 --> 0:05:03.040 But the main thing is we did successfully probe uranus. 0:05:03.120 --> 0:05:08.280 Haha. Yeah, yeah, So it's it's I mean, especially for 0:05:08.320 --> 0:05:13.120 a professional space science communicators, people working for NASA and 0:05:13.160 --> 0:05:15.279 so forth. I don't know, I guess it probably comes 0:05:15.320 --> 0:05:17.679 to the point where you've got to just embrace it, yeah, 0:05:17.720 --> 0:05:20.919 and enroll with it, but it also there has to 0:05:20.960 --> 0:05:23.720 still be some at least low level of just fixed 0:05:23.720 --> 0:05:25.640 frustration over the situation. 0:05:26.200 --> 0:05:29.279 I think it's one of those things that becomes annoying 0:05:29.320 --> 0:05:33.000 and then it comes full circle and becomes funny again. Yeah, 0:05:33.040 --> 0:05:36.200 but for another wrinkle, we have the apparently correct uranus 0:05:36.440 --> 0:05:39.640 and then we have the common uranus. But according to 0:05:39.640 --> 0:05:43.280 an interview I saw with the American physicist Kevin Grazier, 0:05:43.400 --> 0:05:46.440 who writes a lot about space and about science fiction 0:05:46.560 --> 0:05:49.479 from a science perspective, he was the editor and a 0:05:49.560 --> 0:05:52.080 contributing author on the science of Doune, which we have 0:05:52.120 --> 0:05:54.520 talked about on the show before. He says in one 0:05:54.520 --> 0:05:58.840 interview that it technically it is uranus. So you know, 0:05:59.360 --> 0:06:02.000 maybe he's right, But apparently nobody says it that way. 0:06:02.680 --> 0:06:04.720 I mean, it starts with everyone who wants to start 0:06:04.720 --> 0:06:09.120 pronouncing it differently. You know, say uranus sounds good to. 0:06:09.080 --> 0:06:13.159 Me, so you say uranus. I say uranus. Most experts 0:06:13.200 --> 0:06:16.200 say urinus. But in any case, it's gonna be fine. 0:06:16.240 --> 0:06:19.200 We all know which planet we're talking about. It's number seven. 0:06:19.440 --> 0:06:23.480 It's big, it's blue, it's cold, it's beautiful, and it 0:06:23.560 --> 0:06:26.000 has a heck of a lot of moons. 0:06:26.120 --> 0:06:28.560 Yeah, and and the fair amount of mystery surrounding it. 0:06:28.640 --> 0:06:32.400 You know, in this episode we're venturing farther out into 0:06:32.480 --> 0:06:36.640 the void here, so we're gonna encounter some more space 0:06:36.720 --> 0:06:39.680 to wonder. We'll also, I think eventually be getting to 0:06:39.680 --> 0:06:43.440 a fourth pronunciation for your old boy, So so strap in, 0:06:43.960 --> 0:06:47.359 but Urinus. Here are some of the basics for anyone 0:06:47.360 --> 0:06:49.279 who needs a refresher, and I think we can all 0:06:49.320 --> 0:06:52.560 deal with a refresher. Uranus is the seventh planet from 0:06:52.560 --> 0:06:55.320 the Sun, and in size it has the third largest 0:06:55.320 --> 0:06:58.640 diameter in the Solar System. It's about four times larger 0:06:58.680 --> 0:07:03.000 than Earth in diama. Yes, While Uranus and its neighbor 0:07:03.040 --> 0:07:07.840 Neptune were previously classified as gas giants like Jupiter and Saturn, 0:07:07.880 --> 0:07:09.600 it became clear in the nineteen nineties so they are 0:07:09.640 --> 0:07:14.960 actually a subset of gas giants ice giants. So most 0:07:15.000 --> 0:07:17.360 of the planet's mass is believed to be a hot 0:07:17.400 --> 0:07:20.400 and dense fluid of icy materials around a small rocky core. 0:07:20.880 --> 0:07:25.800 Its atmosphere is mostly molecular hydrogen and atomic helium, and 0:07:25.880 --> 0:07:27.960 there also seems to be a small amount of methane. 