I recently noticed that the default background for Ubuntu 23.04 “Lunar Lobster” has a purple star missing and now that i noticed it, i can’t unsee it. The one towards the bottom right is barely visible so that passes.
I didn’t mean the official Ubuntu flavors, I meant 3rd party Ubuntu variants. Stuff like archiveos.org/ubuntu-satanic/ which is literally just about changing a few graphics.
Edit: So apparently what i first wrote up can be summarized as “Asterisms are more relevant and sensible than constellations”…
original commentEspecially nowadays with light pollution it’s easy to tell which constellations make sense, the top ones in the northern sky IMO being: Cassiopeia, Ursa Major, Orion, Cygnus (really just the middle 4 stars), and Ursa Minor but mostly because that’s got Polaris in it and it’s the most important star. Also fun anecdote: When i was a kid and didn’t know any constellations other than orion, cassiopeia, and ursa major; i independently recognized the middle 4 stars of cygnus and called it the Pilot because it looks like the front view of a jet fighter, so how’s THAT for being a sensible constellation!
Uh that one is a rare case of constellation actually look like what it’s supposed to be. It’s pretty easy to see the scorpion tail imo. Doesn’t have all the legs obviously but still close enough to consider it as one.
I’ve heard that not having access to actual dark skies free of light pollution makes it a lot harder to see/understand how people could see figures in constellations, and that extremely faint light from other stars, nebulas, etc adds to the experience. Allegedly it makes Orion’s belt easier to see. I’ve never had access to a sky dark enough to test it in person, though.
Also like, people tend to draw roughly the same lines, at least for asterisms.
I can’t imagine many people, regardless of culture, would look at the northern cross or the big dipper and not draw almost exactly the same lines as everyone else.
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