Sky Scope

Telescopes

Man had a great passion for observing celestial bodies from time immemorial. There were numerous means by which they were observing the planetary movement. Until the invention of telescope by Galileo, great astronomers like Aryabhata, Bhaskara and Copernicus used naked eye and mathematical calculations to record planetary positions. In addition keeping the reference to the pole star and the positions of the stars relative to which calculations were made and the eclipses forecasted. In the Egypt the pole star was kept as the reference and the mathematical calculations made relative to that were used during the construction of the pyramids.

Telescope was first invented by Galileo in the 15^th century, which brought about a new dimension to space exploration. The telescope invention contradicted the popular geocentric belief and provided beyond doubt on the heliocentric theory which is currently followed. But the range of the ancient telescopes was very limited with the maximum distance ranging to the neighboring planets like Venus and Mars. But this has increased to significant heights with modern telescopes being able to cover the outer ring of the solar system comprising planets like Jupiter and Uranus with ease. Long is not the time when the dwarf planet Pluto will be scaled, and with the current technological growth this is a definite reality.

With the availability of a wide range of telescopes the current scope of astronomy has widened greatly. Not long ago, people had to visit planetariums or observatories to know about the beauty of the stars and the planets. But this has changed with low cost telescopes being available that offer portability and ease of use. A large proportion of the astronomers community are amateurs who would be interested in enjoying the beauty of nature more than going in depths about scientific figures and calculations. There are telescopes like the Meade Telescopes that offer the amateur astronomers the space exploration at their homes.