0:07:28.400 --> 0:07:32.720 It experiences the equivalent of a seventeen hour day like 0:07:32.760 --> 0:07:36.040 a seventeen hour seventeen hours of Earth day, and an 0:07:36.120 --> 0:07:37.800 eighty four year solar orbit. 0:07:38.000 --> 0:07:40.200 Now, you mentioned that most of the planet's mass is 0:07:40.280 --> 0:07:44.600 this relatively hot and dense fluid of icy materials. But 0:07:45.000 --> 0:07:47.520 that should not give you the wrong impression about the 0:07:47.520 --> 0:07:51.640 planet overall, because an interesting fact about Uranus is that 0:07:51.720 --> 0:07:55.840 it is the coldest planet in the Solar System, even 0:07:55.920 --> 0:07:59.800 though it is not the farthest from the Sun. Neptune 0:07:59.800 --> 0:08:02.400 is much farther away from the Sun. I think something 0:08:02.440 --> 0:08:06.160 like ten times the distance from the Earth to the 0:08:06.200 --> 0:08:10.120 Sun farther away than Urinus is, and yet it is 0:08:10.200 --> 0:08:13.000 actually a little bit warmer. On average, the temperature in 0:08:13.000 --> 0:08:16.240 the upper atmosphere of Urinus reaches negative two hundred and 0:08:16.240 --> 0:08:20.240 twenty four degrees celsius, colder than equivalent measures on Neptune, 0:08:20.280 --> 0:08:23.160 which are about ten degrees celsius higher. I want to 0:08:23.200 --> 0:08:25.560 come back in a little bit to why that might be. 0:08:25.920 --> 0:08:29.280 But yeah, not the farthest away, but the coldest. 0:08:29.480 --> 0:08:31.480 It's cold out there. It's lonely out there. 0:08:31.640 --> 0:08:34.400 Now, you mentioned that it takes eighty four years for 0:08:34.559 --> 0:08:38.040 Uranus to orbit the Sun once. That means since its 0:08:38.120 --> 0:08:41.320 discovery in seventeen eighty one, which we will narrate in 0:08:41.320 --> 0:08:44.720 a few minutes. Here, less than three full years have 0:08:44.800 --> 0:08:49.520 elapsed on Uranus. It's seventeen eighty one plus eighty four 0:08:49.559 --> 0:08:52.800 Earth years is eighteen sixty five plus another eighty four 0:08:52.840 --> 0:08:55.840 is nineteen forty nine, and then it will be another 0:08:56.000 --> 0:08:58.960 full year on that planet. When it's twenty thirty three 0:08:59.040 --> 0:09:03.199 on Earth. Calendar pages tear away quite a bit slower there. 0:09:04.400 --> 0:09:07.400 This longer year also gives you an idea of how 0:09:07.559 --> 0:09:11.439 far away from the Sun this planet is. You know. 0:09:11.720 --> 0:09:13.800 This comes up on the show a good bit. When 0:09:13.840 --> 0:09:17.079 we make visual representations of the Solar System. One thing 0:09:17.120 --> 0:09:21.120 that's pretty much always impossible to capture is the real 0:09:21.600 --> 0:09:26.120 relative size and distance between objects. There really, I think 0:09:26.280 --> 0:09:31.400 is no convincing way to represent the real distance between 0:09:31.679 --> 0:09:35.520 planets in the Solar System within the same image and 0:09:35.640 --> 0:09:40.280 have it make intuitive sense. So let's talk about the 0:09:40.280 --> 0:09:43.079 scaling up of distances as one moves further out from 0:09:43.120 --> 0:09:46.040 the Sun. The average distance from Earth to the Sun 0:09:46.280 --> 0:09:50.360 is a commonly used measurement. It's called an astronomical unit, 0:09:50.440 --> 0:09:52.960 or AU for short, and it's equivalent to about one 0:09:53.040 --> 0:09:57.040 hundred and forty nine point six million kilometers, pulling up 0:09:57.120 --> 0:10:01.000 numbers cited by NASA JPL for these other planets. Both 0:10:01.040 --> 0:10:04.640 Mercury and Venus, of course, are within one AU, so 0:10:04.760 --> 0:10:08.040 Mercury is about zero point four and Venus is about 0:10:08.160 --> 0:10:11.520 zero point seven AU from the Sun. They're