Notices by ☆⋆Okie Space Queen (okiespacequeen@scicomm.xyz)

Kid: What if there was another planet?

Me: there are millions of other planets.

Kid: but no like what if there was a far away planet?

Me: there are millions of far away planets.

Kid: so I was right.

Jupiter has something like 90+ moons. I'm not going to count.

When I started astronomy they told me 60.

We just keep learning more and more.

Anyway, the big 4 can be remembered
"I Eat Green Cows" (Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto)

A lot of the others also have names.

I'm just telling you all this so I can show you this gif of some moons orbiting Jupiter.

I'm sincerely asking adults to stop being even a little self deprecating in the planetarium.

You do not have a "stupid question" you just have a question.

It discourages children from asking things.

It's okay to ask questions and you don't need to feel bad about doing it.

When you have a chance to ask a question, take a deep breath, and just ask the question.

If you're shy you can come up after and ask without the audience. That's also fine.

Being curious isn't shameful. It's okay.

Teen: can we Google the answer?

Me: I wouldn't waste time trying that because there's not an answer.

Teen: I'll ask chatGPT

Me: do you understand that it's a language model and not a search engine? It doesn't know.

Teen 2: it's not intelligent?

Me: it's intelligent in the sense that it is able to make sentences, it's not intelligent in the sense that it can answer questions about things accurately.

Teacher: wait, it can't?

Me: no it can't answer questions reliably

Teen 2: it can't?

Kid: I have a question about the moon.

Me: go for it!

Kid: did you know if the moon is up during the day it's the same moon as the one at night?

Me: yes! Very cool isn't it?

Kid: we don't say cool anymore.

Me: I'm old.

Kid: it's okay.

Me: thank you.

We live in an era where we can carry a whole library in our pocket, where we can instantly video chat with someone on a different continent, where we can look the furthest out into space than humans have ever even dreamed of, and my printer still takes 20 minutes of trouble shooting every time I want it to do anything.

@evan I assumed that gathered included foraging and answered accordingly.

@evan it doesn't understand my Oklahoma accent, so it is frustrating more than anything.

@evan Can you elaborate on what this would look like?

@evan I voted strongly no but it's because I want to keep talking about my sea monkeys, so you got a biased poll vote in there.

@darnell I have one that originally told me space is fake. I knew no amount of proof can overcome that. Nobody gets there and cares about facts at the same time.

One thing I've noticed while talking to conspiracy theorists is they really only know how to have one kind of conversation about them.

They say a thing.
You rebut it.
They say a different thing.
You rebut it.

And it just keeps going.

I've found that if you never rebut it but instead just keep asking them for more info without letting them change the subject they run out of steam.

You can get about 3 questions deep with a flat earther before they get lost and can't continue. 1/3

Me: imagine you had a litter of kittens

Kid: no, I'm a boy and boys don't like kittens

Me: oof big yikes

Kid: what yikes?

Me: I think it's really silly to try to make your personal preference into a generalization. Lots of men and boys like kittens by the way.

Kid: well I only like dinosaurs, you wouldn't understand

Me: what's your favorite dinosaur?

Kid: pterodactyl

Me: that's not a dinosaur dude

@bertrand @feditips @apps I miss that a lot as well.

If you do addition and subtraction literally any way other than the way you were taught in school and you still get the correct answer, I need you to stop saying you are bad at math.

If you can manipulate numbers to make a system that works for you and you get the right answer you are not bad at math. You are very good.

Kids need to know that adults do simple arithmetic many different ways and it's okay to have a favorite even if it is different than the norm.

You are good at math.

If the sky is clear where you are tonight, go outside and look at outer space.

I've labeled the stars and planets that should be bright enough to see even in a big city.