User:InMooseWeTrust/Reading lists/Solar system

Before you start, watch this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2FwCMnyWZDg

General stuff

 * Solar System - Read this as a general overview.
 * Heliosphere - What consists of "us."
 * Formation and evolution of the Solar System - I'm not sure if people are just guessing or if this really is as it's described.
 * The Planets - This is the famous work by Gustav Holst. I just HAD to include it with the rest...

Sun

 * Sun - This should keep you busy.

Mercury

 * Mercury - Relatively boring and unknown by planetary standards.

Venus

 * Venus - It would be nice if it was more like Mars. That would have been perfect.
 * Observations and explorations of Venus - Almost every mission results in disaster.
 * Colonization of Venus - How do you make Venus into Earth? Well, it's really simple. See for yourself.

Gravity is weird

 * Gravity - Don't pay too much attention to the technical details. Read just enough to get a general idea.
 * Orbital resonance - Again, nothing technical. Just understand what it is.
 * Tidal locking - Why do we always see the same side of the Moon?
 * Roche limit - When a moon comes too close to a planet, it gets crushed and forms a ring.
 * Lagrangian point - Where do you stick things so they don't escape or form their own orbits?
 * Trojan - Clarification on the above.
 * Gravity assist - This is how you use a planet to go to another planet.

Earth

 * Earth - How little do you know?
 * Luna - Everyone who's not blind can see it, but nobody really understands it.

What the hell is a moon, anyway?

 * Natural satellite - That's the proper name. They're not all "moons."
 * Naming of moons - They all have different conventions depending on which planet they orbit and what group they belong to. For example, Saturn's main moons are all named after titans and Youranus's main moons are all named after characters from Shakespeare.
 * Trojan moon - Just like trojan asteroids.
 * Moonlet - Just like Plutinos?
 * Inner moon - Stuff that usually is responsible for rings.
 * Irregular moon - I wouldn't be surprised if Earth had a few.

Mars
The moons are pretty uninteresting, by the way.
 * Mars - It's smaller than Earth, but would be relatively easy to terraform and colonize. But more about that in the future. I'm going to revise this section later on because there really is a lot to read.
 * Atmosphere of Mars - You can actually breathe this for a few seconds... before you suffocate, of course.
 * Exploration of Mars - Considering how the overwhelming majority of space missions go dramatically better than expected, I'm surprised there were so many failures on Mars. Maybe it's a sign the aliens want us to leave them alone?
 * Mars Exploration Rover - You can stop reading after "History" and then look at the pictures for the rest.
 * Life on Mars - No, they're not little green men. They're reptilians that live underground and breathe the carbon dioxide in the air.
 * Colonization of Mars - That sounds like fun.
 * Timekeeping on Mars - This is surprisingly not that complicated. We'll see what people do in the future.
 * Darian calendar - This is where it gets weird. But it makes more sense than the conventional way of doing things on Earth.

Asteroid Belt

 * Asteroid belt - A bunch of rocks that orbit the Sun.
 * Ceres - This is one of the reasons why Pluto isn't a planet. Ceres is affected heavily by Mars and Jupiter.
 * Vesta - The second biggest thing in the main belt.
 * Pallas - The third biggest thing.
 * Jupiter trojan - A bunch of rocks that Jupiter owns.

Pioneers and Voyagers

 * Pioneer program - It was an important milestone.
 * Pioneer 10 - Skim through it to get an overview.
 * Pioneer 11 - Skim through it to get an overview.
 * Pioneer plaque - It was not politically correct in 1970 to show that women have genitals too. At the same time, Gene Roddenberry was a great guy so Star Trek had a Black woman in a lead role... on a SPACESHIP (Nyota Uhura)!
 * Pioneer anomaly - What the hell is going on here?
 * Voyager program - The big leap into the outer solar system.
 * Voyager Golden Record - It's better than the last one.
 * Voyager 1 - Start reading once you get to the part about Jupiter.
 * Pale Blue Dot - Read it.
 * Voyager 2 - Start reading once you get to the part about Jupiter.
 * New Horizons - Read everything except all the really technical parts.

Jupiter

 * Jupiter - This is where the really interesting stuff starts.
 * Atmosphere of Jupiter - The most erratic clouds in the solar system!
 * Great Red Spot - The famous thing that disappears sometimes.
 * Rings of Jupiter - When somebody suggested that Jupiter might have rings, Carl Sagan laughed and ridiculed him. Then Voyager 1 reached Jupiter, and well...
 * Exploration of Jupiter - You got the Pioneers, Voyagers, and New Horizons already.
 * Galileo orbiter - Read everything but the section titled The Galileo spacecraft.
 * Juno orbiter - Don't read the Scientific instruments section. I'm really excited about what this sucker can do.
 * Moons of Jupiter
 * Io (moon) - It's a giant colorful ball of chemicals that spews disgusting colorful stuff out of it all the time. Yum!
 * Europa (moon) - Frozen ball of brown streaks.
 * Ganymede (moon) - Giant icy rock that could be a planet. Maybe it is, and Jupiter could be a sun because it gives off more energy than the Sun does.
 * Callisto (moon) - People just stop paying attention after Ganymede, and they forget there's something else.

Big shot names, part 1

 * Nicholas Copernicus -
 * Tycho Brahe -
 * Galileo Galilei -
 * Johannes Kepler -
 * Giovanni Cassini -
 * Christiaan Huygens -
 * Isaac Newton -
 * Edmond Halley -
 * Charles Messier -

this list is incomplete; skip the section for now

Asteroids will sometimes have identity crises

 * Centaur (minor planet) - No, they're not asteroids, planetoids, dwarf planets, detatched objects, minor planets, or anything else like that. They're half man half horse.
 * Chariklo - To give you an idea of how outrageous some of their orbits can be. I say let's hurl them all towards planets so they become moons.

Saturn

 * Saturn - The planet that was so beautiful, God put a ring around it!
 * Rings of Saturn - Speak of the devil....
 * Atmosphere of Saturn - I guess it's too similar to Jupiter to have its own article. You can read about the Great White Spot and the Dragon Storm if you wish. Also note how the north pole is a Hexagon.
 * Magnetosphere of Saturn - Not as exciting as the one on Earth, but hey, it's FUCKING SATURN!!!
 * Moons of Saturn - Saturn has everything. Seriously.
 * Mimas - Death Star!
 * Enceladus - Ice ball that's way more interesting than Europa.
 * Tethys - It's the other Death Star.
 * Dione - Standard ice/rock.
 * Rhea - Same as above but this one has rings.
 * Titan - I wonder if there's a way to throw Enceladus into Titan and light the whole thing on fire?
 * Hyperion - Chaotic football spongy thing.


 * Cassini-Huygens - Cassini is the flagship explorer of Saturn. It's still there today sending massive amounts of good data.

Youranus

 * Youranus - is a big green ball in space made of methane. And because Youranus is made of Methane, Youranus smells like ass.

Neptune

 * Neptune
 * Triton (moon)

Pluto and Orcus

 * Pluto
 * Orcus

Hauméa

 * Haumea (dwarf planet)

Makemake

 * Makemake (dwarf planet)

Eris

 * Eris (dwarf planet)

Sedna

 * Sedna