both closer 0:10:11.559 --> 0:10:15.480 than Us. Mars is about one point five AU, so 0:10:15.520 --> 0:10:17.680 about one point one and a half times the distance 0:10:17.720 --> 0:10:21.760 from Us to the Sun. Suddenly Jupiter is more than 0:10:21.880 --> 0:10:27.079 five times the distance. Saturn is nine point five AU, 0:10:27.360 --> 0:10:31.760 and then Urinus is suddenly nineteen point two AU, So 0:10:31.840 --> 0:10:36.400 the distances multiply greatly the further you go out, and 0:10:36.440 --> 0:10:41.000 then Neptune is about thirty so another another ten basically 0:10:41.760 --> 0:10:44.240 sort of ten AU between Saturn and Uranus, and then 0:10:44.280 --> 0:10:46.280 another ten between Uranus and Neptune. 0:10:47.440 --> 0:10:50.240 Yeah, So venturing into into the outer Solar system, you know, 0:10:50.280 --> 0:10:53.840 it's like it's like leaving an urban center and traveling 0:10:53.920 --> 0:10:58.439 out into the boonies. The gas stations that you you 0:10:58.480 --> 0:11:02.200 would venture into or are are farther and farther apart, 0:11:03.960 --> 0:11:06.560 and you begin to wonder where your next tank is 0:11:06.600 --> 0:11:07.280 going to come from. 0:11:07.600 --> 0:11:10.800 Yeah, so it's always impossible to reckon the real scale 0:11:10.800 --> 0:11:12.640 of space. And the funny thing is, this is just 0:11:12.679 --> 0:11:15.560 our Solar system. You know, this is like the things 0:11:15.559 --> 0:11:19.000 that are actually relatively very close together from a space perspective. 0:11:19.440 --> 0:11:22.640 Yeah, absolutely, all right, So let's see some more facts 0:11:22.679 --> 0:11:27.760 about Urinus itself. It has thirteen rings, and like Venus, 0:11:27.840 --> 0:11:31.000 it rotates east to west. It also rotates at a 0:11:31.040 --> 0:11:34.120 near ninety degree angle from the plane of its orbit, 0:11:34.400 --> 0:11:36.679 so this gives it the appearance of spinning on its side. 0:11:37.000 --> 0:11:39.760 That is a very interesting and unique fact about Uranus. 0:11:39.880 --> 0:11:42.520 So if you can picture it, all of the other 0:11:43.400 --> 0:11:45.800 planets in the Solar system, you know, they all have 0:11:46.000 --> 0:11:49.120 some degree of axial tilt, but they more or less 0:11:49.240 --> 0:11:51.680 spin like a top, with the north and south poles 0:11:51.720 --> 0:11:54.199 facing more or less perpendicular to the solar plane. So 0:11:54.240 --> 0:11:56.280 you can imagine the Sun in the middle of the 0:11:56.320 --> 0:11:59.439 Solar system, and then there is a disc of flat 0:11:59.480 --> 0:12:02.200 discs spreading out from the Sun that all of the 0:12:02.240 --> 0:12:05.640 planets orbit on. Those planets have some tilt, but they 0:12:05.640 --> 0:12:09.079 more or less rotate so that their equator is in 0:12:09.120 --> 0:12:11.480 line with that plane, and their north and south poles 0:12:11.760 --> 0:12:15.280 are at right angles to it. Urinus is the exception. 0:12:15.880 --> 0:12:19.760 It lies on its side Its axial tilt is something 0:12:19.800 --> 0:12:23.680 like ninety seven or ninety eight degrees, so almost perfectly 0:12:23.880 --> 0:12:27.800 sideways from the perspective of the solar plane. Its equator 0:12:28.440 --> 0:12:32.480 rotates up and down, and its poles point to the sides, 0:12:32.640 --> 0:12:36.280 which has the strange effect that its seasons as it 0:12:36.400 --> 0:12:40.439 orbits the Sun throughout its year, mean that the poles 0:12:41.280 --> 0:12:45.920 get like many Earth years of light and darkness as 0:12:45.960 --> 0:12:50.040 the year progresses. So for forty two years, its north 0:12:50.080 --> 0:12:53.319 pole will be in relative sunshine and its south pole 0:12:53.360 --> 0:12:56.360 will be in relative darkness, and then it flips around 0:12:56.400 --> 0:12:59.679 for the other season. It's a weird planet, very strange. 