Miscellaneous

That's one small step for man, one giant -- hey, get off my moonrock patch! ...Damn kids.

The June issue of Popular Mechanics has an interesting article about property rights on the moon. Since 1967's Outer Space Treaty, nations can't lay claim to lunar property, but that says nothing about individual private rights. Thirteen countries have signed a Moon Treaty, which does prohibit private ownership rights, but none of the major players in space travel are signatories. So no help there either.

I won't spoil the rest of the article -- if you're interested, you can go read it. And while we're talking space, I wanna throw a link out to a great write-up over at Bad Astronomy about astronomers having witnessed the actual kablooey moment of a supernova. Back in my "I'm gonna be an astrophysicist" days, my career was moving towards the study of dying stars, particularly supernovas and pulsars. So I find this story fascinating, and I figure certain select nerds will appreciate reading out this pretty fantastic discovery.

Ok, Science Friday is over. Sorry about that.

Full post as published by Quiz Law on May 23, 2008 (boomark / email).