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Space

Universe Beige, not Turquoise 250

Posted by michael from the housepainters-relieved dept.
ChazeFroy writes: "The universe is actually beige, not turquoise. Researchers at John Hopkins University initially reported it was turquoise, but the software they used contained a flaw that implemented a non-standard white index to arrive at the mint chocolate chip green color." The other color was much nicer than this beige.
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Universe Beige, not Turquoise More

Universe Beige, not Turquoise

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  • Hey that explains it (Score:3, Funny)

    by Remillard ( 67835 ) on Friday March 08, 2002 @11:26AM (#3130533)
    That's why it's the natural color for all computer cases!


    • Steve Jobs is protesting the results.

    • Ha! So that loony David Icke is wrong - again!

      http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_493478.html ?m enu=news.latestheadlines

    • Re:Hey that explains it (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Sloppy ( 14984 )

      Wrong, wrong, wrong. Black is the natural color for computer cases, and it's damn near close to being the color of the universe too. What they don't tell you, is that they conveniently left the black emptiness of most of the universe out of their computations. If you correct for this, then the don't-call-it-beige color becomes such a dim gray, that it can pass for black.

      So if you want your computer to cosmetically integrate with the universe and look like it belongs here, keep buying black. [directron.com] Beige computers will always look like unholy invaders from another dimension.

  • Damn.... (Score:3, Funny)

    by grytpype ( 53367 ) on Friday March 08, 2002 @11:28AM (#3130537) Homepage
    ... now I have to redecorate my apartment!

  • I guess God got this idea from his wife.... (Score:4, Funny)

    by Bob McCown ( 8411 ) on Friday March 08, 2002 @11:28AM (#3130543)
    ...when she said "Beige, I think I'll paint the ceiling beige..."
  • be on the lookout for the new PBS special 'Beige : the color of the cosmos'. I heard they talk about how hawking and einstein were raised in beige rooms.

  • Hex Code (Score:4, Funny)

    by Jodrell ( 191685 ) on Friday March 08, 2002 @11:29AM (#3130545) Homepage
    The GIMP tells me that the colour of the universe is #FEF9E5 in hex. Now that's got to mean something :-p

  • Judging by the huge amount of feedback this one produced, not too many I'd guess. Heck, beige is about the most boring color in the universe. Now we know why.

    • Re:Who Cares? (Score:2, Interesting)

      by ergo98 ( 9391 )
      Really, eh? This is one of those "completely asinine" type stories that astronomers seem to somehow manage to fill the newspapers with. I truly think that astronomers, as a group, must have a fantastic PR department, because every completely irrelevant (at least for the next 2000 years) "re-thinking of the origins of mankind!" breakthrough that has no bearing on 99.999999999999%+ of the population is somehow given front page coverage.

      Of course now I've gone and offended astronomers (no intent to. I just find it odd how many of these "discoveries" are treated as if they change life as we know it: As if realizing something alters the past).

      • Re:Who Cares? (Score:2, Informative)

        by vinton ( 161350 )
        Exactly. According to this CNN article [cnn.com], the astronomers who made the statement didn't regard it as a newsworthy discovery and are surprised by the extent of the media coverage:


        The astronomer said that expressing the color for popular viewing was not even part of the original scientific experiment. They did it "as a lark."

        "We were doing this as an amusing footnote to our paper," said Glazebrook. "Then there was a huge media thing. We were completely overwhelmed. We didn't expect it to get so big."

      • Re:Who Cares? (Score:2, Insightful)

        by Betelgeuse ( 35904 )
        First off, this type of thing is not what the "real science" is about. It's just the PR stuff that seems to grab the front page. True, the color of the universe isn't going affect anyone (really), but you must admit that it's a pretty cool idea.

        Secondly, there are very few things (especially in the academic fields) that are "useful" to the general public. The same argument could be made about art, music, or basically anything else other than food production, medicine, etc. . .

        To quote Henri Poincare: "[The scientist does] not study science because it is useful to do so... [but rather] studies it because he takes pleasure in it; and he takes pleasure in it because it is beautiful. If nature were not beautiful, it would not be worth knowing, and life would not be worth living..."

        • Secondly, there are very few things (especially in the academic fields) that are "useful" to the general public. The same argument could be made about art, music, or basically anything else other than food production, medicine, etc. . .