0:13:00.040 --> 0:13:04.360 This actually comes back to the question of why Uranus 0:13:04.600 --> 0:13:07.760 is the coldest planet, even though it's not the farthest 0:13:07.800 --> 0:13:11.560 from the Sun. How could a planet closer to the 0:13:11.600 --> 0:13:14.920 Sun be colder than one farther away. The answer is 0:13:14.920 --> 0:13:18.319 that planets give off their own heat, and compared to most, 0:13:18.480 --> 0:13:22.760 Urinus gives off very little. So one major idea proposed 0:13:22.800 --> 0:13:26.960 to explain why Urinus gives off so little intrinsic heat, 0:13:27.720 --> 0:13:31.360 is the same as the reason it, unlike other planets 0:13:31.400 --> 0:13:35.520 in the Solar System, rotates on its side. Scientists think 0:13:35.559 --> 0:13:38.560 that billions of years ago during the formation of the 0:13:38.600 --> 0:13:44.040 Solar System, Urinus very likely suffered a colossal impact from 0:13:44.120 --> 0:13:48.600 a roughly Earth sized or Mars sized object, which was 0:13:48.640 --> 0:13:52.040 able to both knock it out of its original orientation 0:13:52.320 --> 0:13:56.720 and give it its its backwards rotation pattern opposite the 0:13:56.720 --> 0:13:59.640 rest of the Solar System and its a sideways orientation 0:14:00.000 --> 0:14:04.360 sways axial tilt, but also to blast away much of 0:14:04.400 --> 0:14:08.080 its mass and energy, leaving it with less intrinsic heat 0:14:08.520 --> 0:14:12.200 than even other ice giants like Neptune, and so if 0:14:12.240 --> 0:14:15.200 this impact hypothesis is correct, it would explain much of 0:14:15.240 --> 0:14:18.960 what we know about Uranus, why it's so cold, why 0:14:19.000 --> 0:14:22.040 it's tilted, and why its rotation is the way it is. 0:14:22.840 --> 0:14:26.440 One of the most striking things about Uranus is its appearance, 0:14:26.520 --> 0:14:30.440 which can vary based on seasonal conditions. But in the 0:14:30.480 --> 0:14:34.880 famous true color images assembled from what was captured by 0:14:34.880 --> 0:14:38.720 the narrow angle camera of Voyager two in nineteen eighty six, 0:14:39.520 --> 0:14:44.400 the planet looks like an almost perfectly uniform field of 0:14:44.520 --> 0:14:50.000 pale blue green color, like a featureless Cyan ocean of fog. 0:14:50.840 --> 0:14:53.240 And this is especially strange when you think about it 0:14:53.280 --> 0:14:56.480 in contrast to the sort of banded surface of Jupiter, 0:14:56.800 --> 0:15:00.680 it's just ripping with visible storms, or or like the 0:15:00.720 --> 0:15:04.000 sandy stripes you see on Saturn with that big, nasty 0:15:04.040 --> 0:15:07.200 polar hexagon. The truth is Urinus is not always as 0:15:07.240 --> 0:15:11.000 calm looking as it is in these famous photos. For 0:15:11.040 --> 0:15:15.320 one example, I found a February seventh, twenty nineteen NASA 0:15:15.360 --> 0:15:20.720 news article by Ray Villard and Claire Seravia noting photos 0:15:20.760 --> 0:15:23.240 that had been taken by the Hubble Space Telescope of 0:15:23.320 --> 0:15:28.120 visible storms on both Uranus and Neptune. And in these pictures, 0:15:28.160 --> 0:15:32.200 the storm on Urinus appears as a gigantic white dome 0:15:32.280 --> 0:15:36.120 of clouds swarming over the planet's north pole, and the 0:15:36.160 --> 0:15:39.120 authors note that this gigantic weather pattern might have been 0:15:39.200 --> 0:15:44.280 formed by seasonal changes of flow in the atmosphere, because remember, 0:15:44.360 --> 0:15:46.640 the planet is tilted on its