Before the cancellation of The Problem with Jon Stewart on Apple TV+, Apple forbade the inclusion of Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan as a guest and steered the show away from confronting issues related to artificial intelligence, according to Jon Stewart.

This isn't the first we've heard of this rift between Apple and Stewart. When the Apple TV+ show was canceled last October, reports circulated that he told his staff that creative differences over guests and topics were a factor in the decision.

The New York Times reported that both China and AI were sticking points between Apple and Stewart. Stewart confirmed the broad strokes of that narrative in a CBS Morning Show interview after it was announced that he would return to The Daily Show.

Enlarge / This image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope shows a globular cluster called NGC 1651. (credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, L. Girardi, F. Niederhofer)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's April 2, and today's photo comes from the venerable Hubble Space Telescope. It showcases a globular cluster, NGC 1651, in the Large Magellanic Cloud.

This cluster of stars is about 120 light-years across. Like other such globular clusters, it is generally spherical, as the stars are bound to one another by gravity. Thus, there is a higher concentration of stars near the center of the cluster.

Enlarge / The SOFIA telescope. (credit: Chris Johnson)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's April 1, and today's photo showcases an airplane—but it's a special airplane with some celestial treats in the background.

The plane is a shortened version of a Boeing 747 that housed the Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy, known as SOFIA. This airborne observatory first took flight in May 2010 and operated through September 2022. The 2.5-meter telescope flew at about 45,000 feet and observed all manner of phenomena from a vantage point above much of the Earth's atmosphere—celestial magnetic fields, star-forming regions, comets, and more.

Enlarge / FS Tau is a multi-star system. (credit: NASA, ESA, K. Stapelfeldt (NASA JPL), G. Kober )

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's March 26, and today's photo comes from the Hubble Space Telescope. It showcases a very young multi-star system known as FS Tau.

This star system is only about 2.8 million years old. In terms of cosmic time, that is but a blink of the eye. It lies about 450-light-years away from Earth.

Enlarge / Cities on Earth shine alongside distant stars. (credit: Don Pettit/reddit)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's March 19, and today's photo comes from the International Space Station. NASA astronaut Don Pettit captured it during his most recent visit to the orbiting laboratory in 2012.

After sharing the photo online this weekend, Pettit described how he captured this effect:

Enlarge / Behold, the star-forming region of NGC 604. (credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's March 12, and today's photo comes from the James Webb Space Telescope.

Astronomers have long been fascinated by a nebula, NGC 604, in the relatively nearby Triangulum Galaxy. That's because this nebula contains about 200 of the hottest and largest types of stars, most of which are in the early stages of their lives. Some of these stars are 100 times or more massive than the Sun. Astronomers know of no other region in the Universe so densely packed with large stars as this nebula.

Enlarge / This image from Webb’s NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) instrument shows a portion of the GOODS-North field of galaxies. (credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, et. al.)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's March 5, and today's image comes from the James Webb Space Telescope.

It's a new deep-field image from the infrared space telescope, showcasing a portion of the "Great Observatories Origins Deep Survey" region of space that has previously been observed by other space telescopes, including Hubble and Chandra. Almost everything in this image that doesn't have lines emanating from it is a galaxy.

Enlarge / The Flame and Horsehead nebulae in Orion. (credit: Andrew Desrosiers)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's March 1, and today's image showcases two nebulae within the Orion constellation.

On the left of the image you can see the Flame Nebula, named as such because it's an emoticon often used in gaming chats—just kidding. Rather, it's an emission nebula about 1,000 light-years from Earth. To the right of the image is the rather iconic Horsehead Nebula, which really does resemble the head of a horse. It's a little less than 1,400 light-years from Earth. The darkness in the nebula is mostly due to thick dust blocking the light of the stars behind it.

Enlarge / Webb has observed the best evidence yet for emission from a neutron star at the site of Supernova 1987A. (credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, et. al.)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's February 26, and today's image highlights the core of a (relatively) nearby supernova.

In the astronomy community, SN 1987A has somewhat legendary status. The first observable light from this exploding star in the Large Magellanic Cloud reached Earth in February, almost 37 years ago to the day. It was the first supernova that astronomers were able to observe and study with modern telescopes. It was still discussed in reverent terms a few years later when I was an undergraduate student studying astronomy at the University of Texas.

