It twists like a Birkeland Current; it’s stringy like a Birkeland Current; it’s dense like a Birkeland Current; but Everyone Knows (if they want to pursue a career in astronomy) that There is No Such Thing as Electricity in Space.

The press release for this new image of the Pipe Nebula recalls René Magritte’s painting of a pipe, on which he painted “Ceci n’est pas une pipe” (“This is not a pipe”). His point was that the image was not the thing. Images must be interpreted.

Aah! says the canny epistemologer, but so must sensory impressions be interpreted: even “the thing” is an interpretation in reference to some general, usually preconceived, ideas about the context (aka a theory). We become so used to interpreting things according to our familiar and habitual preconceptions that we are unaware we’re interpreting. “Obviously” (the word of the day for the unexamined mind), it’s gravity, what else could it be period. Modern consensus astronomers seem to miss that point.............................