          Well, medicine does have an impact upon our lives, so when I see a report that they've found a protein that makes rats live 60% longer, that is much closer to relevance to me than if they found that the universe is actually X years old, versus the previously believed Y (versus the previously believed Z...repeat perpetually: As others have said: Someone will use a better CCD and find that the universe is actually a light red, etc).

          However, my point is that every new astronomy "breakthrough" is reported in all major media, while breakthroughs in other sciences are ignored : I mean, really, how many people are employed worldwide gawking at stars an unbelievable distance away, while at the same time we're not even close to getting a person on the nearest planet, barely even accomplishing keeping them in a tin can in near-orbit? And every couple of weeks there's the standard "Astronomers have found a twin-star X light years away that spins faster than they've ever found one spin before!". Now, when a giant asteroid is headed towards Earth, I care, but when they find that prior knowledge was ignorant (which is a constant theme for "Breakthroughs"), I don't.

  • The Answer to the universe (Score:4, Funny)

    by Semi_War ( 163701 ) on Friday March 08, 2002 @11:30AM (#3130548) Homepage
    42........ Nope doesn't work. Beige... hmmm
  • Scientists should use this as an example of how to make their work accessable to the public.

    With all the news centering on fluff and rather useless stories these days, we have ffinally found the solution to get people to read stories with "boring" content.. just add color!

    Researchers recently discovered that the color you turn when the DMCA takes away your speech is blue. No wait, other report it's a shade of purple.. oh the controversy!
  • There was something fundamentally wrong with the universe.
  • ``It is embarrassing,'' Glazebrook said. ``But this is science. We're not like politicians. If we make mistakes, we admit them. That's how science works.''


    Funny how the article doesn't mention why this *is* science or what is proven by this? Seems like a grad student *who has run out of ideas.*

    And everyone knows the color of the universe is 42.

    • Re:Hmm...the universe and my underwear... (Score:5, Informative)

      by monkeydo ( 173558 ) on Friday March 08, 2002 @11:49AM (#3130654) Homepage
      Funny how you didn't click all the links.

      From Glazebrook's page:

      "We admit the color of the Universe was something of a gimmick, to try and make our story on spectra more accessible. Nevertheless it is an actual calculable thing so we believe it is important to get it right."
      And:
      "Of course, our real motive for calculating the cosmic spectrum was really a lot more than producing these pretty color pictures. The color is interesting but in fact the cosmic spectrum is rich in detail and tells us a lot more about the history of star formation in the Universe. You may have noticed above that the cosmic spectrum contains dark lines and bright bands, these correspond to the characteristic emission and absorption of different elements."

      So this actually reveals something about the makeup and history of the universe. Viola, science!

  • Makes more sense than mint chocolate chip. (Score:3, Funny)

    by ari{Dal} ( 68669 ) on Friday March 08, 2002 @11:31AM (#3130559)
    Even if it isn't as tasty...
    though I've always been more of a butter pecan fan, so the beige is fine with me.
    From a colour perspective, it makes much more sense than a shade of green. Every kid who's ever played with play-doh knows that if you mix a bit of this with a pinch of that to create new colours (which is essentially what you get from stars.. blue, red, green, yellow, etc), you eventually end up with that nasty brown lump of play-doh that ends up getting left under the couch for the dog to play with.

  • Three Questions (Score:5, Funny)

    by Royster ( 16042 ) on Friday March 08, 2002 @11:32AM (#3130562) Homepage
    Before you may cross the bridge you must answer these questions three.

    Q: Where are you from?
    A: Johns Hopkins University.

    Q: What is your professtion?
    A: We are astronomers.

    Q: What color is the Universe?
    A:It's green... no, it's beige AAAAAAAaaaaaaaaiiiiiiieeeeeeeeee!

    • Re:Three Questions (Score:1, Informative)

      by BlackSol ( 26036 )
      case someone hasn't seen it this is funny as its a spoof from Mony Python and the holy grail.