Enlarge / A solar eclipse, on Mars. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's February 12, and today's image is a real treat from the surface of Mars.

In it we see the larger of Mars' two moons, Phobos, passing in front of the Sun. NASA's Mars Perseverance rover acquired this image using its Left Mastcam-Z camera, one of two powerful cameras located high on the rover's mast. It was acquired on February 8, 2024 (Sol 1056). Phobos is rather small, with a radius of just 11 km. But since its orbit is less than 10,000 km from the surface of Mars, it still appears rather impressive against the distant Sun.

Enlarge / NGC 2170. (credit: Mel Martin)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's February 8, and today's photo comes from the skies over Arizona.

This is an image of NGC 2170, the reddish nebula in the center of the frame. It is a large area of cosmic dust that is reflecting the light of bright, nearby stars. There are other nebulae and bright stars in this image, all of which combine to give this image its colorful appearance.

Enlarge / The Crescent Nebula. (credit: 1Zach1)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's February 2, and today's image concerns an emission nebula about 5,000 light-years away in the Cygnus constellation.

Discovered more than 230 years ago by William Herschel, astronomers believe the Crescent Nebula is formed by the combination of an energetic stellar wind from a Wolf-Rayet star at its core, colliding with slower-moving material ejected earlier in the star's lifetime. Ultimately, this should all go supernova, which will be quite spectacular.

Enlarge / Nineteen galaxies observed head-on by the James Webb Space Telescope. (credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, et. al.)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's January 31, and today's image comes from the James Webb Space Telescope. The image is actually a collage of many different photos.

NASA's new infrared telescope observed 19 nearby face-on spiral galaxies in near- and mid-infrared light as part of its contributions to the Physics at High Angular resolution in Nearby GalaxieS program (PHANGS). This program also includes images and data from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, the Very Large Telescope’s Multi-Unit Spectroscopic Explorer, and the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array.

Enlarge / Galaxies in a sea of interstellar dust. (credit: Chris McGrew)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's January 29, and today's image features a pair of galaxies.

Located in the middle of the image, Bode's galaxy is the beautiful spiral and is named after its discoverer, German astronomer Johann Elert Bode. To its right is the Cigar galaxy, also discovered by Bode. The origin of its colloquial name is rather obvious, I think.

Enlarge / This image features an H II region in the Large Magellanic Cloud. (credit: ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, O. Nayak, M. Meixner)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's January 25, and today's image is nothing short of amazing and inspirational.

Courtesy of the James Webb Space Telescope, this image features a nebula, N79, in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a nearby small galaxy. (Can we call galaxies small?) This is a massive, super-active star-forming region that spans more than 1,600 light-years. So what's with that bright spot in the middle of the image? It's a bright young star.

Enlarge / Shooting lidar into the night sky. (credit: Steve Erskine)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's January 24, and today's image features an astronomical sight of another sort.

The image was taken by Steve Erskine a few years ago in Antarctica. Astronomers use lidar to measure the temperature of Earth's atmosphere to calibrate their observations. In this photo, the lidar is being shot nearly straight up from an observatory at McMurdo Station.

Enlarge / The night sky from Australia. (credit: Erin Mikan)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's January 23, and today's image showcases the night sky as seen from the Southern Hemisphere. It's a simple image of the Milky Way from a mobile phone, but it manages to capture so much grandeur.

Erin Mikan said she was inspired to send in this photo after our recent image from Playa Grande, Mexico, showcasing the Milky Way Galaxy above a bioluminescent bay.

Enlarge / The International Space Station flies high. (credit: Kent Christian)

Good morning. It's January 18, and today, we're looking at the brightest object made by humans in the night sky.

I am speaking, of course, of the International Space Station—a facility that has now been flying in orbit for a quarter of a century thanks to the care of NASA, Roscosmos, the European Space Agency, and the Japanese and Canadian space agencies. Anyone who lives in the mid-latitudes or tropics on Earth can see the station from time to time.

