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I don't know constellations because I don't depend on them for navigation. I'm not sure why else I should even care that a bunch of ancients thought this bunch

I don't know constellations because I don't depend on them for navigation. I'm not sure why else I should even care that a bunch of ancients thought this bunch of stars looked like this animal or that one. It's not like I can even see half of them in the sky where I live, regardless of whether the stars are otherwise visible. And even if I could see them, all anyone ever seems to talk about is this small canon of Western names. And if I ever needed to know for some reason, if it could ever in anyone's life possibly matter in the slightest whether this clump was called Cassiopeia by a bunch of people a thousand years ago, I'm about 10 seconds away from downloading an app that will superimpose constellations on my current sky. I can spend an hour reading about constellations and know more about them and their travels than many ancient astronomers could have observed in their lifetimes. And it doesn't mean a thing to me, because we know more about the universe than a handful of clumps that are occasionally visible to the naked eye. I can appreciate the spectacle of a constellation, but everything about them that could possibly matter to my daily experience has been documented and indexed to the point that I never need to know it. I'm not trying to sail back to Ithaca. It has nothing really to do with urbanization and light pollution. Maybe I have fewer opportunities to see them, but if they blazed overhead every night, I probably wouldn't care one lick more about them.

Tade0 9y ago
Never have I ever found somebody who had opinions on constellations so strong that they would write three paragraphs about it. Anyway my (currently) fiance used to use them as a pickup line(not on me though). She said it was pretty effective so there's that.
- FroshKiller 9y ago
  It's less an opinion about constellations than constellations as an example of knowledge people shouldn't worry about "losing" or being "disconnected" from. I imagine most people have a cognitive burden that's heavy enough with things they genuinely need to know without being expected to manage constellations, TV schedules, discrepancies in the Synoptic Gospels, the lyrics to "Time After Time," or how to fry a turkey. You can look all of it up when it matters, and your experience will not be much diminished.
cyphar 9y ago
> I don't know constellations because I don't depend on them for navigation. I'm not sure why else I should even care that a bunch of ancients thought this bunch of stars looked like this animal or that one. One of the weirdest things I found while doing Astrophysics research is that people still use constellation names for most references. There are more thorough catalogue references to stars, but most papers reference "π Sco" (where Sco is short for Scorpius). It was quite bizarre, but it makes sense for a field that is that old. On the downside it meant that whenever a supervisor used relational terms to a constellation I would have to look at a star map (since I have no idea about constellations either).

Tade0 9y ago

Never have I ever found somebody who had opinions on constellations so strong that they would write three paragraphs about it. Anyway my (currently) fiance used to use them as a pickup line(not on me though). She said it was pretty effective so there's that.

FroshKiller 9y ago
It's less an opinion about constellations than constellations as an example of knowledge people shouldn't worry about "losing" or being "disconnected" from. I imagine most people have a cognitive burden that's heavy enough with things they genuinely need to know without being expected to manage constellations, TV schedules, discrepancies in the Synoptic Gospels, the lyrics to "Time After Time," or how to fry a turkey. You can look all of it up when it matters, and your experience will not be much diminished.

cyphar 9y ago

> I don't know constellations because I don't depend on them for navigation. I'm not sure why else I should even care that a bunch of ancients thought this bunch of stars looked like this animal or that one. One of the weirdest things I found while doing Astrophysics research is that people still use constellation names for most references. There are more thorough catalogue references to stars, but most papers reference "π Sco" (where Sco is short for Scorpius). It was quite bizarre, but it makes sense for a field that is that old. On the downside it meant that whenever a supervisor used relational terms to a constellation I would have to look at a star map (since I have no idea about constellations either).