An epic post on neutron stars, pulsars, King Kong, ice cream, and NANOGrav's stunning announcement that the International Pulsar Timing Array has finally found the Gravitational Wave Background
Literally wept reading your ode to the miraclulous nature of this achievement. I hope the scientists involved in this heroic undertaking read this, they deserve to bask in such validating recognition. Truly grateful to them and to you for making the discovery so exciting and accessible!
This is my favorite substack. Keep doing everything you are doing. It's amazing to watch and you have a brilliant way of making all this confusing scientific data/jargon easy to understand, even to a simpleton like me. It's still very early on, as you always say, but I'm willing to say that I believe this theory is more plausible than most any other theory of the universe, that I've come across at least. Can't wait for your next post Julian! Joy's post are also great treats while waiting. Egg on. Rock on. Let's keep evolving.
Thank you man, your book “connect” has helped me a lot. Its completely impossible to quantitise the value your views has given me. Even writing this comment, I feel better. Thats howmuch of an impact your toughts on the universe has on me. Thank you! And much love to you and your family!
Nice article, and excellent description of that graph showing the evidence for gravitational waves.
My one quibble: neither Manhattan nor Anchorage gives a good visual picture of the size of a neutron star. Cities are basically 2D, while neutron stars are 3D spheres. So if we overlaid a neutron star on Anchorage, it would penetrate 10 km into the ground and extend 10 km into the sky. On a human scale, neutron stars are big, so I don't think it makes sense to compare them to human-sized artifacts. It's only on the scale of stars and planets that they are tiny. Maybe a better picture of their smallness would come from pointing out that 300 million neutron stars could fit inside the earth.
Ragnarok in a parking lot is now my new favorite catchphrase. Thank you for taking the time and effort to break down these things for those of us that love the universe but don’t have a degree in astrophysics!
Literally wept reading your ode to the miraclulous nature of this achievement. I hope the scientists involved in this heroic undertaking read this, they deserve to bask in such validating recognition. Truly grateful to them and to you for making the discovery so exciting and accessible!
This is my favorite substack. Keep doing everything you are doing. It's amazing to watch and you have a brilliant way of making all this confusing scientific data/jargon easy to understand, even to a simpleton like me. It's still very early on, as you always say, but I'm willing to say that I believe this theory is more plausible than most any other theory of the universe, that I've come across at least. Can't wait for your next post Julian! Joy's post are also great treats while waiting. Egg on. Rock on. Let's keep evolving.
Thank you man, your book “connect” has helped me a lot. Its completely impossible to quantitise the value your views has given me. Even writing this comment, I feel better. Thats howmuch of an impact your toughts on the universe has on me. Thank you! And much love to you and your family!
You are very funny. 😂
Enjoy your ice cream.🤗
Nice article, and excellent description of that graph showing the evidence for gravitational waves.
My one quibble: neither Manhattan nor Anchorage gives a good visual picture of the size of a neutron star. Cities are basically 2D, while neutron stars are 3D spheres. So if we overlaid a neutron star on Anchorage, it would penetrate 10 km into the ground and extend 10 km into the sky. On a human scale, neutron stars are big, so I don't think it makes sense to compare them to human-sized artifacts. It's only on the scale of stars and planets that they are tiny. Maybe a better picture of their smallness would come from pointing out that 300 million neutron stars could fit inside the earth.
Ragnarok in a parking lot is now my new favorite catchphrase. Thank you for taking the time and effort to break down these things for those of us that love the universe but don’t have a degree in astrophysics!