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A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
Re: D.H. Sadler on Ephemeris Time, 1954
From: Peter Monta
Date: 2018 Mar 17, 23:07 -0700
Cheers,
Peter
From: Peter Monta
Date: 2018 Mar 17, 23:07 -0700
This museum exhibit sounds pretty cool. Perhaps the only problem was the implementation. Nowadays one would use a couple of large computer monitors showing the Moon and stars, together with truly robust, indestructible, video-arcade-quality joysticks and buttons for the visitors.
The only problem I can see with the instruction sheet is that the time and sextant angles are needlessly given to high precision and then never referenced again. Also, the terms "sextant" and "lunar distance" should first be defined in simple language. The key takeaway for the museumgoer should be that the moon moves against the fixed stars in a predictable and measurable way; that seems like it should be achievable in the space of a few minutes.There's a museum in the Bay Area, the Exploratorium, that has many exhibits of this general interactive flavor. Wonder if they'd be interested? :-)
