Studying, Eclipsing, the Sun

IF YOU MISS the forthcoming total eclipse of the sun, don't sweat it, its just a thing. You probably won't miss it though, because wherever you are in The United States, the sun will disappear in the middle of the day, and day will turn into night for a few minutes. It will freak the heck out of you. Sp special is this event that at least one minor league ballpark is the path of the eclipse is going to have a community eclipse watch party, complete with solar glasses. Whether this is in conjunction will a baseball game in unclear. Sure would be a cool way to observe the seventh inning stretch. I shall never forget the solar eclipse of March 7, 1970. I was nearly fifteen, and had a small telescope set up with a sun screen attached to the end of the telescope, so that the image of the diminishing sun would be projected onto the screen. My amateur astronomer friend took a picture of me standing next to the 'scope with the half eaten sun clearly projected on the white screen. I wish I still had that picture. This is precisely the sort of activity in which groups of people can congregate and experience, a few minutes of nature at its most awesome, instead of some manifestation of social media trivial, or violent media content. Total solar eclipses are fairly common; there seems to be one somewhere in the world every couple of years or so. But this one is going to spread straight across the United States, making America one of the best places in the world to see it. that doesn't happen nearly as often. Its amazing to think that the 1970 eclipse that excited my 15 year old intellect was nearly half a century ago. A new telescope is being built which will be over twelve feet in diameter, and will be able to study the sun extremely close up, a few square feet of solar surface. The heat gathered against the four meter mirror will be incredible, and will require a sophisticated cooling system to cool it down. Some conservatives claim that solar activity is the cause of climate change, which it is not. Of course, conservatives have all sorts of wild explanations for climate change; fluctuations in the sun's output, the Earth is out of its orbit, etc. Anything will do, as long as it doesn't involve carbon emissions from of human origin and a need for business regulation. If the sun were the cause of climate change, our solar astronomers would have noticed it by now, would have noticed the fluctuations in the sun's output necessary to change our climate. After all, they are stupid, they have big telescopes, and they pay attention. That's the value of studying the sun, as long as you don't look at it with your naked eye.