I live in Houston, so the station is near and dear to my heart. Many of the astronauts who fly to the ISS train here, and most of them live here. One of my neighbors was one of the earliest station residents. Many hundreds, if not thousands, of people who live close to me work hard to keep the station soaring high and safe. Astronauts are up there doing basic research, understanding how microgravity ravages the human body, advancing commercial space, and much more.

Enlarge / The Cygnus Wall. (credit: Mel Martin)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's January 16, and today we're traveling 2,600 light-years outward into space to the Cygnus Wall.

Although this sounds like some kind of intergalactic barrier, the Cygnus Wall's nomenclature has a more mundane origin—it looks like a wall and is located in the Cygnus constellation. It is the brightest region of the so-called North American Nebula, which in some photographs looks like the outline of North America.

Enlarge / A great view of NGC 7538. (credit: Paul Buckley)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's January 11, and today's image showcases a diffuse nebula known as NGC 7538, found in the constellation Cepheus.

Located some 9,000 light-years from Earth, the nebula is a region of active star formation and produces a large amount of hydrogen—which shows up in this image. The nebula contains a shockingly large protostar that is, astronomers estimate, some 300 times larger than our Solar System and has a mass of 2,000 Suns. Even as astronomical objects go, that's gargantuan.

Enlarge / Some objects in the mirror are closer than they appear. (credit: NASA, ESA, et. al.)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's January 10, and today's image comes from the venerable Hubble Space Telescope. It's an amazing one.

According to the European Space Agency, the large, prominent spiral galaxy on the right side of the image is NGC 1356; the two apparently smaller spiral galaxies flanking it are LEDA 467699 (above it) and LEDA 95415 (very close to its left) respectively; and finally, IC 1947 sits along the left side of the image.

Enlarge / The Milky Way above Mauna Kea. (credit: Samuel Muller)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's January 9, and today's image showcases the Milky Way Galaxy rising above the visitor's center on Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawaii.

The Big Island is one of my favorite places on Earth. It has some of the world's best beaches, some of its most active volcanoes, wonderful people, and a world-class observatory on the great mountain, which climbs about 13,800 feet above sea level. Astronomers say the atmosphere up there, so remote from major landmasses, has some of the best "seeing" quality in the world.

Enlarge / The Wizard Nebula. (credit: George Amanakis)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's January 6, and today's image features a newish star cluster in the constellation Cepheus.

The stars in this cluster are relatively young, estimated at an age of about 4 million–12 million years old. The cluster is formally known as NGC 7380, and the feature is known more informally as the Wizard Nebula. It was first reported by German astronomer William Herschel, who said it was discovered by his sister, Caroline Herschel, in 1787.

Enlarge / The Crab Nebula in all its glory. (credit: Paul Macklin)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's January 5, and today's photo reveals the Crab Nebula in all of its glory.

This object, known more formally as Messier 1 or M1, earned its colloquial name when Anglo-Irish astronomer William Parsons observed and drew this object in the early 1840s. It looked something like a crab with arms, and the appellation stuck. The nebula had been discovered about a century earlier by English astronomer John Bevis.

Enlarge / Sol, imaged by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory. (credit: NASA)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's January 4, and today's image is a photo of our star, Sol. The image was captured by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory, a spacecraft in geosynchronous orbit, on Wednesday.

So why a picture of the Sun? Because we've just passed perihelion, the point at which planet Earth reaches its closest point to the Sun. This year perihelion came at 00:38 UTC on Wednesday, January 3. We got to within about 91.4 million miles (147 million km) of the star. Due to its slightly elliptical orbit around the Sun, Earth will reach aphelion this year on July 5, at a distance of 94.5 million miles (152 million km).

Enlarge / The Milky Way Galaxy above the Pyrenees, right on the French and Spanish border. (credit: bulbs_01_frizzle)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's December 21, and today's image showcases our very own Milky Way Galaxy above the Pyrenees mountain range, which separates Spain from the rest of Europe.

It was sent in by a reader who captured it while hiking through the mountains and in their words bivvying—a new word for "minimalist camping" that I learned about five minutes ago. I'm jealous. Hiking through the Pyrenees and gazing at the stars at night sounds like a wonderful dream. The photographer told me they are no great astrophotographer, but that the skies were so dark and brilliant that even this single exposure photo taken with a Fuji X100 APS camera looks stunning.

