Tag: NASA

Have you ever looked up at a night sky packed with stars? My most vivid memory of a night sky was one where the “stars were so densely packed that you couldn’t make out any familiar constellations.” I had an unexpected philosophical moment during my lunch today when I took 11 well-spent minutes to watch this TEDxPhoenix video about looking up. The speaker, Lucianne Walkowicz, works on NASA’s Kepler mission. Basically, she hunts for planets. What a thing to say at cocktail parties when you introduce yourself: I hunt for planets. Wow. What is even more amazing is that we can all help her hunt for planets. There is a site called Planet Hunters where you can become a citizen scientist and help poke through the data to find planets. And while we sift through data to reveal the treasures sent back by our remote eyes (the telescopes), Lucianne Walkowicz…