Piner High School STEM Certificate

Level One Response

Josiah Smith

Presentation Title: Explorer - Creation Planet

Presenter: Kurt Kruger

Date: February 10, 2022

Summary:

The presentation Explorer - Creation Planet, gave an overview of many of the

fundamental principles and laws of physics that have revolutionized humanity’s understanding of

the universe and physics. The documentary explained ancient theories of the workings of the

universe, famous scientists like Kepler and Newton, and how their findings are shaping future

space exploration. Before the presentation, however, Piner High School’s Kurt Kruger gave a

brief presentation of his own, showing the true scale of the universe.

Using the planetarium dome, Kruger showed a scaled comparison of the other planets in

our solar system compared to Earth, and the sun. He then showed how despite appearing huge in

our sky, the sun is dwarfed by many other planets in the universe. Stars like Beetlejuice and

Polaris are hundreds of times more massive than the sun, and yet they seem minuscule when

looking at them from Earth. Kruger’s presentation served as an introduction to the movie

presentation, as the level of understanding of the stars today is nothing like when Newton or

Kepler was alive.

 The movie presentation began by explaining how space was viewed by ancient

civilizations. They were seen as godly beings by many and were used to predict the future.

Ancient civilizations viewed the stars as different from the sun or Earth and therefore admired

them. The presentation then moved to Kepler and the early breakthroughs of the way the

universe works. Before Kepler’s breakthrough, planets, which get their name from the Greek

word “wanderer,” moved across the night sky in seemingly random directions; they did not stay

in similar positions at night as the stars did. Kepler’s first law, although rejected by many at the

time, revolutionized this thinking. He claimed that the planets moved in ellipses around the sun

and that Earth was just another planet.

Finally, the presentation showed how Kepler’s and other scientists’ breakthroughs have

shaped modern-day space exploration. The moon landing, the launching of the International

Space Station, and the numerous rover landings on Mars would not be possible without the level

of understanding we have of the universe today. The presentation also looked towards the future,

and how laws thousands of years old will still be used to send humans to Mars and beyond.

Reflection:

Although less in-depth than many of the other STEM presentations I have attended, it

was interesting to learn about how ancient civilizations viewed the universe, and how greatly it

differs from our understanding today. Many laws made by early scientists such as Kepler were

widely rejected at first, even though they have since been proven true. This surprised me, as it

shows how widely accepted the old beliefs were, and how different, and therefore incorrect, new

ideas seemed to people at the time. It was also interesting to see how laws made such a long time

ago are still relevant today in modern space exploration. The presentation mentioned how
Kepler’s third law about the orbits of planets is used when launching long-distance satellites like

Voyager I and II. The presentation strengthened my understanding of all these topics and showed

how important early physicists were in our current understanding of the universe.

Supporting Article:

● Author: Daniel Clery

● Date: 11 November 2021

● Title: First Light Machine

● URL: https://www.science.org/content/article/launch-pad-last-nasa-s-webb-telescope-will-probe-first-stars-weather-alien-worlds

As much of the video presentation was focused on how the discoveries of scientists from

hundreds of years ago are still used today, the article I chose to support the presentation is about

the James Webb Telescope. Author Daniel Clery opens his summary of the telescope and its

mission by comparing James Webb to one such scientist. He writes that:

The telescope Galileo Galilei first pointed at the heavens in 1609 had a lens no wider than

a slice of cucumber. Yet with that modest tool, he saw the rings of Saturn, the moons of

Jupiter—and sparked a scientific revolution that toppled Earth as the center of the

cosmos. Astronomy has come a long way since then. But when the James Webb Space

Telescope launches in December, with a 6.5-meter mirror that would tower over Galileo

himself, it will open views of the universe’s first stars and galaxies, probe the

atmospheres of planets around other stars—and launch another revolution

For over 400 years, the technology and science used to explore space have been constantly

evolving. Yet Clery shows that the newest, most complicated, and most expensive telescope to

date still shows resemblance to Galileo’s. Clery mentions how the use of James Webb in the
coming years will help scientists look back further into the universe than ever before, and will

help verify many of the claims made by early scientists. James Webb is an example of how

despite how much more humanity knows about the universe now than in ancient times, there is

still so much more yet to be discovered.