side, so as the 0:15:46.720 --> 0:15:50.880 seasons change, the part of the planet facing the direction 0:15:51.000 --> 0:15:54.200 of the sun goes from a polar region that basically 0:15:54.400 --> 0:15:57.560 remains in direct sunlight for many, many Earth years at 0:15:57.560 --> 0:16:02.080 a time to an equatorial reaon that rotates through standard 0:16:02.200 --> 0:16:05.400 day night cycles like Earth does, except it's rotating on 0:16:05.480 --> 0:16:09.320 its side, and these drastic changes in seasons may give 0:16:09.440 --> 0:16:13.120 rise to major changes in the flow of the atmosphere, 0:16:13.600 --> 0:16:17.600 resulting in weather like this. I was reading an article 0:16:17.800 --> 0:16:22.320 by the astrophysics blogger Ethan Seagull which made the point 0:16:22.320 --> 0:16:27.680 that the Voyager two images are probably especially featureless because 0:16:27.840 --> 0:16:32.040 they were taken during the solstice on Uranus, when the 0:16:32.160 --> 0:16:35.760 continuous rays of sunlight had been falling on one of 0:16:35.840 --> 0:16:39.520 the planet's polar regions for many earth years, and so 0:16:39.640 --> 0:16:45.040 this regime of NonStop polar daytime created a haze of 0:16:45.200 --> 0:16:47.440 methane in the upper atmosphere. So up at the top 0:16:47.480 --> 0:16:50.360 of the atmosphere, there's all this methane up there, which 0:16:50.600 --> 0:16:54.800 both masks the clouds and the visible weather patterns below, 0:16:54.880 --> 0:16:57.560 so you can't really see what's going on beneath all 0:16:57.560 --> 0:17:01.080 that methane, and it absorbs red light, leading to the 0:17:01.120 --> 0:17:05.120 pale blue green color that we can't stop staring at. 0:17:05.680 --> 0:17:08.359 By contrast, when you see photos of Uranus taken by 0:17:08.400 --> 0:17:12.920 telescopes during its equinox, you will see more defined atmospheric 0:17:13.000 --> 0:17:16.200 bands and storms and clouds, not as dramatic at all 0:17:16.560 --> 0:17:19.280 as what you'd see on Jupiter, but the stuff is there, 0:17:19.880 --> 0:17:23.720 so Uranus is not actually always featureless. This seems to 0:17:23.760 --> 0:17:27.400 be a function of when and how it was photographed 0:17:27.480 --> 0:17:32.159 by Voyager two. But in those voyager images it is 0:17:32.560 --> 0:17:38.840 deeply striking, almost haunting, how frozen and unperturbed and uniform 0:17:39.000 --> 0:17:40.720 the planet appears. 0:17:40.840 --> 0:17:44.040 Very interesting. Yeah, yeah, it's a it's there's a there's 0:17:44.080 --> 0:17:45.800 a calmness. So it's a call like you look at 0:17:45.840 --> 0:17:48.919 images of of of Urinus and it's it's calming compared 0:17:48.960 --> 0:17:52.040 to like the the the the the evident kind of 0:17:52.200 --> 0:17:54.200 complexity and chaos of Jupiter. 0:17:54.600 --> 0:18:01.720 Absolutely colder, stiller, more uniform, it'll even lying on its side, 0:18:01.760 --> 0:18:04.639 and not to get to anthropomorphic, but as if dead. 0:18:05.040 --> 0:18:07.159 Yeah, and there's also a sense of the sky to it, 0:18:07.200 --> 0:18:09.639 which is fitting. We'll come back to that in a second. 0:18:09.680 --> 0:18:15.280 But yeah, mostly though this episode, we're getting into the 0:18:15.320 --> 0:18:19.280 moons of Uranus and it has a healthy number of 0:18:19.359 --> 0:18:22.760 moons twenty seven known moons. This is a good n 0:18:22.960 --> 0:18:25.920 this is a number that we can handle, we can 0:18:25.960 --> 0:18:29.280 actually name, I think, all the moons of Urinus, where as, 0:18:29.320 --> 0:18:32.600 of course there are some really robust moon counts for 0:18:32.760 --> 0:18:35.880 Jupiter and Saturn. So things are leveling out a little 0:18:35.880 --> 0:18:39.240 bit for us as we continue our journey out through 0:18:39.280 --> 0:18:40.160 the Solar system. 