Astronomy

Astronomy is a natural science that studies celestial objects and the phenomena that occur in the cosmos. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry to explain their origin and their overall evolution. Objects of interest include planets, moons, stars, nebulae, galaxies, meteoroids, asteroids, and comets. Relevant phenomena include supernova explosions, gamma ray bursts, quasars, blazars, pulsars, and cosmic microwave background radiation. More generally, astronomy studies everything that originates beyond Earth's atmosphere. Cosmology is the branch of astronomy that studies the universe as a whole.

Astronomy is one of the oldest natural sciences. The early civilizations in recorded history made methodical observations of the night sky. These include the Egyptians, Babylonians, Greeks, Indians, Chinese, Maya, and many ancient indigenous peoples of the Americas. In the past, astronomy included disciplines as diverse as astrometry, celestial navigation, observational astronomy, and the making of calendars.

Professional astronomy is split into observational and theoretical branches. Observational astronomy is focused on acquiring data from observations of astronomical objects. This data is then analyzed using basic principles of physics. Theoretical astronomy is oriented toward the development of computer or analytical models to describe astronomical objects and phenomena. These two fields complement each other. Theoretical astronomy seeks to explain observational results and observations are used to confirm theoretical results.

Astronomy is one of the few sciences in which amateurs play an active role. This is especially true for the discovery and observation of transient events. Amateur astronomers have helped with many important discoveries, such as finding new comets.

Astronomy (from the Greek ἀστρονομία from ἄστρον astron, "star" and -νομία -nomia from νόμος nomos, "law" or "rule") means study of celestial objects. Astronomy should not be confused with astrology, the belief system which claims that human affairs are correlated with the positions of celestial objects. The two fields share a common origin but became distinct, astronomy being supported by physics while astrology is not.

"Astronomy" and "astrophysics" are broadly synonymous in modern usage. In dictionary definitions, "astronomy" is "the study of objects and matter outside the Earth's atmosphere and of their physical and chemical properties", while "astrophysics" is the branch of astronomy dealing with "the behavior, physical properties, and dynamic processes of celestial objects and phenomena". Sometimes, as in the introduction of the introductory textbook The Physical Universe by Frank Shu, "astronomy" means the qualitative study of the subject, whereas "astrophysics" is the physics-oriented version of the subject. Some fields, such as astrometry, are in this sense purely astronomy rather than also astrophysics. Research departments may use "astronomy" and "astrophysics" according to whether the department is historically affiliated with a physics department, and many professional astronomers have physics rather than astronomy degrees. Thus, in modern use, the two terms are often used interchangeably.

The initial development of astronomy was driven by practical needs like agricultural calendars. Before recorded history archeological sites such as Stonehenge provide evidence of ancient interest in astronomical observations. Evidence also comes from artefacts such as the Nebra sky disc which serves as an astronomical calendar, defining a year as twelve lunar months, 354 days, with intercalary months to make up the solar year. The disc is inlaid with symbols interpreted as a sun, moon, and stars including a cluster of seven stars.

Civilizations such as Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece, India, China together – with cross-cultural influences – created astronomical observatories and developed ideas on the nature of the Universe, along with calendars and astronomical instruments. A key early development was the beginning of mathematical and scientific astronomy among the Babylonians, laying the foundations for astronomical traditions in other civilizations. The Babylonians discovered that lunar eclipses recurred in the saros cycle of 223 synodic months.