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TheConstellation

How meaning gathers

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Constellation

From Latin constellatio:
a configuration of stars.

contogetherstellastar

We gave a name to the act of seeing stars together.

Orion, as seen from here

The stars are not together.

Some lie tens, hundreds, even thousands of light-years apart. They become a figure because we are here.

Move the observer far enough and Orion comes apart.

A change of observing position in space, not the yearly shift called parallax. The lines show Orion as we draw it from Earth.

Catalogue and method

Star positions: ICRS J2000 right ascension and declination. Distances and V magnitudes: Hipparcos and SIMBAD, order of magnitude. M42 distance ~414 pc.

The sky is a gnomonic projection of catalog stars. Moving the control displaces the observer in space so the Earth figure visibly comes apart. That is not annual parallax, which is a milliarcsecond measurement.

The Orion Nebula: a cavern of gas and dust with young stars forming in the center. Hubble ACS mosaic with ESO ground-based fill.

M42 · Orion Nebula · NASA, ESA, M. Robberto (STScI/ESA) and the Hubble Orion Treasury Project Team · ACS mosaic, 2006

Image provenance and method

NASA, ESA, M. Robberto (STScI/ESA) and the Hubble Space Telescope Orion Treasury Project Team. Ground-based fill: ESO 2.2 m WFI, La Silla.

ACS/WFC mosaic of 520 frames. Filters ACS F435W (B), F555W (V), F658N (H-alpha), F775W (i), F850LP (z), with ESO WFI B, [O III], H-alpha and [S II] fill. Assigned colour: each monochromatic filter mapped to a hue. Not a single-band snapshot and not a spectral false-colour map of non-optical wavelengths.

NASA Hubble material, and ESA Hubble material released before 2009, may be used with credit to NASA, ESA and STScI. This asset is not labelled public domain by habit: credit is required, and the mosaic includes ESO ground-based fill.

ESA/Hubble heic0601a

And yet.

Inside the figure humans call Orion is M42.

The Orion Nebula.

A real region of gas and dust where stars are being born.

The figure is ours. The nebula is real.

A constructed map can guide us to a real birthplace.

Cosmos & Stars.

Stars make worlds.

Worlds may make consciousness.

Consciousness looks back.

How does meaning constellate?

Stars. Minds. The patterns between them.

Enter the Constellation