0:18:40.520 --> 0:18:42.240 Yeah, I think this is more of a fair fight. 0:18:42.320 --> 0:18:44.280 I don't think we said the names of all the 0:18:44.320 --> 0:18:45.560 moons of Jupiter or Saturn. 0:18:45.880 --> 0:18:46.200 Right. 0:18:46.320 --> 0:18:48.800 Well, we can't promise in this series that we're going 0:18:48.840 --> 0:18:52.399 to like discuss all of Urinus's moons deeply, because some 0:18:52.480 --> 0:18:54.240 of them are just kind of rocks that I don't 0:18:54.280 --> 0:18:57.000 know how much there is to say about them. I 0:18:57.000 --> 0:18:59.280 don't mean to be offensive if you're a devotee of 0:18:59.280 --> 0:19:02.719 any particular Bianca or something, but yeah, we will have 0:19:02.760 --> 0:19:04.199 more to say about some than others. 0:19:04.680 --> 0:19:06.680 Yeah, and there's just not a lot to say about 0:19:06.680 --> 0:19:10.800 some of them, just because we just haven't explored Uranus 0:19:11.040 --> 0:19:13.800 or its moons as much. We've only had the one 0:19:13.920 --> 0:19:17.800 voyager two fly by, really, and that's it, basically. 0:19:17.840 --> 0:19:17.959 Know. 0:19:18.080 --> 0:19:20.840 In addition to things like Hubble analysis and so. 0:19:20.760 --> 0:19:33.000 Forth, Before we explore more about the planet and its moons, 0:19:33.000 --> 0:19:34.880 I think we should take a little bit of time 0:19:34.960 --> 0:19:40.320 to discuss the origins of this name, the mythological moniker 0:19:40.400 --> 0:19:43.880 that has caused so much pleasure and pain among astronomers worldwide. 0:19:44.200 --> 0:19:46.480 Yeah, that's right, and you know, it could have been 0:19:47.160 --> 0:19:50.399 it could have been weirder in some respects because it 0:19:50.440 --> 0:19:53.520 took about seventy years for this to be firmly decided 0:19:53.600 --> 0:19:59.359 upon that, yes, this planet is Uranus. William Herschel wanted 0:19:59.400 --> 0:20:01.840 to name it after King George the Third, so he 0:20:01.880 --> 0:20:06.520 wanted to call it essentially the George Star Georgian Sidas, 0:20:07.320 --> 0:20:10.920 but luckily we didn't. Can you imagine if if that 0:20:11.119 --> 0:20:14.040 was the we had all these you know, these Roman 0:20:14.080 --> 0:20:18.240 deity names, and then George Starr amazing presumably not. 0:20:18.400 --> 0:20:20.359 I've got a story to tell about William Herschel in 0:20:20.840 --> 0:20:22.960 a little bit here, but yeah, wanting to name it 0:20:23.000 --> 0:20:26.120 after King George the third, He's just forever in the 0:20:26.160 --> 0:20:29.840 heavens that that would be hilarious. Yeah, I don't know 0:20:29.880 --> 0:20:32.800 what the modern equivalent like this is the this is 0:20:32.880 --> 0:20:34.480 the gerald Ford planet. 0:20:36.040 --> 0:20:38.160 I mean it is. There's always gonna be something weird 0:20:38.160 --> 0:20:43.120 about naming these astral bodies after things and a given culture, 0:20:44.119 --> 0:20:46.000 and we'll run into some of that again when we 0:20:46.040 --> 0:20:48.920 get into some of the literary names that are invoked 0:20:48.920 --> 0:20:51.760 in the moons. But but yeah, I just can't imagine 0:20:51.800 --> 0:20:55.520 this being the George Star. So the namesake here is 0:20:55.880 --> 0:20:59.800 the Greek primordial deity of the sky urin Us or 0:20:59.800 --> 0:21:03.200 I think I think more correctly, or it would be Urunas. Right. 