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Michael Molnar (1945-2023)
Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society ^ | May 14, 2024 | John S Gallagher III

Posted on 12/08/2025 6:58:26 AM PST by SunkenCiv

...in the early 1990s two of Mike’s interests, numismatics and astronomy, came together. As Mike explored the astrological iconography on Roman coins he developed a theory for the "Magi's star.” He interpreted this event as a description of a remarkable pair of highly visible eclipses of Jupiter by the Moon. These occurred in the constellation Aries that was associated with King Herod and was likely interpreted as a sign of a major event. He presented his findings in a 1995 paper in The Quarterly Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society and later in his 1999 Rutgers University Press book "The Star of Bethlehem: the legacy of the Magi". His book, which is still in print, received wide attention and praise by critics and readers.

(Excerpt) Read more at baas.aas.org ...


TOPICS: Astronomy; History; Science; Travel
KEYWORDS: archaeoastrology; archaeoastronomy; aries; astrology; astronomy; epigraphyandlanguage; godsgravesglyphs; herodthegreat; jupiter; kingherod; michaelmolnar; moon; romanempire; science; starofbethlehem; staroftheeast; themoon

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[DOI: 10.3847/25c2cfeb.62daef49] Subtitled: "Molnar pioneered ultraviolet photometric studies of magnetic stars."

1 posted on 12/08/2025 6:58:26 AM PST by SunkenCiv
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The rest of the Michael Molnar keyword, sorted:

2 posted on 12/08/2025 7:01:05 AM PST by SunkenCiv (Kudos to the Admin Moderator, reason: "Randspam" [ 4354167 ])
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To: StayAt HomeMother; Ernest_at_the_Beach; 1ofmanyfree; 21twelve; 24Karet; 2ndDivisionVet; 31R1O; ...

3 posted on 12/08/2025 7:01:23 AM PST by SunkenCiv (Kudos to the Admin Moderator, reason: "Randspam" [ 4354167 ])
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To: SunkenCiv

Arthur C Clarke’s 1955 short story The Star is a disturbing thought on The Star of Bethlehem.


4 posted on 12/08/2025 7:26:50 AM PST by xkaydet65
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To: xkaydet65

Why disturbing?


5 posted on 12/08/2025 7:56:02 AM PST by nikos1121
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To: SunkenCiv
In August 1970 he had nearly finished his PhD thesis when Sterling Hall, which houses the Wisconsin Department of Astronomy, was severely damaged by a truck bomb explosion. Mike's office caught fire, destroying all of his PhD data and thesis manuscripts along with many of his belongings.

Having a close relative working through her PhD in physics, I know the work involved, and having all one's data burned by a truck-bomb explosion is both severely debilitating to his years of effort - and in this case, absolutely absurd.

Mind you, these were the days before computers, and of course, before computer or cloud storage. All his computations would have been on paper, like some medieval monk spending 4 years writing a manuscript.

6 posted on 12/08/2025 8:07:51 AM PST by PGR88
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To: xkaydet65; nikos1121

https://sites.uni.edu/morgans/astro/course/TheStar.pdf


7 posted on 12/08/2025 8:31:43 AM PST by SunkenCiv (Kudos to the Admin Moderator, reason: "Randspam" [ 4354167 ])
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To: PGR88

Definitely. And woke is a lot older than most seem to think.


8 posted on 12/08/2025 8:32:34 AM PST by SunkenCiv (Kudos to the Admin Moderator, reason: "Randspam" [ 4354167 ])
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To: SunkenCiv

I was always a science and astronomy nerd, so read a lot of Clarke and other SF writers in the early 70s, my early teens.I absolutely allowed it to wreck if not totally destroy my faith in Christianity,since atheism is the biggest component of SciFi. Reading ‘The Star’, at age 12 made me feel so adult and erudite. I remember telling my mom about it. Thank God I fully rejected atheism before too long, but it still took awhile for me to embrace my Catholic upbringing, which I did enthusiastically almost overnight.

I believe SciFi messes up a lot of young minds. I still glance at it now and then because of the idea warp but so much is grotesque and pathological, even without atheism included.


9 posted on 12/08/2025 10:05:31 AM PST by F450-V10
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To: F450-V10
Not just sci-fi, pretty much all fiction. It would be nice if every reader (and impressionable is not tied to youth) realized, it's a work of fiction, it ain't an alternative lifestyle, and is generally an long-form op-ed.

10 posted on 12/08/2025 10:31:49 AM PST by SunkenCiv (Kudos to the Admin Moderator, reason: "Randspam" [ 4354167 ])
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