Name that Star

Sasa Jovicic
Sasa Jovicic
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Topic 197544

If a member finds a new star(s), gets right to her name.

Bernd Machenschalk
Bernd Machenschalk
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Name that Star

The short answer is: Sorry, that won't work. Stars nowadays are "named" only by a standardized system that describes their position in the sky.

This is a longer answer:

You can give any star that you see or otherwise know of any name you like. The problem is to get other people to accept that name as the one to be used in communications.

The astronomical scientific society probably knows more stars than different meaningful names people can think of, so it would be seriously difficult and require quite a lot of communication back and forth (proposals and rejections) to even find a unique name.

Finally the most meaningful property of a star is its position in the sky. Having any other name would require scientists to scan huge tables to find the position of a star from its name and vice versa, and do this many times a day, as only a few would have a memory powerful enough to remember them all.

So nowadays stars are identified by their position in the sky, rather than by "arbitrary" names.

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Logforme
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RE: Having any other name

Quote:
Having any other name would require scientists to scan huge tables to find the position of a star from its name and vice versa


I have heard of this invention, a machine that can automate many data related tasks. Maybe the scientists could use one of them? :)

Bernd Machenschalk
Bernd Machenschalk
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RE: RE: Having any other

Quote:
Quote:
Having any other name would require scientists to scan huge tables to find the position of a star from its name and vice versa

I have heard of this invention, a machine that can automate many data related tasks. Maybe the scientists could use one of them? :)

Yah, probably. But anyway, it's one more step than what's necessary now. And indeed, I was more thinking of a time where such machines weren't that common.

BM

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