Enlarge / A new image of NGC 2264, also known as the "Christmas Tree Cluster." (credit: NASA et. al.)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's December 20, and today's image showcases two astronomical objects—the Cone Nebula and the Christmas Tree Cluster—that combined are known as NGC 2264. (NGC, by the way, stands for New General Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars).

These astronomical objects are found about 2,300 light-years from Earth, and because they are relatively close, they are popular astronomical objects to observe in the night sky. This is a composite image from NASA and other organizations that combines observations from NASA's Chandra X-ray observatory along with those from ground-based telescopes. The image has been rotated clockwise 160 degrees so that the "Christmas tree" appears standing.

Enlarge / The path of the Sun over Germany. (credit: Frank Niessen/IAU OAE)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's December 18, and today's photo is an homage to the forthcoming winter solstice—which will visit the Northern Hemisphere on Thursday evening.

This image was a second-place finisher in a recent competition by the International Astronomical Union's Office of Education. This year's contest welcomed astrophotography enthusiasts at all skill levels, including images taken with smartphones.

Enlarge / The Andromeda Galaxy. (credit: The Association of Widefield Astrophotographers)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's December 15, and I have a real treat for you today. This is an image of the Andromeda Galaxy, the nearest major galaxy to our Milky Way. Astronomers believe our galaxy is shaped much as this one is.

The photograph comes from a group that calls itself the Association of Widefield Astrophotographers, and the photo was a 100-hour project by six participants in the United States, Poland, and the United Kingdom. They collected data over several months to produce the image.

Enlarge / This image from the NIRCam on the James Webb Space Telescope shows the central portion of the star cluster IC 348. (credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, and K. Luhman and C. Alves de Oliveira)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's December 14, and today we're traveling about 1,000 light-years from Earth to a star cluster in the constellation Perseus. Astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope have looked there as part of their search to answer a simple question: How small can a star be?

Webb is an ideal tool for such a search because the smallest stars—brown dwarfs, which emit light from the fusion of deuterium—are most visible in infrared light. Astronomers focused on this star cluster, IC 348, because it is young and should have new brown dwarfs. Such small stars emit the most light when they're young, so the smallest stars would be at the most visible point of their lifetime.

Enlarge / An image of a Kuiper satellite in space. (credit: HEO Space)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's December 13, and today's image comes from a company that images other objects in space—HEO Space. It reveals one of the two Project Kuiper satellites currently undergoing testing in low-Earth orbit.

Project Kuiper is Amazon's answer to SpaceX's Starlink satellite Internet constellation. However, in the run-up to the October launch of the first two demonstration satellites on an Atlas V rocket, Amazon was super secretive about the satellites. It released almost no technical details or any photos. So this in-space image is the best we've got for now.

Enlarge / The Jones 1 Nebula. (credit: Michal Mlynarczyk)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's December 12, and today's photo comes to us from Michal Mlynarczyk in the Holy Cross Mountains, Poland. The subject of Michal's image is the lovely Jones 1 nebula.

This faint nebula was found in 1941 by an American astronomer named Rebecca "Becky" Jones using photographic plates. Its name, Jones 1, is notable because relatively few astronomical objects are named after women, and this is one of the first. Jones made her career as an assistant to other more "notable" astronomers of the day, including Harlow Shapley and Wallace Eckert.

Enlarge / This striking image shows the densely packed globular cluster known as NGC 2210, which is situated in the Large Magellanic Cloud. (credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, A. Sarajedini, F. Niederhofer)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's December 11, and today's photograph takes us to the Large Magellanic Cloud, which is one of the very nearest galaxies to our own and lies about 158,000 light-years away.

This Hubble Space Telescope image showcases a brilliant globular cluster within the Large Magellanic Cloud. Such clusters are tightly bound and gravitationally stable, meaning millions of stars persist in a (relatively) tightly confined space for billions of years. This makes them an attractive target for astronomers seeking to study older stars.

Enlarge / Stars over the Grand Canyon. (credit: Mitchell Yee)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's December 8, and today's photo comes from the floor of the Grand Canyon. The photographer, Mitchell Yee, admits that this is not the best shot one might capture from this remote location, but there's a reason—he shot it on his iPhone in August.

