Philip Massey

I made a thing! It's a mosaic of 71 images we took of the SMC. And yes, we are planning to finish the northern section (at top) in a couple of weeks.

In my book, the 2009 Star Trek reboot movie is the best time travel movie---where the time travel is not the central theme but makes the story possible. For that matter, DejaVu is vastly underrated in my opinion. Just saying.

Of course, Star Trek fans know the answer to this: you change the conditions of the test.

I had reason to reflect on the Trolley Problem today. I admit everything I know about moral philosophy I learned from Chidi on The Good Place. Do you continue on course and injure many, or change course and injure one? Many would say the latter, but others would argue neither is moral.

Ah! Nevermind, I figured it out. Turns out I had two kickstarter accounts, and I was automatically logged in as the wrong one. Once I fixed that, it recognized me as a "backer" and all was right with the world. Well, okay, NOT all right with the world, but at least I'll get the book! Thanks!

I'm sorry, but I'm having problems too. I made a generous pledge, but I get daily notices saying I need to add an address. But when I go to the page it links to, and adds my address, it the wants me to pay $38 for the book. Clearly I'm doing something wrong..But it's kind of messed up.

The fallacies behind the cult of Loeb How media hype and misunderstanding fuel pseudoscientific fascination  Introduction The word “cult” is used here in the sense given by...

The most insightful discussion I seen on the Loeb and his insertion into the 3I/Atlas apparition:

tinieblasyestrellas.blogspot.com/2025/11/the-...

Not to be pedantic, but whether the earth was approaching or moving away from Jupiter is irrelevant. It had to do with when the earth was nearer or further away from Jupiter.

Meet the "alebrije." This figurine was presented to me at IAU402's conference dinner, for having won the poster contest. It's a beautiful piece of Mexican folk art. Its origins dates back to the 1930s, when an ill Pedro Linares had a dream of one these that kept repeating the word "alebrijes."

Question: it's been a few years since I did a conference poster. I really like the cloth posters, so I don't have to schlep a poster tube to the meeting. What poster companies have you had good experiences with recently?

I have mixed feelings about press releases, but our historian did a nice job of writing this up. What's missing from the KAFF condensation is that the work was done with @pennylr.bsky.social , @kneugent.bsky.social , and Nidia Morrell.

Well. I'm convinced.

I've been working on the draft of a new paper. I was re-reading a section I'd started months ago this morning and was pretty amused to find that I had written "The second problem is how the fuck are we ever going to assign physical properties
to these suckers?" I guess I should reword this.

I had coffee this am with a friend, Meghan, and I was telling her about my run-in with someone at work a few years back, a meeting which ended with them throwing me out of their office. Meghan looked thoughtful, and said, "You know, Phil: people either love you or hate you." She's not wrong.

They had little tags on them that read:

Today I came pretty close to discovering if I have limits. Fortunately the Romulans surrendered before the shields collapsed and we had a warp-core breach. Still. It was closer than I liked.

Every time I get my old copy of "Text Book on Spherical Astronomy" off the shelf, I hear the theme song to Get Smart start playing in my head.

Deidre was told yesterday that her somewhat pointed questions might be considered by some to be problematically rude, which made me realize how great a name that would be for a rock band.

I'd like a moment of silence for the units on 2MASS zeropoints: watts per cm^2 per micron.

When I went on my firstbackpack with Deidre in the Phillips Mountains in Alaska, I prepared by reading that book. The part where he finally relaxes about what to take into the backcountry realizing that "all of the important decisions would be made by the bear" has become a metaphor for many things.

The 1977 version is great, but the I was enthralled by the 1968 version, narrated by a woman with a delightful British accent. It turns out that the narrator was Judith Bronowski. She also narrated the Ascent of Man, which was written by her father, the mathematician and biologist Jacob Bronowski.

Don't Believe Him Podcast Episode · The Ezra Klein Show · 02/02/2025 · 14m

National events have really overwhelmed me. I found this 14-minute commentary by Ezra Klein helped me better understand what is really happening. Maybe you'll benefit from it too. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/d...

I had what appeared to be an incomprehensible spectrum taken with HST: H-gamma was strongly in emission but H-delta was strongly in absorption. I had been using the standard STIS pipeline but it's in a crowded field. I re-extracted with IRAF and indeed it now all makes sense. Whew!

I still don't know what you mean by "the data"; we published the results in the paper.That was kind of the whole point. Anyway,I wasn't involved in the modeling; that was all done by the lead author.Finally, there's a difference between asking a question ("Does the DM matter?") and chasing someone.

A different DM isn't going to affect the temperatures. Deriving the temperature from photometry will depend upon the amount of reddening, but otherwise a 4000 degree light bulb will have the same colors independent of distance. Those new distances are no better than what we used anyway.

Imagine you wanted to grow some vegetables. Would you write to a gardener and say, "You must have nothing else to do---please come dig up my ground and plant some seeds. I don't know how but I like to eat vegetables." It's not the same as asking "Where can I learn about this?" It's simply rude.

The distance modulus (DM) is m-M = 5 log d - 5, where d is in parsecs. The luminosity L is related to M, the absolute magnitude, as M = -2.5 log L + const. So if the DM you want to use is a little different than what I used (but is probably no more accurate) then these equations are all you need.

The photometry was published as part of the paper, along with the equations used to derive stellar parameters. If you want to recalculate the luminosities based on new distances, be my guest .BTW, emailing the authors and then posting the same request on social media the next day is gauche.

Something I just read in Andy Horowitz's Report, a quote from Susie Essnan on how to keep your sanity over the next four years: "Focus on the micro, because the macro is fucked." There are nearby things that I can affect (maybe not "control") but the big stuff, I can't do much about.

After one challenging night at the Swope I am once again always coming home. My daughter woke me up yesterday by texting she's got covid. My wife is still negative, but that situation is unlikely to last, and I want to join in the fun. My excellent colleague will be handing the observing solo.