Tag
etymology
- Disaster means "bad starThe word disaster comes from Italian dis-astro, a bad star, and belongs to a big family of star words.
- Astronaut, nautical and the sailor rootAstronaut means star sailor. The naut- root runs through nautical, nausea and Nautilus.
- King Lear: Edmund's star speech and the scientific methodGloucester blames eclipses; his son Edmund mocks blaming the stars, a modern idea in a play about ancient Britain.
- RADAR is an acronymRAdio Detection And Ranging, a US Navy coinage from 1940, and how it changed storm watching.
- Fulton's Nautilus, a submarine for NapoleonRobert Fulton built a working submarine for France in 1800, seven years before his famous steamboat.
- Eratosthenes measures the EarthAbout 240 BC, one angle (7.2°) and one distance gave the size of the whole planet.