So what DOES Saturn’s largest moon smell like?

So what DOES Saturn’s largest moon smell like? September 4, 2020

 

Literally Titanic
A public domain image from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) of the surface of Titan

 

There’s good, or at least promising, coronavirus news:

 

“University of Utah Health now using saliva testing for COVID-19 instead of nasal swab: Daily average tops 400 as Utah confirms more than 500 new COVID-19 cases Friday, 5 additional deaths”

 

“Steroids reduce deaths of critically ill COVID-19 patients, WHO confirms: The finding strengthens evidence that clinicians should give severely sick people the drugs”

 

“Will there be a COVID-19 vaccine by November? The CDC surely thinks so: CDC has told states to prepare for a COVID-19 vaccine in the fall.”

 

Some of us, though, are evidently determined, through sheer irresponsibility, to keep the pandemic going as long and as disruptively as we’re able:

 

“Here’s how many people Delta has banned for refusing to wear face masks: Delta has banned hundreds of passengers who didn’t want to wear a mask on a flight”

 

“After 40 students test positive for COVID-19, BYU urges caution on Labor Day weekend: “Behavior this weekend could make or break our ability to remain on campus,” says university’s official Twitter account”

 

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“Stonehenge enhanced sounds like voices or music for people inside the monument: Scientists created a scale model one-twelfth the size of the ancient site to study its acoustics”

 

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But — and Stonehenge seems a perfectly appropriate place of transition — let’s look up from earthly things to the heavens just a bit:

 

“Rarest planet in the universe may be lurking in Orion’s nose: This could be the first known planet in the universe to orbit three suns at once.”

 

“A weirdly warped planet-forming disk circles a distant trio of stars: The bizarre geometry of this system is the first known of its kind”

 

If your candidate doesn’t win this November and if you’ve vowed to leave the country should the Other Guy (aka The Incarnation of Evil) prevail, you might want to give serious consideration to Saturn’s largest moon.  From the descriptions, its balmy breezes sound absolutely lovely, and the images included with this article make it look very beautiful indeed:

 

“What does Titan smell like?  A bouquet of musky sweetness, bitter almonds, gasoline, and decomposing fish would likely fill the air on Saturn’s largest satellite.”

 

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“Astronomy is useful because it raises us above ourselves; it is useful because it is grand… It shows us how small is man’s body, how great his mind, since his intelligence can embrace the whole of this dazzling immensity, where his body is only an obscure point, and enjoy its silent harmony.” (Henri Poincaré, in La Valeur de la Science [1904])

 

 


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