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Test your eyes with a star

by Bob Berman
January 6, 2020
in Nature
1
Test your eyes with a star

(Photo by William Creswell)

(Photo by William Creswell)

It seems that everyone is aware that the name of this year is also the term for sharp vision: 2020. Happily, the night’s very best eye test is available at nightfall right now, in early January. Go out at 5:30 any evening and look just slightly to the right of where the Sun set, until you see the brightest star. This is Vega, and it’s only about one-third of the way up the sky from the northwestern horizon. It’s not high up.

If you have binoculars, bring them along and point them to Vega. That instrument will easily bring out its bluish color, and will also show you a much dimmer star directly above Vega. This is Epsilon, the focus of this week’s column.

Through the binoculars, Epsilon will stand out as a beautiful double star. The question is whether you can see it as a double with just your naked eye – for this is the very finest test of vision in all the heavens.

I’ve been asking groups of people if they can see Epsilon as a double for a full half-century now. What I found is that only perhaps one adult in 50 can split it as a double star. But with groups of kids and teenagers, it’s more like one in every eight or ten can detect it.

It’s a tough test, because normal 20/20 vision will not quite split Epsilon. You need to have slightly better-than-normal vision – specifically, 20/15 vision. People with that degree of keen eyesight can read the ninth line in the standard Snellen eye chart. Does this include you?

Find out the next clear night. Again, simply look at the direction of sunset at 5:30 p.m. The brightest star just to the right of where the Sun set is Vega. The little star just above Vega is Epsilon. If you can see it as two little stars side-by-side, almost touching each other, then this year of 2020 has your name on it.

Want to know more? To read Bob’s previous columns, click here. Check out Bob’s podcast, Astounding Universe, co-hosted by Pulse of the Planet’s Jim Metzner.

Tags: night sky
Thank you for reading Hudson Valley One. We rely on your support to continue providing local, substantive news. Please check out our subscription options to keep local journalism alive in the Hudson Valley.
- Geddy Sveikauskas, Publisher
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Bob Berman

Bob Berman, Ulster Publishing’s Night Sky columnist since 1974, is the world’s most widely read astronomer. Since the mid-1990s, his celebrated "Strange Universe" feature has appeared monthly in Astronomy magazine, the largest circulation periodical on the subject. Berman is also the long-time astronomy editor of the Old Farmer’s Almanac. He was Discover magazine’s monthly columnist from 1989-2006. He has authored more than a thousand published mass-market articles and been a guest on such TV shows as Today and Late Night with David Letterman. Berman is director of two Ulster County observatories and the Storm King Observatory at Cornwall. He was adjunct professor of astronomy and physics at Marymount college from 1995-2000.

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