      In order for to cross the bridge, a troll asks you three questions, if you get one wrong you get tossed into the valley.
    • For the clueless, this is a Monty Python and the Holy Grail [amazon.com] take-off (I can't believe someone managed to get it posted before I did). Note, to be accurate, only two questions should be asked, since it was the second question that Gallahad stumbled.
      BRIDGEKEEPER:What... is your quest?
      GALAHAD:I seek the Grail.
      BRIDGEKEEPER:What... is your favourite colour?
      GALAHAD:Blue. No, yel-- auuuuuuuugh!

  • Jeez, I didn't realize there were that many PC's out there...

    I mean, I knew there weren't as many macs, but wow

    Bill

  • So steve Jobs is not God? (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 08, 2002 @11:32AM (#3130565)
    Looks like it's an Intel universe after all...
    • Maybe so, but when God made the covenant about not destroying the earth by flood again, he displayed the pact with a rainbow. So it might just be best to play along with Steve and his colors. For all of our sakes. ;)

  • Beige vs. White (Score:1, Redundant)

    by pinkUZI ( 515787 )
    Go here [jhu.edu] to look at the other page that the posted color link is comparing to.

    Funny though, I think that the beige on black would have looked more white if the autor didn't comment in bright white text right next to the color.
  • considering that we still only see a fraction of what there is to see. What will happen when the Hubble sees it better in the future?

    I think its much easier to declare black with small bright spots. At least the public can understand that.

    I am still curious as to what significance this really has overall. It appears from the article that it was just for the fun of it, so how does it become news? Originality?
  • . o O (Beige. I think I'll paint the universe beige.)

  • I thought the Cosmic Background was Three Kelvin (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Mr. Neutron ( 3115 ) on Friday March 08, 2002 @11:34AM (#3130582) Homepage Journal
    Use Plank's constant to find out what the peak wavelength at 3 degrees Kelvin (the cosmic bg temp) is. This is the color of the Universe, as it is the color you "see" in all directions (if your eyes could see this wavelength, that is).
  • Yet more proof that we are living inside a massive computer.
  • Our top scients are actually concerned with this? What number was that project on the list? Who honestly gives a flying flip what color the universe is? Who are they, the friggin Martha Stewarts of the Astronomy world? Sheesh! And I thought I didn't have a life for playing computer games! Maybe they collaborated with the study on Medicinal Marijuana. I can see it now...

    "Dude, look at the stars"

    "Dude, if you like brought all the stars together, I'd bet you they'd be the color of hemp"

    "No way man! That's far out!"

    ...I still can't believe that real equipment and time were used for this study, I'm sure it wasn't cheap, especially the man-hours. If I were a student there, I'd ask for my tuition back!

  • ever noticed that home carpets and interior + exterior walls are about this color too. 'off white' is quite popular in the paint + carpet industry

    bleh

  • The Onion? (Score:3, Funny)

    by Lxy ( 80823 ) on Friday March 08, 2002 @11:36AM (#3130599) Journal
    Johns Hopkins Researchers Say Universe Much Blander Than Before

    It's nice to see a respected source as space.com using headlines that sound more like The Onion [theonion.com].
  • I wonder if I could make some dough by selling so-called "beige universe pants". Yeah.. really, it's a the latest fashion trend!!
  • I'm glad to see those students are doing something productive with their time.
  • Are you sure they were't just looking at their pants?

  • Beige (Score:2, Funny)

    by Picass0 ( 147474 )

    The Universe also has Track lighting and a great disco beat.
  • It's a sodium lamp at the end of the tunnel, not a mercury vapor lamp.

  • Phew... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 08, 2002 @11:40AM (#3130616)
    ...For a minute there I was worried! The universe was clashing with the sofa.
  • Now I can sleep better at night knowing that the universe is actually beige...

  • surely (Score:5, Funny)

    by cosmo7 ( 325616 ) on Friday March 08, 2002 @11:44AM (#3130630) Homepage
    the question is not what color the universe is, but how to change it.
    • the question is not what color the universe is, but how to change it. Easy, you just right-click on the background and select the "Appearance" tab. There are several colors to choose from.

      What?
      You mean the Microsoft Way isn't universal?

  • It's not beige (Score:3, Funny)

    by pos ( 59949 ) on Friday March 08, 2002 @11:45AM (#3130633)
    I like how the researcher says that he is open for suggestions on what to name the color as long as it isn't beige...

    and then /. and the rest of the media shout, "The Universe is Beige!"
    • Coffee-stain.
    • My ghod, after reading the article, I expected this page to be filled with suggestions for color names, but the only comment that even addresses the researchers' call for names doesn't even have a mod point.