"While it's a fairly ordinary photo, what was amazing to me was the level of quality of cell phone photography," he told me. "Normally, I'd haul out my big Nikon but since we were hiking down to the bottom of the canyon to meet our dories, weight was constrained. So I skipped the extra 15–20 pounds of camera, lens(es), and tripod and instead enjoyed the 9-mile hike with my 18-pound pack. Of course, this shot could have been much improved with a 'real' camera on a tripod. But there I was, flat on my back on a sand berm, with the best camera I had at that moment, my iPhone 13 mini, and I still made the shot I wanted."

Enlarge / The Heart Nebula. (credit: Paul Macklin)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's December 7, and today's photo takes us toward the iconic Cassiopeia constellation. One of the most colorful features in this constellation is the Heart Nebula, which is also known as the Running Dog Nebula because, well, I'll let you figure that out for yourself.

The nebula itself is located about 7,500 light-years from Earth. It is also rather large, spanning 2° of the night sky, or an area larger than that covered by the Moon. The Heart Nebula's shape is driven by supermassive stars in its core, with the blue colors produced by ionized oxygen and sulfur.

Enlarge / This image reveals intricate details of the Herbig Haro object number 797 (HH 797). (credit: ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, T. Ray (Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies))

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's December 6, and today's image features a stunning outflow from a double star about 1,000 light-years from Earth.

The James Webb Space Telescope captured this photograph and provides unprecedented detail of Herbig Haro object number 797. Such objects are luminous regions surrounding newborn stars and are formed when stellar winds or jets of gas spewing from these protostars form shockwaves colliding with nearby gas and dust at high speeds.

Enlarge / Color composite of galaxy AzTECC71 from multiple color filters in the NIRCam instrument on the James Webb Space Telescope. (credit: J. McKinney/M. Franco/C. Casey/The University of Texas at Austin)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's December 5, and today's photo takes us very far from home to a dusty star factory of a galaxy that we need every bit of the James Webb Space Telescope's power to resolve.

This is the object AzTECC71, and astronomers say we are observing the galaxy as it existed just 900 million years after the Big Bang. And since the Universe is 13.7 billion years old, that is light from a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.

Enlarge / Behold, it's the Devil's Milky Way. (credit: Taylor Thomas)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's November 22, and today's photo showcases our very own Milky Way Galaxy above the red rocks of Utah.

If you've ever hiked in Utah, chances are you've heard of the Mount Nebo Loop south of Provo. One of the best features along this hike is Devil's Kitchen, which features pillars and other interesting rock formations. Taylor Thomas snapped this photograph this summer while visiting the popular outdoor area.

Enlarge / A 50-light-years-wide portion of the Milky Way’s dense center. (credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, S. Crowe)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's November 21, and today's image takes us into the heart of our galaxy.

Specifically, the image from the James Webb Space Telescope features a star-forming region named Sagittarius C, which is about 300 light-years from the Milky Way’s central supermassive black hole.

Enlarge / A view of the double cluster in Perseus. (credit: Markus Noga)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's November 20, and today's photo showcases a double cluster of stars in the constellation Perseus.

These two clusters are quite close to one another, within a few hundred light-years. However, they lie much farther from Earth—each about 7,500 light-years away—so the stars must be very bright for us to be able to see them. And indeed they are, as the clusters are made up primarily of young, very hot supergiant stars.

Enlarge / The heart of the Heart Nebula.

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's November 17, and today's photo takes us into the Cassiopeia constellation, where we find the Heart Nebula 7,500 light-years away.

This is a fairly bright nebula, discovered nearly 240 years ago by astronomer William Herschel. Because of its brilliant colors, the Heart Nebula is an attractive target for amateur astronomers.

Enlarge / Mare Imbrium and its vicinity. (credit: Katie's Observing Log)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's November 16, and today we're looking very close to home, at our nearest celestial neighbor.

This strip of the Moon showcases the vast Mare Imbrium lava plain—it's the large semi-circle that dominates much of the photo. Astronomers and planetary scientists believe this feature formed when a proto-planet struck the Moon about 3.9 billion years ago.

Enlarge / A stunning view of the Barnard 150 nebula. (credit: Tom Carrico)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's November 15, and today's image is something of a Rorschach test.