0:21:03.240 --> 0:21:04.840 We've talked about this before on the show. 0:21:05.160 --> 0:21:06.920 I don't know if i'd stand by that. I've heard 0:21:06.960 --> 0:21:09.840 it said that way too, So we've got Urinus is 0:21:09.840 --> 0:21:14.959 what most astronomers and planetary scientists say. The lay public, 0:21:15.000 --> 0:21:18.120 at least in the US, says Uranus. We got one 0:21:18.160 --> 0:21:21.680 interview with the guy who says, technically it's Uranus, and yes, 0:21:21.960 --> 0:21:23.760 I've also heard uranus. 0:21:24.000 --> 0:21:28.240 Yeah, though, I love Uruanas. But I'm gonna feel like 0:21:28.240 --> 0:21:31.280 a weirdo if i start calling it that just among 0:21:31.320 --> 0:21:35.560 friends and family or even on the podcast. So I'm 0:21:35.600 --> 0:21:37.439 just gonna have to stick with you. Okay, let's do 0:21:37.480 --> 0:21:41.440 it all right, So who is we can say Urunas? 0:21:41.480 --> 0:21:43.440 Though when we're referring to the god, I think maybe 0:21:43.440 --> 0:21:48.560 that's a good way of differentiating it. Here Greek primordial 0:21:48.600 --> 0:21:51.159 deity of the sky and both a child and a 0:21:51.200 --> 0:21:54.639 consort of Gaya, the parent and a parent of Titans 0:21:55.200 --> 0:21:58.639 of the Cyclopses, as well as the Hecataneries, the one 0:21:58.720 --> 0:22:02.520 hundred handed warriors who don't get enough I think attention 0:22:03.119 --> 0:22:05.800 in the various wars of the gods, perhaps just because 0:22:05.840 --> 0:22:09.240 they're hard to illustrate. It's hard to maybe imagine what 0:22:09.280 --> 0:22:11.879 one hundred handed monster looks like. 0:22:12.400 --> 0:22:14.359 I don't know, you can imagine two hands is just 0:22:14.440 --> 0:22:15.560 kind of multiply from there. 0:22:15.960 --> 0:22:19.480 Yeah, just like an absurdity of goro coming at you. There. 0:22:19.960 --> 0:22:24.560 What's the Latin prefix for fifty? Like the quinta deca goro? 0:22:26.520 --> 0:22:29.640 I don't know that sounds good. Okay, that's a lot 0:22:29.680 --> 0:22:33.160 of button inputs though, for the punches. Anyway, Uranas is 0:22:33.240 --> 0:22:35.840 the one who stands on high. He is the rain maker. 0:22:36.440 --> 0:22:39.840 Among his many children was the titan Cronus, who, at 0:22:39.880 --> 0:22:45.600 Gaya's urging, rebelled against his father, And of course Cronus 0:22:45.600 --> 0:22:48.320 famously castrated his father in the myths and cast the 0:22:48.320 --> 0:22:51.640 bloody pieces over his shoulder and ushered in a new 0:22:51.760 --> 0:22:55.800 age of gods. Cronus would of course, eventually be overthrown 0:22:55.840 --> 0:22:57.600 by his own son Zeus. 0:22:58.080 --> 0:23:00.480 Okay, well, here I thought, this is a good opportune, ever, 0:23:00.560 --> 0:23:05.760 reading from Hesiod's Theogony to explain what happened to old Urinus. Here, Oh, 0:23:05.840 --> 0:23:09.119 let's happy, Okay. This is the version hosted on Harvard 0:23:09.200 --> 0:23:12.040 Center for Hellenic Studies website. This is a translation by 0:23:12.080 --> 0:23:15.320 Naggie and banks. Oh, and it's gonna mention Earth and Sky. 0:23:15.400 --> 0:23:17.960 I think Earth would be the goddess Gaia, and Sky 0:23:18.080 --> 0:23:22.199 would be Urinus. Here yeah, Hesiod writes, Now monstrous strength 0:23:22.280 --> 0:23:26.080 is powerful joined with vast size. Four of as many 0:23:26.119 --> 0:23:28.840 sons as were born of Earth and Sky. They were 0:23:28.880 --> 0:23:32.000 the fiercest and were hated by their father from the 0:23:32.119 --> 0:23:35.119 very first. As soon as any of these was born, 0:23:35.400 --> 0:23:37.719 he would hide them all and not send them up 0:23:37.720 --> 0:23:40.640 to the light. In a cave of the Earth and 0:23:40.800 --> 0:23:45.240 Sky exulted over the work of mischief, while huge Earth 0:23:45.400 --> 0:23:49.520