      You know, maybe it's because they complained about "beige" and then called it something horrid like "I11 E Gamma."

      OK, how about

      • Putty
      • Toast
      • Sand
      • Grits with Redeye Gravy
      • Natalie Portman's Naked Flesh in March
      The really scary thing is that it does indeed look like the precise color of my company-issued IBM PIII/800 workstation.

  • That's more like it (Score:4, Funny)

    by medcalf ( 68293 ) on Friday March 08, 2002 @11:45AM (#3130636) Homepage
    I'm glad they cleared that up. For a while, there, I was really worried.
  • non-standard white

    WTF??????? What the hell is non-standard white?

    Am I the only one who thinks that maybe these astronomers were inspired by illegal substances at college [Dude, I can see the universe]? After all they got UK artist Damien Hirst (of shark-in-formaldehyde fame) to do their clour calibration on beagle 2. This guy is a complete fruitcake, and with him on their side I am suprised that the clour of the universe was not "magenta with cyan polkadots"......

    UK artist Damien Hirst is reported to have provided paintings to travel on the spacecraft. These would be used as test cards for the cameras [bbc.co.uk]
    • Talk to a graphic artist some time (or, depending on what quality of monitor drivers you're using, explore your own monitor settings.) Setting the white point properly -- i.e., deciding what temperature "white" on your monitor corresponds to -- is vitally important for sophisticated image creation and processing. A difference of a few degrees Kelvin can change the whole color balance of your image. If you have these controls on your machine (on a Mac you definitely will, on a PC you probably won't unless you've installed Photoshop or something equivalent, and I don't know about Linux) play around with them and you'll see what I mean.
  • and I just got done accessorizing to the old Universe's dark, mudddy teal.

    N
  • ... to beige now that we know the universe is not a minty green?
  • ''But this is science. We're not like politicians. If we make mistakes, we admit them. That's how science works.''

    This is brillant (sorry beige... :-))
  • Just goes to show, the universe is a PC-clone, not a Macintosh.
  • On the scientists' home page for this study, they talk about how they "de-redshifted" all the 200,000 colors before mixing them into the equation. I suppose this was to figure out what the color of each galaxy would be if you were parked nearby at zero relative velocity.

    However, this isn't what you see from earth at all. Originally I thought they had simulated what would happen if you could "funnel" all the starlight on a dark night visible from Earth (or even outside our atmosphere) and created one beam from it. They've sort of done this, but in their model they've stopped the expansion of the universe and "corrected" the light to make it appear as if the universe is static and all those galaxies are not actually moving away from us.

    So, I'm not sure what to make of this color - it's not one you'd ever actually see: it's not "real" in the sense you could measure it somewhere.

  • The magic color (Score:3, Funny)

    by KartMan ( 565213 ) on Friday March 08, 2002 @12:03PM (#3130726) Homepage
    It makes sense - Dell's conspiracy grows deeper by the minute! Dude, you're getting a universe.
  • God isn't gay and has no gay friends, because they would have mocked him for his horrible taste. :P

    I'll stick with the false-color images of the universe EM background as a nice blend of purple and black
  • before we find out that the color is actually khaki, and there's some alternate universe next door that's colored IBM/corporate blue, and that our neighborhood of universes is actually some wageslave in a cubicle trying to figure out the question to 42.

    Sigh. I miss Adams.

  • "Beige" (Score:2, Informative)

    by joshjs ( 533522 )
    In the parent article, the author asks for suggestions for a name to this color, and explicitly asks for people not to suggest "beige." (Perhaps he/she views it as the easy way out.)

    Any other suggestions?

  • So now we find that the universe is simply off-color?

  • So this is what it takes (Score:4, Informative)

    by beigeboy ( 565208 ) on Friday March 08, 2002 @01:15PM (#3131131)
    Hi this is Glazebrook here (honest!)

    I am a regular slashdot reader for my sins. Finally an incentive to actually sign up.