The photo depicts the Barnard 150 dark nebula—dark in the sense that the thick molecular clouds of this nebula obscure light coming from beyond it toward Earth. The nebula is located about 1,200 light-years from Earth and is visible in the Cepheus constellation.

Enlarge / Behold, it is Arp 273. (credit: James Peirce)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's November 14, and today's photograph is drop-dead gorgeous. It features an astronomical feature known as Arp 273—so named because it was part of an atlas of peculiar galaxies compiled by American astronomer Halton Arp six decades ago.

In this case, Arp 273 is not one but two galaxies located about 300 million light-years from Earth. The two spiral galaxies are in the process of interacting with one another, and astronomers using the Hubble Space Telescope believe the distinct signs of intense star formation in the nucleus of the smaller galaxy were probably triggered by the encounter with the larger one.

Enlarge / This panchromatic view of galaxy cluster MACS0416 was created by combining infrared observations from the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope with visible-light data from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light; a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It is November 13, and today we're traveling 4.3 billion light-years away from Earth, to a cluster of galaxies known as MACS0416. This distant object, which turns out to be two galaxy clusters that are colliding with one another, was first discovered in images captured by the Hubble Space Telescope.

Hubble, of course, brought "deep field" astronomy alive by publishing images with thousands of galaxies. Now, by combining Hubble observations with the new James Webb Space Telescope, NASA and its partners have produced an even deeper field image. The resulting panchromatic image, which combines visible and infrared light, gives us one of the most comprehensive views of the Universe ever obtained.

Enlarge / The Garlic Nebula in all its glory.

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's November 10, and today's photo reveals a faint supernova.

It has the formal name CTB-1, and after its discovery in the 1950s, it was thought to be a planetary nebula. (Regular readers will recall that planetary nebulae turned out to not have anything to do with planets.) CTB, in case you were wondering, stands for "Cal Tech Observatory catalog B."

Enlarge / Messier 45 as seen from Texas. (credit: Jeff Cohen)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light; a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It is November 9, and today's photograph brings the Pleiades into focus.

This bright, open cluster of stars is known by several names. Sometimes it is the Seven Sisters, sometimes Pleiades, and in Japan it is known as the Subaru cluster—the automaker actually took its name from the astronomical object, reflecting the joining of five companies. The company's logo mimics the star cluster.

Enlarge / This image shows the asteroid Dinkinesh and its satellite as seen by the Lucy Long-Range Reconnaissance Imager (L’LORRI) as NASA’s Lucy Spacecraft departed the system. (credit: NASA/Goddard/SwRI/Johns Hopkins APL)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light; a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It is November 8, and yes, we're headed back out to the Lucy mission again. NASA has shared some additional information about an asteroid flyby last week, and there's more goodness to share.

A few days ago, the Daily Telescope reported that the Lucy spacecraft had found not one but two asteroids during its flyby of the small main-belt asteroid Dinkinesh. It turns out that was not the whole story. Subsequent data downlinked from the spacecraft revealed that the smaller of the two asteroids is a contact binary—two smaller asteroids in contact with one another.

Enlarge / A view of the "Headphones" nebula. (credit: Bill McLaughlin)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light; a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It is November 7, and today's photo brings the "Headphones nebula" into brilliant clarity. The origin of this name seems rather obvious, no?

This is a planetary nebula, and I well remember studying these as an astronomy major decades ago. Why? Because the name is so damn confusing. Planetary nebula are formed when dying stars—including our own Sun one day—expand and form a glowing shell of ionized gas. They were given the name "planetary" nebula because, when first observed by astronomers about 250 years ago through rudimentary telescopes, they looked somewhat like planets.

Enlarge / Orion and the Running Man Nebula. (credit: David Beverly)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light; a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It is November 6, and we're looking toward one of the most prominent constellations in the Northern Hemisphere's night sky.

The Orion constellation likely needs no introduction, but for readers who are not astrophotographers, the Running Man Nebula may be less well-known. It can be found in the top-most part of Orion, in the "sword." This is a reflection nebula in that it consists largely of clouds of interstellar gas that reflect the light of nearby stars. The nebula is relatively close to Earth, as celestial objects go, at 1,500 light-years away.