Now that we are in the month of March, for most of us in the northern hemisphere the worst of the winter is over, and it is only a couple of weeks until 21 March, the first day of spring. 21 March is an important date for other reasons, too. For one thing, it is used as the basis for the… Continue reading The first day of spring
Author: Steve Hurley
Hi I am Steve Hurley. Although I work in the IT industry. I studied for a PhD in astronomy in the 1980s. My real passion is explaining scientific concepts to a non-scientific audience. My blog (explainingscience.org) covers various scientific topics, but primarily astronomy. It is written in a style that it is easily understandable to the non scientist.
Publications and videos
For links to my books and videos please visit www.explainingscience.org
Short post of the month February 2016 – gravitational waves
The subject of February's short post of the month is gravitational waves. These were predicted by Albert Einstein back in 1916, and after decades of searching have finally been detected. In an announcement made on 11 February at a Washington DC press conference David Reitze, the executive director of the LIGO Laboratory, said: “Ladies and gentlemen, we have… Continue reading Short post of the month February 2016 – gravitational waves
Terraforming Venus
Updated December 12 2025 In a previous post I have discussed living on Venus in floating colonies. I'll now discuss terraforming. This the process of changing the global environment of a planet in such a way as to make it suitable for human habitation. Because it is so far beyond our current technological capabilities, most articles… Continue reading Terraforming Venus
Living on Venus
In this post I'll look into the distant future and talk about humans living and building settlements on the planet Venus. Because it is well beyond what we can achieve with our current technology, it is a topic that been more in the realm of science fiction rather than factual scientific writing. However, even though there are many difficult obstacles in… Continue reading Living on Venus
Transit of Venus
On 6 June 2012, a transit of Venus occurred. This rare astronomical event, when Venus passes directly in front of the Sun, and appears as a large black dot on its surface slowly moving from one side to the other in about 3 hours, has only happened eight times since the invention of the telescope (ref 1). This post… Continue reading Transit of Venus
Explaining Science 