    I am amused to see the story got on the front pages this time, sorry that I had to be wrong to achieve this feat!

    hope you all read the web page and about the science of starlight (and color!)

    http://www.pha.jhu.edu/~kgb/cosspec/

    and it's much more complicated than 'averaging 3 numbers'. The color is a volume-averaged - deredshifted (otherwise it would not be very meaningful) sum of all starlight. Those of you with www skills will be able to track down the origin of the erroneous software I will not deprecate it here.

    Karl

    p.s. the color suggestions are poring in, my favorite so far is 'cosmic latte'

  • As long as the answer is still 42, I'm OK. I just have to go out and buy a new matching towel. Anyone want to buy a turquoise towel set?

  • Steve Jobs visits Johns Hopkins (Score:4, Funny)

    by guttentag ( 313541 ) on Friday March 08, 2002 @01:51PM (#3131402) Journal
    (reality distortion field takes effect)
    Researcher 1: Hey, I think the universe is that greenish color.
    Jobs: It's called Bondi, you twit!
    Researcher 2: Nah, I think it's more bluish.
    Jobs: (Jumping up and down furiously) AQUA! AQUA! AQUA!
    Researcher 1: Let's just call it turquoise.
    (after Jobs returns to Cupertino to plot his domination of the universe's color...)
    Researcher 2: What the hell were we thinking? The universe is beige, not turquoise! Duh! We'd better change our report. What? 'It looks like you're trying to change the color of the universe?' Stupid paper clip.
  • So does this mean that various racist organizations are gonna be complaining about living in a "mud" universe?

    Color coordination is a bitch with beige. What should I wear to the next Big Bang?

    Beige is such a bland color. How is our universe ever gonna attract another universe if it's such a bland color. Now, universe X14, that's a universe with a sense of color.

    Did they account for the color shift caused by the atmosphere? Remember, these are the same type of guys who used metric instead of English measurements on Mars.

    Why aren't there any other color universes? This is a beige conspiracy against universes of color.

    I'll stop now.
  • Then this must mean... Martha Stewart is God!

  • How about "SunTan" ©? Har Har, get it - Sun (as in stars)...Tan (as in Beige)...


  • Good luck if you can see the difference between this color and white! You should be able to just see it


    Umm, on my color calibrated Apple Studio Display, its quite easy to see, and its clearly beige -- actually more in the Crayola "Flesh Tone(TM)" range.

  • Fantastic! (Score:2, Funny)

    by zendeath ( 517353 )
    Now that we know what colour the universe really is, we can all wear more appropriate, colour matching clothes.

    Thank goodness for this type of research.


  • Is there any scientific use for knowing the color of the universe? I can't imagine one. Who paid for this? (probably my grossly overtaxed self in some indirect way).

  • What about space? (Score:3, Funny)

    by sean23007 ( 143364 ) on Friday March 08, 2002 @04:46PM (#3132674) Homepage Journal
    According to the article, they took the colors from 200000 galaxies and averaged them to find beige. However, this does not take into account all of the empty space in between, which is an integral part of defining the universe. Perhaps they should go back to the simulation again, and add in an amount of black proportional to the volume of space in the universe not taken up by celestial bodies. Then we would know whether or not the human eye can really even see the universe, or if will just appear as nothing from a sufficiently large distance.

    Uhhh, we made another mistake. After having reviewed our software yet another time, and fixing the error, we have determined that the universe is indeed invisible. Sorry to all of you attempting to paint your houses the color of the universe...
    • Too late. I already painted my house with invisible paint. It looks exactly the same as it did before.

      What? I'm not just making that up because I'm lazy.
    • Take into account the black? That would be the same as you going out on a clear night and looking up. THAT's what the color of the universe is including empty space.

      U ask if the human eye can really even see the universe? Well, everything we see is IN the universe and is PART OF the universe. Of course, we can't see ALL of it at once...

  • Average isn't always the right measure (Score:3, Insightful)

    by andyo ( 109338 ) on Friday March 08, 2002 @05:22PM (#3132850) Homepage Journal
    Here's an example of where averages mislead. The interesting thing about color is not the average, but the contrast between colors. Trust me; I'm renovating my house right now. Or trust anybody who's stared too much at the sun.
  • ..I just had my room repainted to mach the color of universe and now they tell me that I did all of that for nothing..

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