Re: VMs: Re: Kircher's Moon

[<steven.e.parsons@xxxxxxx>]

Hi all,

I've been following this discussion silently so far.  To the best of my
knowledge, spiral galaxies were first recognized by William Parsons (Earl
of Rosse) in the mid-19th century.  A snip from a BBC website concerning
his achievement follows (from
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/parsons_william.shtml):
                                                                     
                                                                     
                                                                     
                                                                     
                                                                     
 In early 1845, before his telescope was completed, Rosse had        
 resolved his first nebula, discovering it to be a spiral galaxy of  
 stars. While some nebulae seemed to be genuinely unresolvable       
 clouds of gas, in many Rosse was able to pick out individual stars, 
 and so clear were his images that he realised that many of these    
 so-called nebulae were in fact spiral galaxies like our own. By the 
 end of 1850 he had found fourteen spiral galaxies, and was the      
 first person to realise that galaxies often have spiral structures. 
                                                                     
 Cheers, loved the discussions,                                      
 Steve                                                               
                                                                     
                                                                     
                                                                     





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